Business Intelligence (BI) is all about the data. The ability to consume data in a digestible format empowers teams to understand their business better than ever before. New insights acquired through a BI tool can shine a spotlight on challenges that previously seemed ambiguous and difficult to pinpoint, let alone resolve. Businesses using BI technology understand how to make changes to inefficient processes that result in significant positive impacts to their company’s bottom line.
Successful results from an initial BI project typically spur the creation of additional projects. With an increasing number of projects comes additional requirements. One common request is for real time data. This is a crucial need when you are making important business decisions based on the data you’re pulling. You need to be certain it is the most accurate data available.
On the surface, it seems obvious that having real time data is essential for every project, but adding that requirement also adds significant expense. The truth is, there are many cases where real-time data is not necessary. It’s important to think through the logic of when and where you really need real-time data before setting up new projects. Let’s look at a few examples:
Retail Companies – an eCommerce provider may need 24/7 access to inventory data to update their online store with current data to ensure customers are not ordering merchandise that’s out-of-stock or has an extended back-order.
Manufacturing Companies – production line data needs continual refreshing, but only during production line hours. It isn’t needed when the line is shut down for lunch or in the evenings when workers have gone home for the night.
Finance and Accounting Departments – payroll data may only need to be updated once a week to calculate billable hours for employees that week.
These scenarios are a few of the limitless number of projects you may decide to implement. The point is that there’s a difference between needing to have the data available all the time, and needing to have it updated all the time. Certain data doesn’t need to be refreshed every minute around the clock, so requiring real time on all data connections, all the time, would significantly raise your costs without adding value.
The resolution to this challenge is what we call ‘anytime data.’ That means you decide, based on business requirements, how often you want your data updated. The frequency you select can be specified down to the week, day or minute.
With the ClicData TEAM plan, the frequency of your data pulls is completely dictated by your business needs. You will be empowered to customize every single connection with exactly when the data is pulled down, and each refresh will update tables and graphs in your dashboard accordingly. You can be confident that your data is refreshed at the right time and at a competitive price.
