Is Big Data Only About…Big Data?

Post written by Wade W., BI Consultant at Ideaca. Read more about BI on his blog: Pragmatic Business Intelligence.  

If nothing else, IT is all about buzzwords, and “Big Data” is one of the new arrivals to the party.
It is, however, a descriptive one. “Big Data” evokes images of enormous relational databases, providing analytical (or operational) reporting.

Big Data is not only about size however. Rather, it refers to attributes of the data that together challenge the constraints of a business need or system to respond to it. Those attributes can include any or all of attributes such as size/volume (of data), speed (of generation), and number and variety of systems or applications that simultaneously generate data. Another thing that is unique about Big Data is how it varies in structure. Elements of “structure” would include the diversity of its generation (eg. Social media, video, images, manual text, automatically generated data, such as a weather forecast, etc), information interconnectedness and interactivity.

I heard somewhere a thumbnail statistic that 80% of data in companies is unstructured or semi-structured. Just to clarify the meanings of those terms, an unstructured data artifact would be a document, an email, a video or audio clip. A semi-structured data artifact would include data that does not conform to the norms of structured data but contains markers or tags that enforce some kind of loose (or not so loose) structure. XML documents would be an example of semi-structured data.  Tagged documents in a Knowledge Management system would also fit into this definition.

Structured data is what we would find in any database – a Data Model has been defined and the data is physically arranged within this model into tables. The data in these tables is described with metadata (i.e. data types (such as “character”) and the maximum length of that data (number of bytes)).

The methods of data creation are multiplying and the velocity of its creation are increasing. And that, in itself is a complicating factor. Some analysts (IDC, for example), predict that the Digital Universe -  that is, the world’s data – will increase by 50x by 2020. There will be in the same period, a growing shortage of storage, which will drive investment in the cloud as both individuals and corporations look for scalable, ubiquitously accessible, lower-cost and environmental data storage options. In addition, the same study predicts that of all that data, unstructured data, especially video, will account for 90% of that data.

There is also an important historical dimension to Big Data. For decades, companies have been hoarding structured, semi-structured and unstructured data in hopes of one day being able to extract value from it at some point in the future.

A large percentage of all this data will come with a wrapper of automatically generated Metadata – that is, (as indicated above), data about (or that describes) that data. A practical example could be the generation of a data artifact coming wrapped with metadata from those GPS enabled, media rich, socially linked mobile devices we all carry with us that transparently capture location, GPS coordinates, time, weather conditions and a plethora of other data elements when you click that holiday photo with your mobile phone. IDC predicts that such metadata is growing twice as fast as data.

It is clear from the last three paragraphs that Big Data describes explosive growth in data and metadata and an equally explosive opportunity to capture, tame and corral that data to extract value from it.

So the case has been made that we have a lot of data today and we will have even way more tomorrow, but should your organization be investing in Big Data today?

In a sense, probably you already are. Enterprise Business Intelligence environments lay a solid foundation for the next phase of Big Data. EBI is an earlier iteration of Big Data and, married to tools such as Hadoop and NoSQL databases for example, enable a natural evolutionary growth curve to your mastery of your information ecosystem.

Big Data has a requirement for a new way of thinking, new tools, clustered commodity hardware and probably, substantial investment. It comes down to your business, and if there is a clear value-based case to present that data to your company’s brainpower. The actual needs for this will be radically different depending on your industry. Oil and Gas may be interested in leveraging real time alerts in wellhead data or analyzing petabyte seismic datasets.  Packaged Goods multinationals may be interested in monitoring and engaging advocates, detractors and influencers across multiple Social Media platforms, mining and understanding sentiment and identifying problem areas in real time in order to identify opportunity or identify and avert potential brand-damaging events. Financial institutions may be interested in monitoring international money traffic to identify fraud or illegal activity. Government entities may mine extremist forums, or other unstructured data traffic to identify national threats.

Big Data can serve these needs in real time, enabling rapid (or even automated) response to flagged events. Whether it is a fit for your organization today would be determined through viewing your industry and business through a critical lens on your current Information Intelligence maturity, a strategic assessment of the data and information assets currently owned or available to your organization, and a prioritization of potential initiatives. How much data you harness and convert into information should be a key outcome required from this exercise. The opportunities are legion, but initiatives should have clear objectives and success metrics understood prior to a project kickoff.
Whether it is today or tomorrow, Big Data is becoming mainstream through necessity. Whether that is a road your organization wants, or needs to drive today, is something all medium and large organizations should be considering now.

What are your thoughts on Big Data? Is your organization currently considering Big Data as a strategic imitative or Proof of Concept?

Just Imagine...

