Location Intelligence and Mobile BI: Advancing Data Analysis in Retail

You’re an area manager for retail conglomerate CheapStuff. The northwestern sector of your region is underperforming. The situation demands your personal attention – and a visit.

You’re an area manager for retail conglomerate CheapStuff. The northwestern sector of your region is underperforming. The situation demands your personal attention – and a visit. Luckily, you can take all the location-based information you need with you on your smartphone – your Business Intelligence (BI) solution has integrated Location Intelligence (LI) and mobile reporting capabilities.

LI – the combination of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and BI allows you to combine location-based data and traditional metrics – and Mobile BI – the ability to receive reporting and analytics on-the-go via mobile devices – empowers you to uncover otherwise hidden trends, patterns and relationships; no matter where you, or your assets are located.

Just ask Yellowfin

So, what can a BI platform, encompassing LI and mobile analytical capabilities, bring to a retail organization’s critical business processes and operations?

Just ask Yellowfin how, at:  http://www.yellowfinbi.com/YFContact.i4

6 ways to utilize Location Intelligence and Mobile BI in retail

The ability to access location-based reports from your mobile device allows you to formulate a strategy from the departure lounge.  You’re able to: 

• Track stock levels of individual retail operators to coordinate warehouse deliveries to ensure individual shop fronts are always well stocked
• Categorize underperforming stores to assess their ongoing viability and ability to raise profits
• Assess the sales of particular items by store to determine effective and efficient sales campaigns and stock distribution
• Assess customer purchase habits, frequency and residency to help new marketing campaigns boost store traffic and sales
• Segment customers in a multi-dimensional way via purchase history, demography as well as location, to develop highly effective and personalized relationships
• Identify the location of potential customers and suggest specialized marketing messages via location-specific mediums
• Detect and mitigate unnecessary competition between regional stores
• Forecast and redevelop store-specific budgets and expectations based on the size of surrounding populations and other location specific information

The importance of where: Location Intelligence and Mobile BI

Gartner’s 2012 BI Magic Quadrant survey indicated that the majority (53%) of organizations will deliver some form of mobile analytics by year’s end.  The same report revealed that many organizations, across a diverse range of industries, are beginning to apply BI and analytics to new business areas. As a result, respondents listed “geographic-intelligent functions” as one of the standout new product requirements for 2012. 

The insight able to be leveraged by assessing location-based data on mobile devices is enormous. LI is the glue that binds organizational data assets together, generating context, meaning and exposing crucial relationships between data types. Mobile BI is the platform of the future for reporting and analytics, as executives abandon their desks, and spend more time amongst assets, employees and customers.

With the intensification of trends towards globalization, outsourcing and the instantaneous (driven by our constant connectivity courtesy of the Internet), not knowing will no longer be an excuse, no matter where you, or your company’s operations, are located.

For more on LI and Mobile BI, simply visit:

• Yellowfin’s Mobile BI solutions homepage
• Yellowfin’s LI solutions homepag
• Yellowfin’s blog – Location Intelligence and Mobile BI: The future of BI
• Yellowfin’s blog – Location Intelligence in the retail and fast food industry

Further reading: Still not convinced?

Still not convinced? Check out some of our recent blog posts on Location Intelligence:

• 4 Reasons why you need to implement Location Intelligence in 2012
• Recruiting with Location Intelligence & Data visualization
• Location Intelligence & data vis explore US software industry
• The Benefits of Location Intelligence: You’re in real estate, didn’t you know?
• Defining Location Intelligence