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• Top data visualization techniques and how to best use them

  BI and analytics teams and self-service BI users can choose from various types of data visualizations. Here are examples of 12, with advice on when to use them. Continue Reading

• What does a business intelligence analyst do?

  Business intelligence analysts are key members of BI teams who analyze data, create dashboards and handle other duties. Here's a look at the job and the skills it requires. Continue Reading

• Data science interview preparation: How to answer top questions

  A successful interview for a data scientist position relies on the ability to effectively communicate and demonstrate your combined experiences and skills. Continue Reading

• 4 features of great data visualization and storytelling

  Data visualization and storytelling go hand in hand when it comes to explaining data. Here are four ways to make sure you build and tell a strong data story for your audience. Continue Reading

• Top embedded analytics examples in enterprise applications

  Embedded analytics has been trending for ease of use and accessibility for users. Here are the top use cases for these tools in enterprise applications. Continue Reading

• Definitions to Get Started

  • What is continuous intelligence?
  • What is embedded analytics?
  • What is composable analytics?
  • What is a metrics store?

  • What is decision intelligence?
  • What is a business intelligence dashboard (BI dashboard)?
  • What is real-time business intelligence (RTBI)?
  • What is self-service business intelligence (self-service BI)?

  View All Definitions

• Embedded BI software creates common ground for diverse analytics

  Learn how embedding separate business intelligence capabilities into one application empowers users to drill down, access and analyze data without opening a separate tool.Continue Reading

• Data scientist vs. data analyst: What's the difference?

  Data scientists and data analysts have a lot of crossover in their roles, but they're certainly not the same. Here's a look at some key differences in the positions.Continue Reading

• Augmented analytics tools: Business uses, benefits and barriers

  This guide examines the capabilities and potential benefits of augmented analytics technologies and offers guidance on how to use them to simplify BI and analytics processes.Continue Reading

• days sales outstanding (DSO)

  Days sales outstanding (DSO) is the measurement of the average number of days it takes a business to collect payments after a sale has been made.Continue Reading

• NLP uses in BI and analytics speak softly but carry a big stick

  Self-service analytics vendors are adding NLP features to their tools to make them even easier to use. Learn about notable NLP applications as well as some caveats.Continue Reading

• Ethical data mining and analytics elude privacy, usage snafus

  This handbook examines the ethics of data mining and offers advice on missteps to avoid when mining and analyzing customer data to help drive marketing campaigns.Continue Reading

• 5 augmented analytics examples in the enterprise

  Here are the top examples of augmented analytics uses that BI vendors support and enable, including data preparation, NLP-based querying and automated insights.Continue Reading

• Augmented data analytics overshadows traditional BI process

  Automated functionality is being added to BI software to help users find and analyze data. This handbook looks at the benefits and challenges of augmented analytics.Continue Reading

• How to integrate Power BI and SharePoint via embedded reports

  Expert Brien Posey explains two methods for including Power BI reports on pages in SharePoint Online's cloud service: publishing a link to a report, or embedding one.Continue Reading

• Data-rich organizations turn focus to ethical data mining

  As data analytics has increasingly become a core component of organizations' strategies, concerns have arisen around how data is mined. Experts offer tips.Continue Reading

• Qlik Research head talks Associative Engine, NLP and Data Swarm

  Elif Tutuk, research head at Qlik, discusses projects her team is working on -- including a smarter Associative Engine, multi-attribute visualizations and NLP.Continue Reading

• Avoid turbulence when shifting to data analytics in the cloud

  When migrating BI and data analytics to the cloud, factor existing analytics processes, software evaluation, data protection and cost controls into a thoughtful plan of action.Continue Reading

• How to make a self-service BI tools deployment less painful

  Self-service BI can be a big change for everyone in an organization. Expert Rick Sherman offers three principles to keep in mind that could make things easier.Continue Reading

• Bolster citizen data scientists with support, training

  As more citizen data scientists take on work traditionally tasked to business analysts, organizations must consider how to support them. Start with a centralized data team.Continue Reading

• How the rise of augmented analytics tools affects BI vendors

  BI vendors are responding to interest in augmented analytics capabilities with simplified interfaces and features that allow for access to deeper insights.Continue Reading

• Why data literacy skills still matter with augmented analytics

  Democratizing data analytics gives everyone access to tools and information, but data literacy is still required for analyzing data and delivering successful outcomes.Continue Reading

• Tips for creating curated data sets for self-service BI users

  Data curation initiatives can help streamline BI processes by reducing the amount of time users spend locating and preparing data. Get four tips for preparing data sets.Continue Reading

• 6 big data visualization project ideas and tools

  These data visualization project examples and tools illustrate how enterprises are expanding the use of "data viz" tools to get a better look at big data.Continue Reading

• 3 ways to make machine learning in business more effective

  Dun & Bradstreet analytics exec Nipa Basu offers three tips on how to integrate machine learning tools into business processes to help drive better decision-making.Continue Reading

• How do augmented analytics and BI tools differ?

