By Brooke Larson, Manager of Enablement
I recently took a trip to Arches National Park, UT. The topography of this area is absolutely stunning. There are over 2,000 natural sandstone arches in the park. According to the National Park Service, the majority of visitors drive through the park and look at the landscape, less than 40% of visitors hike the trails to specific arches that can’t be seen fully from the road. These statistics reminded me a lot of where our clients are with Data Visualization and Integration.
Delicate Arch in Arches National Park, Utah
Generally, the first questions from the client are, “Why should I take this next step? What will it get me? Why get out of the car, I can see the arch from here? My organization is comfortable, we understand our visitors’ behavior on our website. We have good penetration of dashboards among the executive team. Often in staff meetings, we drill into a data point and try and discuss anomalies. We are using data in our decision-making.”
This is a great example of using data to respond to what has happened and this anomaly detection will always be critical. But this is a far cry from using data to systematically drive decisions. Truth be told, we know that on average, Fortune 1000 marketers depend on data for only 11 percent of all customer-related decisions*. Taking the next step means looking beyond the rear view mirror at what has already happened to predicting what your customer may want or need. That’s were the money is.
So, how do you get there?
First, get out of the car. Like the more curious visitors to Arches NP, make a more detailed exploration. The more curious and adventurous visitor to Arches is rewarded with a much richer view. From this vantage point, one can now see that the arches are comprised of different layers of rock from the Navajo sandstone, Dewey Bridge and entrada sandstone all from the Jurassic period. You can start to see patterns – and you’re likely to find similar patterns as you explore more of the arches. Rather than beautiful natural wonders seen through the windshield from a distance – you might as well just buy a poster and hang it on your wall – the up-close investigation reveals more and leads to a deeper understanding and appreciation of the landscape.
So what does this have to do with your data?
Similarly, with your data, your goal is to understand how customer data can turn into customer understanding. A closer exploration will reveal patterns, which are the very basis for predicting the future.
The reason this is not as simple as it sounds is because the data is often in many different silos. For any company trying to become more customer-centric, this is a significant problem. Data visualization is designed to solve this issue – you can literally bring any data sets together and you can make it easy to consume and consider what the data reveals.
Creating even more of an imperative, recent studies show that up to 50% of knowledge workers’ time is wasted looking for data, identifying and correcting errors, and seeking confirmatory sources for data they do not trust**. This is wasted time. Why wouldn’t you want to recover this time and achieve the following direct, real and immediate benefits:
Improved response times: Data visualization puts the data into the users’ hands allowing them to more quickly identify issues and improve response times. Think of it as self-service data exploration.
Greater Simplicity: Visualizations allow users to get the big picture and see the details at the same time. It simplifies the data by allowing the users to interact only with relevant data.
Easier visualization of patterns: Have you ever tried to find patterns in data while reviewing thousands of lines in a spreadsheet? Using visualization allows users to better absorb the data and see new paths. This enables users to identify new patterns and trends that were impossible to see using tabular data. It allows decision-makers to view data using graphical representations including charts, fever charts, and heat maps.
Enhanced Collaboration: Collaboration gives teams access to the strengths and skills of everyone involved by combining the experiences of the entire group. These skills can be used to solve problems faster and improve innovation. Using advanced visualizations makes it easier for teams to collaborate. Instead of having to consume tens of thousands of lines of data, they can rely on visual representations that consolidate the data
For most of our customers, getting started with data visualization begins with a proof of concept or a half-day discovery workshop with key stakeholders. This is a low cost and low risk model that allows you to demonstrate to yourself and others the power and potential of data visualization. This process doesn’t even require infrastructure investment, it really just means getting out of the car and taking a look around.
* http://blogs.hbr.org/2012/08/marketers-flunk-the-big-data-test/
**Getting in front of Data Quality, Harvard Business Review by Angelia Herrin | 2:41 PM January 22, 2014
