The collection and analysis of data are the top priorities of many companies these days. Information can make wonders for a business. Having it at your disposal gives you actionable strategies that can potentially progress the success of an organization. Whether it is customer data based on social media interactions, transactions, website activity, or data from any other source, the information can be used to make the most critical business decisions.
However, collecting information is just the first of many steps. There’s also the matter of HOW you’re using your data. Essentially, data can make or break your success.
Why Is Data Important?
Without a good plan to analyze and organize what you’ve collected, you can miss many important things – and make mistakes along the way. It is impressive how much technology can help you in gathering big amounts of data. But, it is still your job to come up with a good strategy to handle what’s been given to you.
There are many ways that you can use data to influence the success of a business. According to BernardMarr, organizations use it in one of three ways (or combined):
- To inform their decision-making processes
- To create or enrich their streams of revenue
- To refine the current working operations
According to this source, companies who perform advanced data analysis are five times more likely to make a faster decision than their peers. Making decisions is crucial for a business – and making the right ones can be helped a lot thanks to data collection.
With this in mind, let’s have a look at how you can use the data you’ve collected efficiently.
1. Organize it to make it actionable
No matter how much you invest into collecting data, financially speaking or time-wise, it won’t matter unless you make it actionable. Data has no value without proper organization. Once you gather some information, organize it into lists and break it down into actionable segments. It should be organized in a way that’s easy to manage, act on, and share with every involved party.
If you keep piling data in one corner or spread it across many clouds and computers, you’ll hardly find a way to make it actionable. You can miss out on important information or misuse them, not to mention come to the wrong conclusions that can hurt your brand.
In the end, it is not about what you gather or how much you have– it is about how you use it. You cannot properly leverage the information unless you organize and store it well. In the age of privacy breaches, strict laws, and bigger competition than ever, software documenting and storage is key to good strategies for your business. Fortunately, you can use advanced tools like Document360 to keep and organize the information, translate it, share it with your team, as well as act on it.
2. Focus on quality over quantity
People spend time and money to use the most effective analysis pipelines. This is a good investment into the future of your business. But, if you then feed the analysis pipeline with poor or questionable dates, you haven’t gained anything – and lost a lot.
This is why, in addition to collecting information, you need to be sure that the data you take action on is clean and accurate. Inaccurate or confusing information can easily turn into the wrong conclusions and with it – bad actions for your business.
Your focus should be on data quality, not quantity.
PwC has performed research that brought on unexpected results. Data-driven organizations are three times more likely to improve their decision-making processes. Still, many are collecting and using it, but they cannot reap the maximum benefits data offers because they focus more on quantity over quality.
Faulty data is easy to come by, unfortunately. The industry has made big strides in the effort to curb fraudulent traffic. However, bots are still widely present across the Web. According to FossBytes, more than half of the traffic on the internet today is nonhuman.
What does this mean for your business?
It means that, unless you focus on detecting the good data and eliminating the faulty one, you’ll make inaccurate decisions regardless of the quantity you’ve collected.
There’s also the matter of customer satisfaction and safety. The mere term of it, ‘’big data’’ can bring on the wrong approach. Because of evolving regulations and concerns on behalf of customers who share this data, businesses have to place their focus on quality more. PwC also shows that 79% of users are concerned about how companies use the information they provide.
3. Understand the data privacy policy
Customer data is important and helpful when you’re creating a brand or strategy for the business. However, customers are now warier than ever. They are hesitant about sharing their information in the fear that someone will misuse it.
If you take the wrong steps because you were poorly informed, you won’t just lose customers’ trust, which is essential for the success of your brand. You can also get into big legal trouble. Going against the privacy policy, whether it is your own or as set by law, can cost your business a fortune and destroy its reputation. It doesn’t matter if it is done accidentally – there’s no room for error when it comes to customers’ safety and privacy.
When you’re obtaining personal information about buyers and interested parties with the goal to improve your brand, you need to eliminate the possibility of any violations by the business. Right now, over 59% of customers already believe that their information is vulnerable to security breaches. Over 54% don’t even believe that businesses have their best interest in mind.
It is your job to convince your customers that you’re a business that protects them.
4. Use the right tools for visualization
Once you’ve collected the right data, organized it properly, and made sure that you are protecting your customers, it is time to put it to use. Today, one of the best ways to handle large amounts of data is via content and visualizations.
What works best these days?
Depending on your business, the message that you plan to share, as well as the type of content you’re using to leverage that data, you have many options to consider. You can create videos, images, and one thing that has been very successful in the past couple of years – infographics.
If you’re struggling with organizing all that data into an infographic or designing the piece, you can use helpful tools like Piktochart. The Piktochart’s infographic templates will allow you to create unique infographics whenever you need them and reduce the time necessary to craft them from scratch. You can simply add the information in the template and create an enticing visual tool to attract or retain your customers.
Such data visualization tools provide users with an easy way to create an accurate, attractive visual representation of big data. When you’re facing many data points and want to present a lot of information all at once, you need a coherent, well-organized design.
Similar to visual tools you use to create imaging and infographics, you can use data visualization software for a variety of other purposes including the creation of annual reports, dashboards, and other sales materials.
5. Words still matter
Visualization has been more used than ever. Telling big stories is very effective thanks to visualization, but that does not diminish the power or importance of words. Content remains ‘’king’’ in the marketing industry, even now. It’s spread across blogs, social media posts, websites, articles, reports, and even on those visual creations like infographics, videos, and images.
A lot of data representation is based on content.
Whether you put a bit of content into your data or create an entire, big piece to boost your business, words are still very important. When thinking of words, you need to consider everything starting from title to conclusion. Make headings and titles less generic, the content more visually appealing and attractive, but before it all – focus on value.
To this day and in the future, the content will remain your fiercest tool for convincing people to trust and choose your brand. You’ll use it to make a point, share information, communicate with your audience, and even collect more data to further your strategies.
Final thoughts
Collecting data can be of incredible and irreplaceable value for your business, regardless of the industry or its purpose. With it, you can tweak the existing strategies, learn how to better reach your audience, and put your goals into actionable strategies.
However, gathering it is just one step in a big mission. You need to also make sure to keep this data out of the hands of your competitors and criminals, all to gain and retain the trust of your consumers. But, before it all, you need to know how to detect the quality data and use it to your benefit. This can give you a big competitive advantage if you take your time, pick the right strategies, and provide value to your audience.