  See how augmented analytics compares to traditional BI and self-service analytics tools and what this new generation of AI-powered data analysis platforms can deliver.Continue Reading

• Rising demand for business analytics education programs

  Colleges and universities are increasingly offering business analytics degrees. The graduates can help build IT and business capabilities of small and medium-sized organizations.Continue Reading

• GPU implementation is about more than deep learning

  Simulmedia is using GPU technology to power reporting tools, while eyeing future deep learning applications, helping to justify the cost of the hardware while building experience.Continue Reading

• Ten KPI templates for your dashboards

  KPIs help companies gauge success, but how do you choose the right metrics to create useful reports? Here you'll find 10 KPI examples to inspire your executive dashboards.Continue Reading

• Beat the challenges of predictive analytics in big data systems

  Big data and predictive analytics may seem synonymous, but understanding the constraints of each discipline is the key to extracting business value from projects that combine them.Continue Reading

• How predictive analytics techniques and processes work

  Predictive analytics is no longer confined to highly skilled data scientists. But other users need to understand what it involves before they start building models.Continue Reading

• Ten steps to start using predictive analytics algorithms effectively

  A successful predictive analytics program involves more than deploying software and running algorithms to analyze data. This set of steps can help you put a solid analytics foundation in place.Continue Reading

• funnel analysis

  Funnel analysis is a way to measure and improve the performance of customer interactions in a step-wise progression from the initial customer contact to a predetermined conversion metric.Continue Reading

• Location-tracking system improves business efficiency

  For organizations in industries such as healthcare and trucking, analyzing data on the location and movements of employees is helping to streamline operations.Continue Reading

• unstructured text

  The unstructured text collected from social media activities plays a key role in predictive analytics for the enterprise because it is a prime source for sentiment analysis to determine the general attitude of consumers toward a brand or idea.Continue Reading

• Lambda architecture

  Lambda architecture is an approach to big data management that provides access to batch processing and near real-time processing with a hybrid approach.Continue Reading

• text tagging

  Text tagging is the process of manually or automatically adding tags or annotation to various components of unstructured data as one step in the process of preparing such data for analysis.Continue Reading

• Scala (Scalable Language)

  Scala is a software programming language that mixes object-oriented methods with functional programming capabilities. It was used to create the scalable Spark analytics engine.Continue Reading

• revenue attribution

  Revenue attribution is the process of matching customer sales to specific advertisements in order to understand where revenue is coming from and optimize how advertising budgets are spent in the future.Continue Reading

• data journalism

  Data journalism in an approach to writing for the public in which the journalist analyzes large data sets to identify potential news stories.Continue Reading

• Big data vendors should stop dissing data warehouse systems

  Wayne Eckerson examines the analytics roles of data warehouses and big data systems and says he's tired of data warehouse bashing by big data vendors.Continue Reading

• Laws leave gray area between big data and privacy

  Laws on data collection and use remain foggy, leaving businesses to feel their way through big data and privacy laws.Continue Reading

• Google Advertising ID

  Google Advertising ID is a piece of universally unique identifier code that allows mobile applications running on Android devices to identify users and gather data for the purposes of building profiles.Continue Reading

• Defining and using KPIs in a successful business intelligence system

  In this book excerpt, author David Loshin discusses how to select key performance indicators and turn data into actionable knowledge for BI success.Continue Reading

• Change agents: Leaders in information management technology

  In this guide, we examine various transformative projects and the agents of change who made them possible through creativity and determination.Continue Reading

• Quiz: Creating effective predictive analytics programs

  Take this brief quiz to test your knowledge of predictive analytics and what is needed to implement successful predictive modeling processes.Continue Reading

• location intelligence (LI)

  Location intelligence (LI) is a business analysis tool capability that enables companies to gather geographic- and location-related data to better understand global, regional and local business trends.Continue Reading

• collaborative BI (collaborative business intelligence)

  Collaborative BI (collaborative business intelligence) is the merging of business intelligence software with collaboration tools, including social and Web 2.0 technologies, to support improved data-driven decision making.Continue Reading

• Quiz: Test your knowledge of mobile business intelligence trends

  How much do you know about mobile business intelligence tools and best practices for managing mobile BI initiatives? Take our brief quiz to find out.Continue Reading

• noisy text

  Noisy text is an electronically-stored communication that cannot be categorized properly by a text mining software program. Noisy text is often caused by an end user's excessive use of idiomatic expressions, abbreviations, chat and text acronyms or ...Continue Reading

• cloud analytics

  Cloud analytics is a service model in which one or more key element of data analytics is provided through a public or private cloud.  Cloud analytics applications and services are typically provided through a subscription-based or utility (...Continue Reading

• enterprise mashup (or data mashup)

  An enterprise mashup is the integration of heterogeneous digital data and applications from multiple sources for business purposes. An enterprise mashup is also sometimes known as a business mashup or, less precisely, as a data mashup.Continue Reading

• deep analytics

  Deep analytics is the application of sophisticated data processing techniques to yield information from large and typically multi-source data sets comprised of both unstructured and semi-structured data.Continue Reading

• in-database analytics

  In-database analytics is a scheme for processing data within the database, avoiding the data movement that slows response time.  Continue Reading

• Examples of decision support systems (DSS) aiding business decision-making

  Learn how decision support systems can help the business decision-making process. Find out why decision support is needed and what IT skills business managers need for DSS.Continue Reading

• business intelligence competency center (BICC)

  A business intelligence competency center (BICC) is a team of people that, in its most fully realized form, is responsible for managing all aspects of an organization's BI strategy, projects and systems.Continue Reading

• Creating key performance indicator (KPI) reports and dashboard design

  Learn about key performance indicator (KPI) reports and the benefits of KPI reporting. Read about common executive dashboard design mishaps and see examples of KPI scorecards.Continue Reading