In an increasingly data-driven world, companies that can make more informed decisions have a competitive advantage. Data analytics is a powerful tool that can help companies understand their data and identify opportunities for improvement, transforming complex information into strategic actions.
This article explores each step of how to use data analytics for decision making, with practical examples and detailed explanations to help you understand how data can drive your business success.
What you will see in this article:
How can Data Analysis help in decision making?
How does the Data Analysis process work?
Step by step guide on how to use Data Analysis for decision making
How to Use Data Analytics to Generate Relevant Insights
The Journey to Data-Driven Intelligence
How can Data Analysis help in decision making?
Data analytics is the process of examining, cleaning, transforming, and modeling data with the goal of uncovering valuable insights, hidden trends, and actionable insights . It focuses on making sense of raw data, empowering organizations to make informed, strategic decisions.
Data analytics plays a crucial role in everything from malta email list marketing to healthcare to scientific research. It enables companies to identify market opportunities, understand customer behavior, optimize operational processes and anticipate trends.
Additionally, data analytics helps mitigate risk by making decisions based on concrete information rather than hunches. It transforms data into a strategic asset, empowering companies to become truly data-driven.
How does the Data Analysis process work?
We can consider data analysis as a process that, through a structured methodology, allows us to explore data and helps us obtain valuable insights . Data analysis encompasses sequential steps that range from identifying problems to creating recommendations based on detailed analysis and hidden patterns.
It is important to consider the data analysis process as a chain of steps where one depends directly on the other, it is almost like a cake recipe in general, of course there are difficulties and specificities in each step according to the project or segment of the company.
But in general, if you follow this step by step, in small and large projects, you will have a better chance of adding a lot of value to the business.
Step by step guide on how to use Data Analysis for decision making
The steps below can be adapted, this method is one that I, in many years of experience, understand as a premise for working with data and actually generating value with the analyses.
1. Identify the Problem or Business Objective :
Start by defining what you want to achieve or solve. This could be increasing sales, improving customer satisfaction, or optimizing processes.
Example: An online store wants to understand why cart abandonment rates are high.
Suggested Tool: Brainstorming to generate a list of key questions.
2. Data Collection and Processing:
Find relevant data sources, such as sales records, customer information, and website interactions. Then organize this data for easy analysis.
Example: The online store collects browsing data, purchase history and customer information. This data can come from Google Analytics for navigation measurement and analysis. In addition, we may have transactional or CRM data that can be collected via an ERP.
Suggested Tool: ETL tools, it can be good old Excel, Python , Power Query or more advanced ones like Talend , to extract and prepare data.