Covid-19 changed BUSINESS ANALYTICS FOREVER.

Covid-19 hits the world and might have changed the market forever.

In the past 5 years, due to the Pandemic, the authentic functioning of businesses in the market that we have used since past 100 years has been useless and initiatives were made by companies to function in the crisis situations. That is when the Business Analytics(BA) field gained its stronghold as one of the most popular sector and is currently a booming field to work in.

While efficiency continues to rank as the top reason companies use business analytics tools, the pandemic has created unique situations where?data has helped. For example, some businesses have used customer relationship management (CRM) systems and social media data to get feedback on what customers needed to feel safe at brick-and-mortar stores throughout the pandemic.

Business intelligence tools that support data-driven decisions through sales forecasts and stress tests have also become increasingly vital to maintain profitable operations during the challenges of the current economy.

In a?report?on the use of data during the pandemic, 德勤 wrote that companies using data-driven insights show higher resilience in a turbulent economy. They also point out that companies with an “insight-driven by default” approach have tightened dominant market positions and grown share value during the crisis.

“These organizations are equipped to manage the crisis more smoothly, and we also expect them to recover and excel faster once markets and regulatory efforts return to normal,” the report stated.

Pre-Covid BA

Before the world took a hit by pandemic, Business Analytics was considered as a costly non-affordable service which was used only by a few large companies and services to manage data and gain insights. It was a service that many medium scale and small scale businesses used to ignore due to lack of funds and also the common market practices.

麦肯锡 stated,?“In these uncharted waters, where the tides continue to shift, it’s not surprising that analytics has become an essential navigational tool. Analytics supports numerous urgent tasks facing businesses today: forecasting demand, identifying potential supply-chain disruptions, targeting support services to at-risk workers, and determining the effectiveness of crisis intervention strategies, to name a few.”?

Post-Covid BA

麦肯锡 explained that organizations without much experience with analytics are now relying on data analytics for the reasons mentioned above.

State of BI & Analytics Report 2020: Special COVID-19 Edition from Sisense was a survey conducted involving 500 data professionals and business executives from all industries.

The survey report showed that 49% of companies use analytics “more or much more” than before the pandemic. Among smaller businesses, defined as those with 51 to 200 employees, 68% reported using analytics in operations, 56% in finance, 50% in sales, and 45% in products.

When asked why they are using Business Analytics, the survey participants answered:

• 55% use data to improve efficiency
• 47% use data to improve business interactions with their customers
• 45% use data to predict business outcomes

Summary

While advanced analytics has demonstrated value before and during the COVID-19 pandemic, it has also shown fallibility in the wake of a crisis. Leaders who recognize the sources of fallibility and take steps to strengthen their company’s analytics strategy will be better equipped during the present crisis and future extraordinary events.

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