What do you do if your small business needs help leveraging data and analytics for informed decisions?

The first step would be looking for areas in the business that can benefit from data-driven decision-making, and making sure that relevant data can be reliably collected for at least a few months or even years to make sure to capture seasonal trends and patterns, the needs of the business and the nature of the data needed will help create a clear objective for the business and the data team.

Ever been surfing? Surfing the waves requires the right board. In business, that means understanding where you can leverage your strengths to maximise impact. It’s about picking the wave that matches your board perfectly. Asking what type of data we need, and what are we going to use it for. Identify what decisions need data backing—this will guide your data collection strategy. Not sure speak to a data specialist -message me i know some amazing ones.

This article covered Identifying needs very well! To add to this, I would encourage you to begin with a simple budget. I have seen countless organizations from solopreneurs to large scale medical practices overspend on tools thinking that the data collection and features of the software were a business necessity, when in reality the time spent learning how to use AND implement the software turned out to be a major financial constraint on the business. Make sure to review the competitor products and pricing, and asses if it is more practical to purchase an annual or monthly subscription. To assist with cash flow, it is often better to find a tool you intend to use enough to justify an annual subscription

The first step is to clearly understand what decisions need to be supported by data. For my business, this meant identifying key areas where data could have the greatest impact, such as customer behavior and marketing, sales trends, and operational efficiency. Setting specific objectives for what I wanted to achieve with data analytics helped in focusing efforts and resources effectively. Once you identity your needs, then you can start planning which specific goals you want to achieve and which metrics support those goals.

This was an issue with my business and I hired someone to build out Google Data Studio for me. This gave me a customized dashboard that had all my relevant KPI's at my fingertips. No more spreadsheets and CSV files. The whole project took less than a week and cost less than $500. Best decision!

Know your businesses numbers! Gathering relevant and accurate data is crucial for making informed decisions. Collect information from various sources and organize it effectively for analysis. This ensures your decisions are based on solid evidence, leading to better outcomes!

Collecting data is like assembling the pieces of a puzzle. Use both internal sources, like sales figures, and external sources, like market trends, to get a comprehensive view. ????

Collecting data involves not just customer data, but also data on sales, website traffic, social media engagement, and any other metrics that could provide insights into business performance. The data you collect should be only data that you will actually take action on. The biggest mistake I have made is tracking too many metrics and not actually making changes and taking action based on the data. This can actually slow your business down and cause you to make slower decisions. Find metrics that lead to decisive action and focus only on those.

This is key, if you and your team are not skilled in looking for patterns in data ithen bring in an expert. Its an investment rather than clunky adhoc approach. Don't read the tea leaves, use the data to create evidence and tell you a fact base story. Use analytics to spot trends, behaviors, and outcomes. This insight can illuminate paths you hadn't considered. ????

Before analyzing the data, you should have a couple of questions that will be answered in the data (think having a hypothesis like in Stats class). This will give you direction going into the analysis and may lead to insights/follow up questions you didn't consider. Perform the eye test - glance through the data for a few minutes to identify outliers and general trends. If you aren't using Excel (still the undisputed champion), see if your software has any analytic features to assist you. Pro Tip: Based on the level of confidentiality required, see if the data can be exported as a CSV or PDF for AI to analyze. Don't be an amateur and enter one prompt - begin a dialogue where you ask follow up questions to discover valuable insight

There’s a toolkit for everything, including data analytics. Whether it’s Google Analytics for web traffic or more advanced tools like Tableau for data visualization, find the right ones for your needs. ????? Depending on the scale and volume of your data will depend on the tools to use and the level of the investment. Turning your data in dashboards can be game-changing for companies to increase results.

Since this is focused on Small Businesses, I'll save you some time and $. You don't need to purchase Tableau, SQL, or the corporate-level tools. Excel, Google Analytics, Hubspot (or your CRM of choice), your Accounting Software, and even the basic analytic tools from social media sites will provide you with more than enough information. I have personally worked with 50+ small business owners generating anywhere from $60k (after paying themselves salaries) to $1.5 million in NET PROFIT and saw them find success with way less software than you would expect.

To assist in data analysis, I explored various data analytics tools. My favorites are Google Sheets and Google Analytics. I gradually moved to more sophisticated options like Looker Studio. Looker Studio helps in visualizing data in a more accessible and understandable way, making it easier to find actionable insights. I'm a big fan of creating templates in Looker Studio which allows me to create reports much more efficiently.

The organization's culture also needs to adapt to a data-driven decision-making approach. You, as a leader, will have to lay out the KPIs in such a way that all levels of employees can understand their progress and areas of improvement. As your business needs evolve, you will have to be continuously updating your KPIs and associated targets, but once that is ingrained in the culture, your business will have a competitive edge.

As the saying goes, your team is only as strong as your weakest link. It is your job to ensure that the relevant team members, as well as anyone else curious to learn, should be informed about the significance of your analytics. An informed team might ask key questions you haven't considered which could lead to better KPIs and overall performance of the business. A major difference between a small business and a major corporation is the level of care. You probably know someone who only shows up to work for the paycheck, and is solely focused on their career. You should want a team interested in the well-being of your company. There is no better way to instill this mentality than by continuing their education and development