Behind the Scenes.

The most important data goes into a lot of research, planning, studies, experiments, and the like before it gets down to "business". Business in the sense of promoting, publishing or marketing it to the consumers.

Behind the scenes is where the real "profit" comes into play. Its just like starting a business of your own. First, you have to observe the market where you want to put up the business. Then, you come up with ideas of what businesses would click in that area, or something like "this is what people have been waiting, wanting, craving and looking for all this time".

Have you ever wondered what makes an established company successful and why are they becoming more successful? What is the secret? This questions linger in our minds questioning how come this companies know when is the right time to come in to the consumer market. It's as if they got it all under control. Brother's Burger (I'm craving for one right now) a burger line fast food that promotes quality, satisfaction and taste conducts a 70%, 50% off sale on their specialty burger, which is Brother's Burger. They plan this out on a timely manner. The sale would go for the whole day, meaning you have to grab the opportunity even if their doors at lunch time would be flooded (oh yeah, floodgates of heaven.. here I come!) by people wanting to take part of a once in a blue moon mouth watering occasion. The next day would feel like nothing happened, back on its original tab. These promotional events is somehow random, it makes you feel that you want more and you can't wait to partake on the next sale. Customers would be left questioning: "WHEN WOULD IT BE..... AGAIN??"

Probably, after they have compiled all the information they need, a statistical data would be generated in order to show how promotions or any other strategic application affected the target market and when they would most likely to market it once again. The results cause in Statistics, more and better data could actually spawn an accurate outcome. "However, statistical techniques are driven by the data and are used to discover patterns and build predictive models" taken from Thearlng's Data Mining Techniques.

Data Mining is also a way of extracting information. But, it is more of the bigger scope of analyzing data. Statistics is only a part, a method, of its Data Mining Tools. There are several tools that you can purchase in able to enhace and at the same time improve the use and ability of Data Mining. Histograms, Clustering System, Linear Regression, Nearest Neighbor and etc.

Before shelling out a fortune, you have to see and analyze what you are investing into.

Results of using these tools leads to creating several branches on the decision tree. Collectively speaking, if the company has the advantage of possessing data then more choices would engender, but having the decision tree technique into use could help cut down to the data that is most needed. There is also another technique, among several others, that is called modeling where you could try to find something that is still very unknown to you. Modeling helps to respond in your concerns.

So among all the tools and techniques that are available today. We must, indeed, make use in order for us to progress in our future corporate life. Remembering or by just keeping in mind the true importance could lead us to become more aware of the wants and needs, that could be in time the most in demand consumer service or product in the philippines and in the whole wide world.

"All the good things came beneath an idea plus the gathering of data, every fact and information will matter".

Before the best and the most popular movies, celebrities, business people, corporations, music, basketball teams and a whole lot more had become who they are and what they are now... its because they all passed BEHIND THE SCENES, and the rest just followed.

Let me end by saying "I.T. is not what you know but I.T.'s what you can prove"

Gain or Pain?

These days more and more companies are improving through the help of I.T. But does it all revolve around the development and increasing of their technological capability?

The fastest growth in the industry's business trend is Technology. Let me start by saying "The competitive advantage of technology really lies in how you and your organization decide to respond to technology and use it" this quote came from a case study entitled: Disruptive Technologies Disrupt Blockbuster Late Fees.

Nowadays Information technology helps business to gain and sustain such advantage against their competitors. It's the reality of booming companies in the world today, they use information to be capacitated by a foundation of their products and service, the more "hi tech" and the more information you get the more successful your company would be. "They transformed technology from a supporting tool into a strategic weapon" this is a proof coming from Thomas A. Davenport; Competing on Analytics.

True that technology is growing and growing faster but we have to remember that information and people are the most important resource in Management Information Systems. Now, I am moving to a more specific angle in Information Technology. From what I remembered from my Database for Management class, There is a Database Management System that is made through the computer system that enables the users to record, incorporate and update files automatically. The DBMS could be the structure on how the company wants to share information to their customers. It could also be the base for their clients to place their datas into the input screen (if there would be any) that is provided by the company to be able to serve them better. There are alot of DBMS available in the market today like Oracle, this is one of the main DBMS that is used by rather large companies.

Though many companies depend on enhancing their competitive advantage still they struggle with the limitations of using Information Systems. As Don Tapscott said in Business Intelligence: Actionable Insights for Business Decision Makers; "And while they provided significant value, these systems were often constrained by inherent challenges, such as complexity and data limitations---problems which continue to the present day". So it continues, even if it has some disadvantage at some point still the power of the internet give people the hope to pursue the question of "what will happen next?".

But nonetheless it caters more advantage, for it is more and so developing and enhancing. There are such solutions like In-memory technologies that helps, for example the IT team of a certain company to help provide more services by not affecting their need to design, build and maintain intermediary data sets.

Popular companies involve Telecommuting, and outsourcing or what they usually call BPO's. This companies usually work with the help of Information Systems. They gather, manipulate, create, and even survey datas to be able to cater to each of their customers need. Many banking corporations seek the service of outsourcing companies to help them improve their customer service, hotlines, collection of payments/ fees, and even offering new products and services. The use of IT nourish the companies competitiveness among their rivals. We could say that there is a lot of "call centers", and all of them are quite effective because they are in demand. Another example would be online bookings. More and more travel agencies are trying to make their service as accesible as possible. So even if people are on the go, they just go through the internet or just have a phone call and you're ready to go. That easy.

Think about it. It may be a PAIN at the beginning and starting up of improvement using IT, because you may need to shell out and invest a lot of money to make your capacity as the best as possible (undergo trainings, maintenance, securiy, etc.) but their will always be a GAIN just wait and see how your business would flow and grow. Probably the best key, really, is be a Knowledge Worker. People are into the "easiest way around" mode, so more and more companies look into ways on how to reach this potential customers. I bet IT is the answer.