Which type of analytics should I use?

The term “Analytics” covers a wide spectrum of meaning, depending on your level of understanding of the field (or indeed desire for detail). We all, at a base level understand analytics to mean “discovery and interpretation of information”. In a business context this can range from the financial health of an enterprise, competitor comparisons, and sales figures, while at a personal level many of us use analytics to tell us how healthy we are, and whether we have done enough steps that day to justify a glass of wine as soon as (or maybe before!) the kids are in bed. The team behind the Big Data London expo (if you missed it in 2019, see our report here) produced a report entitled The Fourth Industrial Revolution, included in this report was a very helpful summary of which type of analytics to use. John Chapman summarises the report:

• Descriptive Analytics - the interpretation of historical data to better understand the changes that have occurred in a business.
• Diagnostic Analytics - a form of advanced analytics that examines data or content to answer the question, “Why did it happen?”
• Predictive Analytics - the branch of advanced analytics which is used to make predictions about unknown future events.
• Prescriptive Analytics - is the third and final phase of business analytics and helps businesses find the best course of action for a given situation.

Our consultants at TouchstoneBI work with all of the above analytics on every project they undertake, we ensure that we take the time to fully understand our customers, and their business challenges and successes before starting any implementation project in order to be sure of success. For more information about the software that is available to you to help bring clarity to these questions, please see the articles and links from this page, or just get in touch.