Post written by Chris S., BI Consultant at Ideaca. Read more about BI on his blog: The Outspoken Data Guy.

For quite some time I have been imagining what the possibilities of Big Data might be. I am certainly no expert in the area but being the data guy that I am, I often wonder what might be able to be done with data that may be being collected at any point in time. Face it, we are so connected now that our every move generates some form of data and often multiple pieces of it.

For example, if a marketer wanted to know everything about Chris Sorensen in a given day, chances are that most of that data is logged somewhere. What time I leave my house is available via my cell phone, my driving directions and speed are also available there as well. When I sit on the train I surf the web, send emails and organize my task list, all of these actions generate recorded data. What time I log into work, how often I am active on my computer and what I am do all day long is logged. Where I shop, what I buy (if I have a rewards card) is all tracked. My Facebook views, tweets all contain things that could be used to build a personality model of myself and my habits.

It is not really that big of stretch to think that this data could be used in one gigantic model to predict my next move and perhaps even entice me to make a different one. Maybe instead of stopping at Home Depot to get my painting supplies, an app could suggest the best place for me to go based on what I am doing. Sound like a stretch? Not really…Think about the labor that gold miners went through just to get a few stones. Now gigantic machinery does the same thing. The same thing is happening with Big Data where machines are able to gather information from a variety of sources and store large volumes of it in order to form predictive models. We are only at the tip of the iceberg but just imagine what the possibilities might be

Is your website mobile friendly? Here's why it should be.

Many people believe that it is sufficient to only offer desktop computer versions of a website because that’s where people primarily use the internet. However, recent studies by Pew Internet have discovered that this is not the case. Increasing numbers of people primarily use their mobile devices to research or surf the internet. In some cases, these people do not have access to a desktop computer, have to share it, or prefer the convenience of their mobile devices. These mobile-only customers are as valuable as desktop computer users and need access to the same information.

How many people fit into this mobile-only category? A lot, especially young adults between 12 and 29 and low income adults. If your customers fit into either of these categories then it is especially important to make sure your website information comfortably fits onto a mobile screen. Even if your customers do not fit into these categories, more than half of all Americans used their mobile devices to browse the internet in 2012. This means that even if it isn’t your customer’s primary internet method, they may still be accessing your website and information on their mobile devices.

It is important not to force mobile only users to find a desktop computer to access your information. As well, forcing customers to zoom and scroll to navigate a site designed for a much larger screen will only frustrate them and detract from your valuable information and services. The good news is that mobile-only users may access the internet differently but they do not need unique information. The same messaging, content, services and offerings that you share on your website can be duplicated on your mobile site. Even the colors and branding used can and should remain consistent. This means that including a mobile site requires only technical changes and not major messaging or branding shifts.

Embracing customers regardless of the way they browse the internet is the best way to make sure your content is available and accessible. This ensures no potential customers are excluded, no matter the way they choose to browse the internet.

Sources: Pew Internet, Harvard Business Review Blog

Have you adopted mobile and tablet retail technologies?

If you haven’t, you might be falling behind and missing out on valuable opportunities.

Advancements in technology bring changes in retail and the way that people shop. Customers are no longer satisfied with customer service only at the till, promotional offers they don’t relate to and primarily using cash to pay. At the same time, retailers want to save money and gain valuable insight into their customers and how they shop. Retailers and customers can satisfy both of their wants with modern payment technologies.

Retailers face many challenges when considering new payment methods including cost, customer security and the speed of transactions. Growing technologies such as mobile payments improve customer convenience, reduce fraud and help retailers learn more about their customers. As for security, mobile payments offer security levels comparable to EMV, but without the expensive hardware. With the right technology, payments can be made on devices such as tablets. This allows employees to take payments from anywhere in the store without having to move heavy or awkward equipment. Tablet payment technology also offers access to information formerly limited to the till such as available inventory. 

When customers know that providing information leads to an improved shopping experience, they are more likely to provide retailers with their personal data. Retailers can then use this information to learn about their customer’s shopping habits and even customize offers to fit their exact interests. Various technologies are now available to assist in collecting and using this data efficiently. By implementing the right software, you can gain valuable access to your customers shopping preferences and habits, while benefiting customers with customized offers. 

While the future of retail technology is unclear, it is likely that mobile payments and tablet technologies will become more common and the benefits of collecting customer data will become more important. Retailers who adopt modern technologies today will better prepare themselves for the future and coming changes in retail. If you’re interested in learning more, Ideaca has knowledgeable consultants that are happy to discuss what technologies are right for you and your business.

 

BYO...laptop?

