Retail Data: Getting answers to data questions shouldn’t be this hard

You’re in a meeting with a vendor talking about running a new promotion. They have their budget, you just need to know which of their products is going to be the best fit and which stores are going to deliver the greatest bang for their buck.

They are ready to pull the trigger, you just need the answer….

Think about your everyday life. When you have a question like “who won the 1953 Tour de France?”. What do you do? Like 70,000 other people every second you probably ask Google. In just a few seconds you get an answer which is accurate and relevant.

Google is powerful, fast and most importantly simple.

You didn’t have to do a training course or get a qualification and like most people you opened up Google and saw the search box and started typing. Google has put the power in your hands, you can ask your own questions to really complex questions and get answers fast.

So why is it so hard to do the same thing in the work environment, especially when we are talking about data questions?

The answer is really about the tools. The tools that most businesses use were not developed for the typical business user, like you. They were developed for a data analyst. They provide massive flexibility and capability, but at the cost of ease of use and simplicity.

In reality some dashboards are as confusing as the cockpit in a 747.

But for the typical business user, a simpler, more familiar interface means you can find the answers to all of your data questions.

What Google has shown is that using the power of search and complemented by AI (artificial intelligence) and ML (machine learning), we can develop a tool that has the ability to understand and interpret simple language human questions and convert those into machine queries that can trawl across masses of data to produce pinpoint accurate answers in seconds.

Just as Google has done for the web, modern search driven analytics platforms like ThoughtSpot are doing for data. What this means is that any business user can use ThoughtSpot’s search to ask their own question of data and get an answer back almost instantaneously.

Let’s come back to our initial question. What product is having the highest sales and in which location?

We are asking “what are my top products by sales?”, so why not just ask that in the search bar?

Click enter and boom…

So in a flash I know my top product is the Travel Duffle and my next question is which stores are selling the most of this product?

Just right click on Travel Duffle and select ‘drill down by store’ and we have the answer. Illinois has sold almost 360,000 units in the last 2 years.

With tools that have been made for business users, it’s easy for them to get the answers that they need on the spot and make decisions in the moment.

Whether you generate revenue of $5 million or $500 million, talk with us today to discuss how we can help you maximise the value of your retail data.

You can get in touch with us via email at info@pivotanalytics.com.au or calling 1300 475 510.