What is business intelligence？

Business Intelligence(BI) is defined as the concept of using modern data warehouse technology, online analysis and processing technology, data mining and data display technology for data analysis to achieve business value.

Real-world examples of business intelligence

The examples in this article are real applying cases using the application FineReport. If you are interested, you can click the link to know more details about the product.

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Supply chain business intelligence examples

Supply chain is a key factor for a company’s sustainable operation. With the aid of business intelligence, it’s helpful to make business analysis and decision.

Take the following figure as an example. Business intelligence will clearly present market proportion, supply chain distribution and other key indicators with charts and numbers. Moreover, BI will keep to update in real time as the reality changes.

Operational business intelligence examples

Cost is vital to business operations. Therefore, it’s necessary for the business world to utilize business intelligence.
Take the following figure as an example. By using BI, users can realize real-time updates of dynamic cost data through data reporting, and can see the cost distribution. In addition, BI can also judge the completion status according to the entered purchase plan, and provide a reference for subsequent cost decisions.

Sales business intelligence examples

Sales analysis is one of the most important examples that business intelligence provides value to the company.
Take the following figure as an example. BI can compare monthly and annual sales targets with completions, further calculate the completion rate for each time period. Through BI, users could conduct horizontal comparisons of various departments and branches to provide support for the company’s strategic decision-making.

Marketing business intelligence examples

Marketing is the key step to improve company performance. In another word, whether the company is performing well could relate to the effect of marketing.
BI offers help. Take the following figure as an example. Through clear charts and indicators, the BI dashboard shows the marketing status. If there is abnormal data, it means that there is a problem in the operation, and the company can make adjustments based on it.

Business intelligence use case examples

Choose a suitable business intelligence tool

With the popularity of data, the business intelligence market has also ushered in a big explosion. Various BI tools have emerged on the market. Many companies do not know how to choose the right tool when selecting BI or report software. The leading products in the market include PowerBI, tableau and FineReport. If you have difficulties in choosing proper product, you could refer to my previous articles on BI software comparison and free open source BI tools.

Among all these products, I’d like to introduce FineReport best. It was honorable mentioned in Gartner 2021 Magic Quadrant for Analytics and Business Intelligence Platforms.
FineReport has significant advantages in the market. It’s fully functional and professional, and has simple and efficient design,with low learning cost. Besides, it owns a rich industry accumulation. In addition, there are many templates built in the software in FineReport Demo, and you can download them and apply them directly. Moreover, FineReport is free for personal use, and offers a quote-based plan for enterprises. In a word, FineReport is price-friendly to customers.

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BI Use case in Real-world

BI use: Nike China

The world-famous sports brand Nike has long been in the forefront of the world’s top 500. After Nike entered China in 1980, Nike China adhered to the concept of “Local for Local”, having achieved rapid development in China and quickly occupying the market.

Challenge

China has a vast territory and a vast market. Different markets have different product demands. How to count and coordinate the needs of various markets is a big problem for Nike China.

Solution

Nike China uses business intelligence based on big data analysis of video trajectory rendering and face recognition to track product popularity in real time and adjust store display layout. After this step, it will determine the product sales layout based on the analysis results.

Results

With the help of business intelligence, Nike China has arranged the layout of counters in various stores. And further it has arranged inventory according to the popularity and sales volume of each product.

BI use: Dräger Medical

Dräger is an international pioneer in medical and safety technology. Founded in Lübeck in 1889, Dräger has transformed to a world-leading enterprise in its fifth generation as a family-run business.

Challenge

It’s hard to decide marketing plans without checking the sales situation of the product. There exists a time lagging when delivering the sales situation.

Solution

Using business intelligence to establish a sales trend analysis theme on the unified reporting platform, Dräger can receive the results of data analysis more conveniently and intuitively. Based on historical data and sales forecast data models, the sales trend chart for a certain period of time in the future can be displayed. Products and distributors have been screened and viewed under different conditions to provide a basis for timely adjustment of relevant operating strategies.

Results

According to the analysis results of business intelligence, Dräger Medical has made timely adjustments to the marketing plan to make it fit the actual situation. Therefore, it has been at the forefront of the industry for a long time.

BI use: BBK Group

BBK Group, a large-scale enterprise group in China, has created world-renowned brands like OPPO, Vivo and OnePlus. It was established in Hunan, China in 1995. Now Its business scope covers a wide range of retail trade, commercial real estate, e-commerce, internet finance, logistics and transportation.

Challenge

There are challenges at the sales prediction level, which leads to the arrangements of inventory. If a product has too much inventory, it will cause a waste of resources, if the inventory is too small, it will cause dissatisfaction with customers. 

Solution

The company resorts to business intelligence. FineReport uses Python script processing method to predict the customer flow of the store. It comprehensively considers the indicators such as time, weather, season, temperature, historical customer flow, store operating area, etc. to construct the feature project. Also, it uses the efficient integrated algorithm XGBOOST to carry its prediction.

Results

The accuracy of store customer flow forecast has now reached 95%. The company could arrange proper inventory through business intelligence avoiding waste or dissatisfaction of customers.

Conclusion

With the help of business intelligence, enterprise-level users can fully mine existing data resources, capture, analyze and communicate with information. In this way, BI helps managers understand data relationships and make better business decisions. Stop hesitating! Click to know more about the awesome reporting&business intelligence software FineReport!

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