BYOD..."Bring-Your-Own-Device" seems to be the biggest strategy that companies are now trying to master. Employees expect to be able to bring their own mobile phones, laptops and tablets into the office setting without having a "company device" to also manage but having the convenience of using their own device from home. Sure this seems quite convenient, and maybe cuts some costs here and there, but what does this really mean for companies?

We have outlined some new challenges that will come with this policy from The Globe and Mail's article that provides some more insight on how BYOD will change your business:

 Some issues that IT may run into:

- Employees expect the same degree of advanced technology and services integration in the workplace that they already experience in their personal life

- Employees may threaten you "give me the advanced technology that I know I can have, or I will do it myself"

Aberdeen Group found that the top 20% of performers (defined as Best-in-Class organizations):

- provide mobile access to almost all employees

- recover all but 5% of lost or stolen mobile devices
- improved their personal speed of decision-making by 14% over the prior 12 months, 3.5 times the improvement of Industry Average

Is your company in this top 20%?

If your business has not thought about BYOD or even a mobile strategy as a plan for the next coming months, you are sure to face some struggle with the new demands of the "tech savvy" employee.

To find out some more benefits and reasons to Go-Mobile, check out our previous posts on mobility and our event slides from a previous event we held in Waterloo based on building a mobile strategy NOW!

 

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Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference 2012: Toronto

Last week, the City of Toronto was flooded with more than 16, 000 people representing Microsoft Partners from all over the world! Partners from coast to coast took  part in the biggest ever Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC). 
WPC travels the globe to take place in a new city every year giving Microsoft Partners a chance to discover the latest technology and trends to come in the year ahead. It also provides a valuable forum to gain industry knowledge, and learn new strategies to ensure Microsoft Partners, like Ideaca, can continuously deliver the highest standards of care and information to our customers.


This year, the conference was held in Toronto at the Metro Convention Centre and the Air Canada Centre. The conference was said to bring in the most traffic throughout the GTA that Toronto has ever seen for a conference, and even brought in a whooping $500 million to the City of Toronto! 

Each day Ideacans experienced  dozens of sessions and key note speakers that helped us to learn new strategies and product knowledge. There were even a few ground-breaking announcements, such as a demonstration shown on Kinnect that scanned a person to virtually produce them in 3D, then their 3D image was printed out into a 3D mold!  Truly a thing to see!  We also spotted new laptops that can convert into a tablet; which will be beneficial to all those stubborn people who cannot part without their keyboards. There was also a great deal of hype around the new Windows 8 phone and operating system that is sure to make many smartphone and Windows 7 users change their mind about what they currently have. Windows CMO and CFO Tami Reller announced at the conference that the new Windows 8 operating system will be launch in 231 markets worldwide, starting in October 2012.

The 5-day conference kicked off with a stunning performance by Cirque du Soleil and wrapped up Thursday night with a packed concert by the Grammy Award winning band Train. What a week! Ideaca is proud to have been apart of it and we look forward to sharing our new learning with our customers in the year to come.

Were you at WPC this year? What was your favourite part?
 

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Hang up on the past...dial into mobility NOW!

Last Wednesday evening in Waterloo, Ontario, Ideaca hosted a cocktail event "Mobility...Canada's most overlooked priority & why it is crucial to business success!".

This event focused on the urgent need for Canadian businesses to step up their initiaves in creating a mobile platform for both their employees and for their customers.

Brad Blaskavitch, Sales Director at Ideaca, touched on the many ways a company can develop different mobile strategies to better their customers experience, as well as satisfying the everchanging needs of their employees.

Christa Nesbitt, Sales Director at Ideaca,  also wowed the audience with a few demos showcasing submitting expenses on the go, tracking store productivity and sales in real-time and a virtual tracking program to discover and maintain issues in the field.

If you missed out on this event, it will be hosted again in Fall 2012 in Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver. Stay up-to-date for event details in your city!

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Virtual Shopping, the future is here!

After a day of hard, excruciating work, most people are just interested in going to their homes and doing what they do best - relaxing. However, for many people, a hard day’s work isn’t completely over until you make a visit to your local grocer.

Imagine, having to push your way through a large crowd to try and get to a relatively available check out, only to be forced to wait for an extensive period of time in a long, endless lineup. That thought has propelled the latest development in mobile technology – Virtual shopping! According to the Globe and Mail's article Virtual shopping gets real at Toronto subway station, these mobile devices are increasingly becoming more elaborate and intuitive to a point that they can also do our daily shopping, as proven by Tesco (a multi-national supermarket) and Samsung.

