Top 6 Tools for Business Analytics in 2023

Business analytics has grown tremendously in the past few years, but the field itself is not new. Companies have been analyzing information and data (mostly financial reports) for decades. What has changed?

The development of data systems, data warehouses, enterprise resource planning software, business intelligence (BI) tools, Cloud adoption, and the advent of social media have led to a massive rise in data.?

Alongside the rise of data, the demand for business analytics grew. And for a reason. Sometimes data-driven insights can be a company’s main competitive advantage. Below you’ll find a list of practical tools to help you discover these insights.

Top Tools for Business Analytics

Now that we have a snapshot of why business analysis is so important, let's review some of the top tools .

1. Microsoft Power BI

Power BI is a Business intelligence tool from Microsoft that is widely used to analyze, visualize and find insights from data. As a business analyst, you’ll most likely use it to link separate data sets, create visuals or graphs of the data, or analyze the data in order to predict future metrics. Why Power BI users also love this tool is because it makes it easy to share data insights within the organization.?

If you have never worked with Power BI but are familiar with Excel, I’m pretty sure you can get a well enough overview of the features in around 20 hours of focused learning. Even though it's more advanced than Excel in terms of data visualization, the interface is pretty similar and intuitive.?

2. Tableau

Tableau is another data visualization tool that is at the top of the market. Not only is it fast, but it offers several features to connect to various kinds of data sources. From Excel files to databases, Hadoop, and the Cloud, you can literally get data from anywhere.

In terms of ease of use, I give Tableau more marks than even PowerBI. You can create custom SQL queries inside Tableau to get data for your visualizations. Creating custom dashboards is so simple even a non-developer can easily write formulas and generate real-time graphs and dashboards.

3. Qlik

Qlik Sense is a complete data discovery and analytics platform. With its modern interface, users can model and manage data, and create visualizations, layouts, and stories.?

But, why would you use Qlik instead of other tools? Its unique ‘associative engine’ allows users to explore data in all directions and get a broader and more complete analysis of the data. It also includes AI and machine learning capabilities, and it can be used on-prem or in the Cloud.

Basically, Qlik offers and combines three different services:

• Data Integration – Builds data pipelines and gathers all your data in one place.
• Data Insights – Uses data analytics to generate visualizations and insights.
• Data Literacy as a Service – Helps organizations understand how they use their data and generate ideas for business improvement.

4. Domo

Domo is a modern cloud-native tool? It offers libraries to connect to a wide variety of systems, like AWS, Jira, GitHub, and so on. Industry leaders believe that Domo offers one of the most powerful data integration capabilities when it comes to BI tools.

Some of the key advantages of Domo are:

• Well-adapted to mobile devices?
• Single product software
• Consumer-centric design
• High deployment speed

5. Oracle Analytics Cloud

Oracle Analytics Cloud (OAC) is the newest, cloud-based analytics solution of Oracle BI products. Some say that this platform offers “the most comprehensive analytics and visualization software in the industry”.?

OAC can work with analytics at any scale and in every environment, whether that’s in the cloud, on-premises, or a data center, but I would recommend it for mid to large enterprises.

Oracle Analytics Cloud features include...

• Self-service visualization
• Data preparation
• Enterprise reporting
• Advanced analytics
• Dynamic user-driven what-if modeling
• Self-learning mobile analytics

source: us-analitycs.com

6. Looker

Looker is a part of Google Cloud Service and is one of the most popular business intelligence tools on the market. It lets you perform data integrations, create data models, and use those to develop dashboards and generate insights.?

Its edge over other tools is the ease with which you can collaborate with teammates on projects. It also has a great, simple-to-use interface. However, it takes some upfront investment and can be a little slow at times.

Where to start??

If you want to join a large company as a beginner business analyst, then they may already use one or more BI tools. In that case, you will have to learn those tools. But first, make sure you have a good grasp of SQL; all business intelligence tools use SQL in one way or another.?

You should also understand what the different kinds of data visualizations do and when to use each one. With these SQL and basic data visualization skills, you’ll have a strong foundation to learn any of the tools that are listed above.

This article is based on the work of Himanshu Kathuria , "Top 10 Tools for Business Analytics ".