The biggest mistake that many businesses make is to underestimate the value that business intelligence can add to any sized business. It has been universally agreed by the business world that your assets lie in many places. Yes your plant and machinery is one of them but this pales in significance when you compare it with the assets that your staff brings with them.
However more and more people are realising the huge value that analysis of your business, past and present can and does bring to the table. If you do not understand in great detail how your business has performed in the past, both the positives and the negatives then how can you move forward? How can you drive a business forward to growth without this basic knowledge? Well essentially the answer is you cannot.
In today’s competitive markets, luck and flying by the seat of your pants no longer cuts it. Now matter how successful your brand and or product is, if you do not have a grip on the basics of how your business is performing and why, then you are doomed to fail. This is as certain as night is day.
But what you may not realise is that a business intelligence tool can be as simple as an excel spreadsheet. Yes there are many that are more complicated and intricate but at least it’s a start. And start you must. BI reporting tools need not be expensive, many of the tools available on the market, come in suites, and you can choose the ones that you need, and only pay for those.
In fact your bank manager can probably recommend some. You don’t necessarily have to buy them through your bank; it is usually cheaper to get your own. Most packages offer great support and training and are user- friendly for the novice.
If you even run your own market stall, then you should still be using some form of business intelligence tool to grow your good business and kill off the bad. It is not about how much you sell, but about how much those sales bring into your bank account.