Adapted in South Korea by Tesco and Samsung, ‘virtual 3D’ stores were installed in subway stations across Seoul, South Korea which allowed commuters to simply scan the QR code of the item that they desire with a mobile device. When those customers arrived at their homes, their items would have been shipped – and possibly even delivered - to them within the same day. This technology has been recently adapted by the online retailer well.ca, who has launched their version of ‘virtual 3D’ stores amongst Toronto subway stations, forecasting a possible change in retail marketing as we know it.
 

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RIS Reveals 2012 Mobile App Award Finalists

Mobile apps have become huge in retail and are continuing to grow in popularity at a rapid rate. They are becoming ubiquitous in the retail landscape from both a consumer and corporate standpoint.

Retail Info Systems News (RIS) has just revealed their 2012 Mobile App Award Finalists, categories include: Enterprise Excellence, Innovation, Shopping, and Store Operations.

A few facts based on recent RIS research were also included in the article:

• More than half (a total of 57.2%) of responding retailers update their mobile apps every three months, or more frequently, 42.9% every two to three months, and 14.3% every month
• 50% of consumers return to the retailer's app at least once a week
• Mobile app budgets are on the rise among nearly three-quarters of surveyed retailers
• Among those with growing budgets, the average increase is 50%

The finalists, and the above facts, speak to the advancement and innovation occurring in the retail mobile app space. Retailers are starting to pick up on this so the next year should be interesting...

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Corporate Mobile Application Strategy

In the March/April edition of Exchange Magazine, Ideaca's Brad Blaskavitch wrote an article around creating a Corporate Mobile Application Strategy for your business.

In this article Brad outlines five essential technology components for a successful mobile strategy:

1. Mobile Devices: Smartphones and new generation tablets are more powerful and capable than ever before, and keep evolving at a rapid rate. Their power allows for more advanced applications. The ability to store data when network connectivity is lost, has been critical to corporate mobile application initiatives.

2. Mobile Applications & Platforms: Previously, organizations delayed investment in mobility for fear of tying themselves to a single hardware vendor, causing paralysis. Today's mobile computing platforms and development tools have advanced to the point that device OS/manufacturer is no longer significantly relevant. Mobile applications can be developed once to run on Android, Apple iOS and Blackberry.

3. Network/Carrier Infrastructure: Wireless telecom companies have made tremendous investments to improve the speeds of data transfer and expand their geographic coverage. We have seen the transition from 2G to 4G networks. These improvements allow mobile applications to have more capability and perform at acceptable speeds.

4. Corporate Technology: Many companies have invested heavily in corporate systems and line of business applications to improve operational efficiencies in administrative functions, systems such as Enterprise Resource Planning, Financial, Customer Relationship Management and Business Intelligence. Organizations now have the key internal infrastructure to support a true corporate mobility strategy and extend these capabilities to their mobile workers in an integrated solution.

5. Cloud Computing: While many will argue that it isn't a core requirement, cloud computing has allowed many organizations to scale their technology footprint without incurring the significant capital costs of a more traditional on-premise hardware strategy. The ability to scale up or down the computing power of an organization, eliminating hardware and IT resource constraints, has freed up capital and IT resources to focus on value add solutions to increasing the organizations competitiveness.

For the rest of the article, click the link below to check it out on page 32-33. http://www.exchangemagazine.com/currentissue/ExchangeVol29No4/

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Toronto Advertising Week 2012

This week a few members from the marketing team got together to attend a few sessions at Toronto's Advertising Week.

We found some of the sessions to be most compelling, and were intrigued to find out what the future has in store for us, and the way technology will be shifting within the next year.

One particular session caught our attention, which was put on by Google Canada, where we learned about "Going Mobile" and the future of businesses on the mobile internet.

Google has launched a page where you can type in your company site, and see how your site currently looks on a mobile device. This page give you tips and trick to optimize your site for mobile accessibility.


    Check out Google's Mobile site to see how your site ranks!   Follow @Ideaca

The Mobile Working Population Will Continue to Grow

The "Mobile Worker" will no longer be a thing of the "future", but slowly will become a very present reality. The portable freedom one has when working on their phone is enough to change the way we work, and view our working environments.

It has come to be a serious concern of most employees, as they are feeling that they are not getting the most out of their days, as they are stuck having to go into their offices for simple tasks. The mobile device however, has started to completely erase this process of "going into the office just to answer an e-mail".

This of course adds to the flexibility of the modern day worker to have the independence and ease to come and go as they please, as they are able to get their work done, wherever they are, and not necessarily having to be present in the office. People are suddenly given the freedom to do this anywhere, at any time, in the palm of their hands.

Does this cause any problems, or take away from being social and making face time with your company/clients? Or is this the way the world is going, and it is something that we have to come to accept?

Check out this article from IDC (International Data Corporation) about the predictions for our mobile future can be found here.

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