Is Big Data the Secret Ingredient to Startup Success?

Guest post by Finnegan Pierson.

Big Data has become a very popular phrase in most workplaces and in smart business circles because it’s a secret ingredient in propelling a startup to success. But how does a startup business utilize the large sets of generated big data and analyze it in such a manner that it becomes beneficial to the company? To answer the question, you ought to understand how Big Data has been used in helping businesses make more informed decisions and hence become more efficient in their daily operations. A company should monitor the changing trends in the data in order to increase traffic and improve sales.

Data Driven Success

 Although businesses may fall under the same specialty, every company is unique and the way it chooses to analyze or interpret data may determine whether it will succeed or not. It’s common knowledge that in the technological and business world, Big Data drives decision making. The Economic Intelligence Unit, released a survey that suggested that about 75% of most business executives feel that their organizations are being driven by data. A similar survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers concurred by showing that 64% of the interviewed executives admitted that their decision making has greatly been driven by Big Data. This is a substantial amount that goes to show how Big Data is a secret ingredient to the success of a company.

Making the Right Call

The fact that decisions are made based on the data released by companies only confirms that some executives find it challenging to make the right call that will make money for their various companies solely on intuition. It’s interesting to see certain managers finding it overwhelming to achieve positive results within the stipulated time frame due to the rapidly changing state of play.

Although there are certain managers who would prefer to make decisions based on their guts, most of the qualified and experienced executives don’t ignore the value of the prevalent data. A good business manager will always rely on data analysis about various human behavioral and trend changes before making an informed decision. As a business owner or manager, you should install Spark, which is an Apache project that provides the fastest data processing platform so as to be ahead of the competition. Spark is said to be as fast as lightning in cluster computing and will optimize your ability to analyze Big Data before making major decisions in the organization.

Perfecting Decision Making

 Procter and Gamble, which is one of the leading consumer companies globally, appreciates that the analysis of Big Data has transformed decision making. Decisions are made in an easier, faster, and accurate manner than when using the traditional instinct-based intuitions. This is because everyone, including the consumers, is looking at the same reality of how trends keep changing rapidly. In the past, most managers kept debating on the ‘what’ because everybody had different data. But, with the Big Data technology, everyone has the same truth at his disposal and thus it’s faster to move to the ‘how’ and make a decision quickly.

Since there is a lot of data, businesses are relying on real-time analysis of the data in order to conduct business swiftly. A business leader or owner can use the valuable information collected during a customer interaction and make instant decisions because the data is analyzed instantly. The continuous processing of data as it comes in helps a business greatly in not only being reactive, but also proactive in its day-to-day operations. When your device is connected to a network it keeps producing data on a continuous process and the feeds will come via live dashboards and in form of alerts.

Conclusion

There are a variety of factors that will determine the success of a start-up. Does the company have a good product? Can it produce goods and services in a timely matter? Is management capable enough to transition from one business phase to the next? Is the company scalable? Is the market large enough to sustain the business?

All of these factors, and many others, determine the success of a company. BigData can help improve a start-up from day one by arming everyone in charge of making decisions with the data necessary to make educated choices.

Properly utilizing BigData allows the startup to make business decisions based on hard numbers and objective analytics instead of trusting in gut feelings and intuition. It improves the overall decision making processes from the ground up making management and customer analytics easier and smoother for all involved.