Why Mine Data

Data mining has become a popular buzzword used to describe almost any type of data manipulation. This can include any grouping, segmentation or clustering of data into charts, spreadsheets, and bar graphs. Data mining techniques continue to evolve from the classroom to the boardroom.

It is estimated that the amount of NEW information doubles every year. Courtesy of the internet, researchers predict that the average person will soon be able to access virtually all recorded information.

To keep up with this data flow, a recent Gartner Group report indicated that spending on Business Intelligence (BI) is expected to grow 9% annually for the next few years. IT managers ranked BI as their highest priority followed by business process integration and security enhancement tools.
Yet, despite these projections, the "return on knowledge" has been marginal.
Consider this:

• $15 billion is spent annually on data warehousing
• Only 7% of off-line and 2% of online is effectively analyzed
• Over 80% of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system installations are failures
• IBM estimates that companies use less than 1% of their data for analysis due to the complex nature and limited scale of current data mining systems and techniques.

It is hard to imagine how you can successfully manage a customer relationship before you establish it and that is what we help our client's do with our tools, techniques and talent.
Here are some questions to ask before investing in a BI or CRM solution:

• Who are your most and least profitable customers?
• How do they want to interact with you?
• Who are your best prospects?
• Which ones are likely to buy additional products from you?
• Why have you lost customers?

Once you understand the answers to these questions, you are in a better position to know what you need in a BI or CRM system based on the nature of your industry, company, competitors, prospects, current and lost customers.