Ways to Make Business Intelligence Work for Your Small Business

Smart Ways to Make Business Intelligence Work for Your Small Business Sponsored by:

MICHELLE GATMAITAN, BUSINESS OBJECTS PARTNER SPECIALIST, CDW CORPORATION

• Customer data

• Market data

• Product data

• Operations data

• Financial data

Business Intelligence

• What is business intelligence?

• How can I maximize its potential for my small business?

• What solutions are available?

• How can they help me make smarter decisions?

• How can I make sure my investment in business intelligence will pay off?

• How can I sell the value of business intelligence to company management?

• How do I get started?

Questions We’ll Answer Today

ANGELA HARVEY, PRODUCT MANAGER, BUSINESS OBJECTS JAMES THOMAS, VP OF PRODUCT MANAGEMENT, BUSINESS OBJECTS

What is Business Intelligence?

Tools to transform data to information, so you can answer any question confidently

• Also known as spreadsheets, reporting and dashboarding

• Consolidate data from multiple sources for a holistic view of performance

• Leverage your existing infrastructure

Business Intelligence Spans All Industries and Departments Department Business Intelligence Needs Manufacturing bill of materials, inventory Quality Assurance defects per lot, bug tracking Call Centers average time per call, throughput Sales performance per region, top deals, forecasts Human Resources departmental salaries, attrition Product Management enhancement requests, sales IT server utilization, user accounts Finance income statement, accounts receivable Technical Support open support tickets, call volumes Shipping manifests, barcodes, shipment tracking Web Marketing most visited sites, click-through

Tools to Solve Your Business Problems For Used by For Used by Created and distributed by IT or developers (in applications) Consumed by business users in analytical roles. Reporting—consolidated data from disparate sources presented in a highly formatted way. Mostly text-based with graphical elements. Answering predictable questions with a high-level of detail and drill-down capabilities. Interactivity lets one report suite many needs. Created by IT or technically savvy business users. Consumed by business users and senior management. Dashboarding—at-a-glance view of business performance through a totally visual interface. A high-level holistic view of performance. Interactivity allows for collaborative discussions.

Taking a Budget from Spreadsheet to Interactive Dashboard Static Financial Statement …to interactive what-if simulation

Make Better Decisions

Sales Opportunity Tracking

Business Intelligence: A Sound Investment During a Tough Economy

Refining Your Business Focus Focus on refining your business and IT strategies, as well as enterprise architecture Encourage and support your people Understand that long-term technology investments will be more important than ever Don't ignore the longer-term needs that will be crucial to keep your business efficient and competitive Continue to emphasize intermediate- and long-term planning to stay in the competitive forefront as the current crisis abate Finally, when evaluating cost cutting, target areas in which a reduction in functionality now can eliminate legacy constraints * Source: Gartner Research - IT Innovation Will Be Key to Turn Economic Crisis Into Opportunity LEVERAGE INFORMATION SYSTEMS THAT HELP YOU MANAGE THE KEY VALUE DRIVERS* * Source: Accenture 2008 - When Good Management Shows: Creating Value in an Uncertain Economy “ Plan for the acceleration of the modernization of IT infrastructures and evolve an information-centric foundation”

Understanding business performance lets you make informed decisions to run your business efficiently and allocate resources appropriately

• Will I hit my number?

• Where are sales lagging?

• How much would profitability soar if R&D costs were reduced 2%?

• How many laptops are past their warranty?

• Are all our systems patched?

• Exactly how much did we spend on couriers last year?

• Have recent process changes reduced our Q&A cycle?

• Which of my products are growing the fastest?

Get the Answers to Your Business Questions

Confidently make money-saving decisions based on current information

Connect to live data to monitor performance in real time

At-a-glance view of performance makes it easy to single out areas for improvement

Built in alerting & trending

Drill down for more information

Manipulate data to understand potential outcomes with what-if scenarios

Understand Real-Time Performance

Reduce IT’s workload while empowering end users

Formatted information needs to be interactive, so one

document can suit many needs

Tools end users can use themselves

Drill-downs, what-if scenarios, sorting,

parameter panels

Pre-built templates and samples let you get started quickly

Connecting to numerous data sources and live data refresh

lets you automate data consolidation and formatting

Centrally secure, manage and distribute information

Save Time

Improve ROI by choosing tools that work with your existing IT infrastructure

Don’t replace what you’re currently doing—enhance it

Export to or host in familiar formats

• Microsoft Office, Adobe PDF, E-mail, the Web, Microsoft Sharepoint and other portals

• Integration kits

Leverage Your Existing IT Investments

Improve ROI by choosing tools that work with your existing IT infrastructure

When choosing a solution think about:

• Which data sources you need to pull information from

• How you intend to share information (in portals, exported to specific formats)

• Platforms your end users are working on (Windows, Mac, UNIX)

Leverage Your Existing IT Investments

Based in Los Angeles, USA

Purchases accounts receivables from its clients on a monthly basis- a form of financing known as “factoring.”

Interstate purchases in excess of $300 million dollars per year in invoices from its clients.

More than 50 users use Crystal Reports Server, including users in operations, sales, executive management, and finance.

End-users receive reports automatically in Excel or PDF via email

Users also access reports over the web, an essential element for Interstate’s large remote sales organization.

Users can also change parameters on reports and drill down to do further investigating.

Data was captured in an application with insufficient reporting flexibility

No access to data in a timely and efficient manner

Lost business opportunities and money

Improved Risk Management

Identified New Business Opportunities

Better Sales Communications

Increased Customer Retention

Business Pains Company History Implementation Overview Measurable Results “ The fact that Crystal Reports is so easy to use — and I’m going to say fun — is also the reason why we use it so much today.” - Tony Furman, President of Interstate Capital Corporation - Crystal Reports Server Implementation

What Do I Need? Be economically savvy by choosing tools that meet your minimum requirements, but can easily be scaled up as your needs grow & Basic reporting from $495 Dashboarding from $895 Dashboarding & Reporting from $995 Central Report Management from $2495

Reporting and dashboarding tools are in the Business Intelligence category. They’re designed to consolidate data from numerous sources so you can understand business performance

Business Intelligence investments make sense in today’s environment because they help you make informed decisions to save money over the long haul

To get the most from your existing infrastructure, and your BI investment, choose a solution that’s strong in heterogeneous environments

Different types of tools are better for different needs—look for solutions that meet your minimum requirements, but can easily scale up as your needs grow

Summary

You contact your dedicated CDW account manager for assistance on developing a BI solution that’s right for your organization

Your CDW account manager works with their Business Objects Partner Specialist for assistance with questions, quote requests, conference calls and more