5 Ways to Turn Business Data into Business Insight: Fly your business into the Cloud (Part 5)

This is the fifth and final post in our five-part series (sad face). We’ve previously looked at how dashboards can provide easy information access to your team members based on their specific roles, how self-service BI reporting can lighten the load on IT resources, how to make BI more mobile, and how Big Data is doing big things for small and mid-sized businesses.

Today, we’ll finish with a bang by taking a closer look at the Cloud.

We already discussed the importance of businesses being mobile-ready. And it is no secret that having easy access to your information from anywhere anytime is of vital importance. On-premise business intelligence systems are still the main approach, taken up by companies but the demand for web-based and web-accessible BI is on the rise.

Needless to say, there are many benefits of choosing the cloud but you need to be aware of some factors like data security, storage needs and ROI (return on investment). Furthermore, should you choose to have a cloud-based business solution, it would be best to refer to our consultants, as they will provide with professional opinion as to what would best suit your business needs.

But, let’s talk to the point and give you an example of some of the benefits of the cloud. Suppose you are a start-up company that has limited capital resources. When you choose to take your business to the cloud you will not need to worry about:

• Software licensing costs
• Infrastructure requirements (servers, for example)
• Having an IT-dedicated department

Overall, it is third parties that are doing the hard work, letting you focus on what is important to you – growing your business.

There is so much choice when it comes to the Cloud. You can either decide to go all in and move your entire solution to the cloud (BI, financial management, and productivity tools) or you may want to take up the hybrid approach where only a portion of your solution is in the cloud.

We hope you enjoyed our 5-part series on how MS Dynamics NAV can help you move your business forward. As always, comments are welcome. If you think that someone else might benefit from reading this short blog post, please share  🙂

5 Ways to Turn Business Data Into Business Insight: Divide and Conquer… Big Data (Part 4)

This is the fourth post in our five-part series. We’ve previously looked at how dashboards can provide easy information access to your team members based on their specific roles, how self-service business intelligence (BI) and reporting can lighten the load on IT resources, and how mobile BI impacts users and IT.

Today, we’ll focus our attention on the impact of Big Data on SMBs. 

Big Data is a term that can be a bit daunting if your business does not have the appropriate tools to interpret it. Your business generates enormous amounts of data and without being able to make sense of it all, Big Data is simply a buzzword, represented by lots of ones and zeroes. Having the right analytics tools can help your business organize Big Data into manageable chunks of information that will be the base of your strategic planning.

MS Dynamics NAV is based on the Microsoft stack (including SQL Server, Office, and SharePoint), which provides every user with the toolset to easily analyze and manage great amounts of data. Such toolset allows your employees to present you with detailed information on your financial history (providing you with insight as to how your company has developed throughout the years), sales figures (do you need change of tactics?), cost structures, customer information and much more business data that can help you get a real picture about the current state of your business.

It may seem somewhat complex but having advanced analytics tools in your business’s arsenal can, for example, match your inventory price levels against the prices of your competitors (by using historical data with Bing’s maps and social search information). Such analysis can help you plan in a more profitable way. You also have access to valuable information such as who your most profitable clients are, which in turn will help you build a better cross-sell and up-sell strategy that will make both you and your client happy.

Next time, we’ll take a closer look at what “the cloud” is and how it relates to business intelligence.

We hope you found our penultimate post of this series helpful!

5 Ways to Turn Business Data into Business Intelligence: BI, the mobile way (Part 3)

This is the third post in our five-part series. We’ve previously looked at how dashboards can provide easy information access to your team members based on specific roles and how self-service business intelligence (BI) and reporting can lighten the load on IT resources.

Today, we’ll discuss the impact on users when they can benefit from having mobile access to their business data.

Making everything mobile should be the key goal of nearly every business. Mobile access to your data will provide your business with that little oomph it needs to guarantee its success. Why? When you give your employees the same flexibility and functionality in their business systems that they get in their personal lives, they use something familiar, which, in turn, would make them happier, more productive and your business reaps the benefits. And when it comes to business insight and reporting, you can put the information team members need in the palms of their hands, anytime they need it, wherever they are.

Employees will have it easier when they have to collaborate on a project and you, the manager, will be able to keep a closer eye on how things are developing. Furthermore, in a time of crisis your response time would be much, much quicker than it would be if you weren’t mobile.

