Building a data strategy that works is like gold dust in the era where data overwhelm is a norm. International Data Corporation (IDC) says that the growth in the amount of data will increase up to 175ZB in 2025 from 33ZB in 2019, with a 61% of growth rate annually. It has become more important to understand how to build a data strategy when we have access to an enormous amount of data. Having said that, if you want to use data to develop your business, you must start with a data strategy. The type of data you collect and how you analyze it depends on what are the goals of your business. Build a data strategy that makes the process smooth and braces you and your people for the future voyage.
What you should ask yourself before building data strategies?
- What problems can my business solve?
- How can I collect data?
- From where do I collect data?
- How do I analyze my data?
- How will the data affect my business strategies?
- What type of data do I need?
- What type of data shall I exclude?
- Where does my data come from?
- Which hardware and software do I need?
- How will I present insights?
Tips to build data strategies
- Analyze the vision of your business
Before jumping on the data collection, it is better to determine the goals of your business. What is the meaning of collecting data that won’t help you achieve your goal? Identify the priorities and strategies you have laid for the future.
Are you trying to understand your current customers, looking for more customers, or identifying the platforms to provide your service?
Define what you want to achieve through data and identify the unanswered questions.
- Start small
Determine every small question for your business and find out the specific data that can answer the question. In this age of big data analytics, it is more important to analyze the little parts. Small questions and problems might affect your business greatly. Thus, it becomes critical to focus on creating small databases that answer the important questions of the company. Identify the best possible data and then look for the data you already have. Analyze the data that is out there that you could use. But you must know what data you need for your business.
- Data analysis
Once the need for the data is determined, you need to identify how you will turn the data into insights that help you achieve your business goal. Big data analytics services play a major role in identifying unstructured data like e-mail conversations, video content, social media posts, along with traditional analysis like website clicks and transactions.
- Communication to end-users
At this stage, it is most important to keep in mind – the target audience. You need to analyze the format in which the data can be presented to your audience. Think about making it visually catchy and engaging for the customers.
- Software and Hardware
Identify the basic software and hardware requirements for your business data. Do you require cloud solutions? What are your current data storage technologies? Do you need to supplement your current capabilities? Establishing your needs is significant to building a data strategy.
It has become more essential now than ever to build a powerful strategy with data. It helps you to keep your hand up in the market of business. Strong data strategy creates a new world for your business and climbs you up to top ranks.
