Do you have data scattered throughout your business? Are you worried about your data accuracy? Looking for a single source of data to help you make informed decisions? If these challenges sound familiar then a data warehouse could be a fundamental step in your digital transformation journey, supporting your business as it evolves and adapts to competition in this digital age.
We have published this handy Data Warehouse Checklist to help you identify whether your business needs a data warehouse.
Is your data inconsistent between your systems?
Are you confident that all of your systems have up-to-date information such as company addresses and contacts? A data warehouse can use information from sites like Companies House or Creditsafe to keep multiple systems updated simultaneously.
Data consistency could be the difference between business success or failure. Data is the foundation for solid business decisions, and poor data can lead to misinformed business actions.
Do your management reports involve hours consolidating data from multiple systems?
With a data warehouse, data from multiple systems can be quickly and automatically consolidated and transformed into a single data source, massively reducing the time and effort required for producing reports.
Do you need to view historic data or make future predictions?
By snapshotting data at predefined points in time, a data warehouse can use historical data to spot trends, helping predict future events or identifying risks. For example, you might see a 5% increase in seasonal sales from October-December but operating costs increase 20%. You could also identify a drop in customer spending, which could be an early sign of them changing suppliers. Analysing data and spotting trends enables you to be proactive rather than reactive.
Does your team have to re-enter the same information more than once?
A data warehouse consolidates the information across your disparate systems and uses it to ensure the highest data integrity across the board.
Does your Finance Team have to manually enter a new customer’s information even though it’s already in your CRM system?
When an opportunity is won in CRM, the account details can be passed into your financial system to start the account opening process. This can be achieved in several ways; by integrating the two systems, by using Business Process Automation (BPA) and by using a data warehouse as the central source of information.
Does your Contract Team have to manually enter a new customer’s information even though it’s already in your CRM/accounts system?
When a Contract is initially set up, the account details can be passed into your financial/ERP system to start the account opening process. This can be achieved in several ways; by integrating the two systems, by using Business Process Automation (BPA) and by using a data warehouse as the central source of information. The information can subsequently be updated when the contract is renewed.
Do your Account Managers process orders for customers that have been put on hold by Finance?
If one of your customers exceeds their credit limit, your Finance team may put their account on hold until they receive a payment to reduce the money owed. A data warehouse ensures such important information is shared across these systems, allowing your Account Managers to help resolve the situation correctly and promptly.
Does your Support Team log Tickets for Customers without an active support contract?
We all strive to deliver excellent customer service. However, there might be times where your Customer Service Representatives need to refer a customer to their Account Manager before a ticket can be logged. A data warehouse can connect your ERP system with your Ticketing system to ensure the Customer Service Representatives are notified when a customer does not have an active support contract.
Do your customer contracts expire before the renewals have been processed?
If you have contracts, chances are you have a process for managing the renewals. Occasionally, there are unforeseen delays that may prevent the contract from being renewed in time. A data warehouse can handle this scenario in several ways, depending on your requirements. Perhaps a notification to the Account Manager and Contract Renewal team is sufficient, or you may want to prevent any jobs being booked until the renewal has been completed. A data warehouse is very flexible and can be built according to your needs.
Do your Account Managers provide quotes using outdated product pricing?
Your price lists are usually set in either your finance or ERP systems – and prices often change over time. A data warehouse can capture that data and either pass it to your other systems or, better still, be used as the source for pricing queries.
Do your site engineers and Account Managers go to the wrong address?
When addresses are updated in the primary (master) system, a data warehouse can ensure the changes are fed through to all other systems, keeping your data accurate and preventing valuable time being wasted and customers being let down.
Do your Account Managers chase customers for debts that have been paid?
A data warehouse can update your CRM system with payment information that is updated in the finance system. You can decide the frequency this information gets updated from nightly to real time.
Is your BI tool limited to data held within one particular database?
A Data Warehouse will act as the central hub for all your data, allowing your BI tool to digest information on all your data from all your systems, delivering accurate reports and crucial business insights to your management team.
Do you find it difficult to report consistently across different departments, branches and/or brands?
Linking Business Intelligence tools, such as Power BI, to a Data Warehouse can help businesses see performance across branches/departments of a business to compare them.
Do you understand your customers’ buying cycles?
Linking Business Intelligence tools, such as Power BI, to a Data Warehouse can help you identify trends with customer cycles. For example, on average, customers tend to be inactive after 2 years, which means procedures can be put in place to re-engage with them before they look for another supplier.
Do you need to control access to your data to prevent certain departments/users updating the specific fields?
Using a Data Warehouse means that you can control what people have access to. In most cases, it will be read-only. However, sensitive information can also be made visible only to Management.
Do you find your systems become slow when intensive reporting is run?
Using a Data Warehouse means that running reports, using BI or carrying out complicated searches doesn’t put a strain on live system performance. Instead, the data is copied to the Data Warehouse and that is used as the data source rather than querying the live system databases.
So, you think you need a Data Warehouse, what now?
Answering “Yes” to just one of these questions means your business might need a data warehouse. So, if you want advice on whether a data warehouse would solve your challenges and are looking for a Technology Partner to guide you, get in touch.