How does it work? A MS Dynamics business solution uses Office and Microsoft SharePoint as a platform for collaboration and distribution and extends access to key information and reports so that users can easily work from their phones or tablets. And with Microsoft SharePoint or Skydrive, users can securely save their reports to the cloud, access them from their personal devices, and easily share them with other members of the team.

This safe and easy way to share data and insight will reward you with increased productivity and a level of service that will make your competition completely unaware of what exactly hit them.

In our next entry, we’ll talk about what Big Data really is for small and mid-sized businesses AND how you can make it work for your company.

As always, comments and shares are welcome 🙂

5 Ways to Turn Business Data Into Business Insight: The DIY* Factor of Business Intelligence (Part 2)

 

This is the second post in our five-part series. In part one we looked at how dashboards can provide easy information access to your team members based on their specific roles. Today, we’ll discuss the push towards empowering users while lessening the business intelligence (BI) and reporting burden on IT.

In a perfect scenario where money were no object, your business would have a personal IT advisor for each one of your employees. However, we believe it would be better if you could redirect that money to other, more effective, channels. Just imagine if all your employees could manage, obtain and act on data on their own. Your people would have all the info they need, and your thinly resourced IT teams could focus on the bigger technology picture of your entire business.

The reporting and analytics tools within Microsoft Dynamics NAV help you answer your specific business questions quickly through, high-impact reports, charts and simple analysis designed to be easy, usable and adaptable for everyone. In other words: you don’t need to have a special set of IT skills in order to obtain the reports you need.  

The MS Dynamics NAV has built-in hundreds of out-of-the-box standard reports. Users also have the ability to tweak and adapt these standard reports—changing fields, adapting terminology and adding inputs from other data sources. And you can do all these things without needing any external help. With a reporting, collaboration and distribution platform based on Microsoft SQL Server, Office and SharePoint, you and your employees can take full advantage of your business solution investments and get the business insight you need. Again, without IT involvement!

Just sit back and watch how your employees’ productivity (and IT’s) skyrockets, as you put the power of BI and reporting in their hands.

In the next blog post, we’ll take this one step further, and show you how a business solution from Microsoft can make business intelligence as mobile as your team is. 

*Do it Yourself 🙂

5 Ways to Turn Business Data into Business Insight: Better, Not Bigger Dashboards (Part 1)

In this five-part blog series we are going to examine how MS Dynamics NAV can help you turn business data into a powerful money-making and time-saving tool that could only help your business develop more quickly. We hope you enjoy our little project. Comments are welcome! 

When you’re running a business that’s growing, it can sometimes be hard to have a complete view of your financial picture and overall performance. As you grow and add customers, suppliers and product lines, you need access to the information that matters most to your business. And every member of your team needs an accurate, timely look at what’s most important for their unique role.

In this five-part series, we’ll dive into the principles that will ensure both you and your team are armed with the information you need to manage and grow a better business.

Better, Not Bigger, Dashboards. 

Running a successful business depends on the ability to gain insight from business data and present information in a meaningful way. To be successful, your people need to transform data into actionable insight—no matter where they are located in the organization. Microsoft Dynamics NAV helps them make informed decisions as a natural part of their everyday work experience by making the tools on their desktop even more effective. Here are some examples:

• Role Based Reporting: Monitor current activity and compare it to historical performance and growth targets, giving your people access to specific reports related to their task or role.

• Easy Access to Charts and KPIs: View business performance at a glance and drill into more detail when trends are spotted and you need additional information.

• Ad-hoc Query and Analysis: Robust analysis capabilities, especially with a familiar tool like MS Office Excel, enable your team do ad-hoc queries on the fly without needing help from the IT guys. They can compare plans to actuals, analyze that information, make the necessary adjustments, and then take action, based on detailed information.

With business intelligence capabilities in Microsoft Dynamics NAV, you and your team can also be notified whenever key thresholds are hit, either through emails in your inbox or messages on your homepage. For example, you can establish the parameters that make the most sense for your business and get alerts when sales drop below expectations, inventory levels rise, or cash flow is a potential concern.  

In conclusion, what we are trying to say is that when you have the right insight and can take quick action, you can make the types of decisions that save and make real money.

Next time, we’ll discuss how your team can take BI and reporting into their own hands without relying on IT.