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Do you want to grow your business, innovate, drive efficiencies, &/or create new revenue streams? Of course, you do! Well data is the starting point…and this is the only data-focused roundup you’ll ever need!
DATA IN THE NEWS
With the news being totally dominated by the Queen’s funeral, you’d think I’d struggle to find anything remotely data-related…but fear not data lovers! Thanks to the team at Statista, there’s loads of data out there on the UK royal family and HRH the Queen. This one’s my favourite, clearly showing the winning reign of Elizabeth II…
The colours relate to the royal houses so you can dive into this in more detail at
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1030708/reign-of-british-monarchs/ to get your fix of royalty + data!
DATA TIPS
In DATA DATA DATA, I want to share the most important lessons learnt that I’ve realised in the 5 years since I set up Data3 and started working with SMEs on their data challenges and data opportunities.
This time, it’s start small and take the first step. I talk to many businesses who are overwhelmed with the data challenge – they’re anxious about GDPR fines, worried about selecting the right technology, fearful about the lack of data expertise they have in house, worried they can’t afford to invest in data, concerned they’ll make the wrong decision, crippled with fear around data security, or just too damn busy. Sometimes this can result in inaction, paralysis, and continuing business as usual…no matter how inefficient that might be.
Instead, start small and focus on one big problem or opportunity – what’s the biggest problem you need to solve? What would make the biggest impact right now? What would win the hearts & minds of your stakeholders? Start there…take the first step. Your first project might be a Board-level dashboard, or a specific piece of data analysis, or pulling together data into one place for just one of your customers.
Think of this as a pilot project, or a prototype, or the foundations that you can use to build more data projects on. Think of this as a way to better understand the business benefits that can be realised and the potential ROI for data projects. This way, you’ll get off the starting blocks and have the best chance of delivering commercial benefits for your business ASAP.
DATA THEMES
Last time, I focused on the number 1 most frequent question, the team and I get asked – Microsoft or AWS? [insert link to issue 1]. This time, I’m focusing on the number 2 most frequent question, the team and I get asked…Power BI or Tableau?
I LOVE Power BI AND Tableau! They are both excellent business intelligence (BI) and data visualisation tools, and they are both rated incredibly highly by independent platforms like Gartner and G2.
My personal view is…
1. Power BI is great when you want lots of people within your organisation to have access to a BI tool that’s intuitive for beginners, and enables people to self-serve, as it a natural evolution from Excel, and part of the Microsoft suite
2. Tableau is great when you have dedicated BI developers who will be using it every day, invest in becoming experts, and want to take advantage of all the advanced analytics and visualisation options
Of course, there are many other tools out there too – we’re also big fans of Looker, Google Data Studio, Qlik and more…which makes the question of ‘which BI tool?’ a question that we discuss all the time with our clients, and it can be contentious as everyone has their favourite!
In future issues of DATA DATA DATA, I’ll cover the 3rd, 4th, 5th, and other most frequent questions that I’ve come across when talking data with our clients…anyone want to guess what they are?!
DATA CRAZINESS
I LOVE seeing examples of good/bad/funny data visualisations, data wins, data mistakes, and more.
This time, I’ve found some fantastic, super informative examples, and all very topical…
· Worried about your energy bills? This data visualisation shows the % of renewable electricity by country – we’re at 47.1% in the UK apparently – https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/renewable-energy-and-electricity/#bycountry
· Worried about the world getting to net zero carbon by 2050? This data visualisation shows the size of the challenge for the USA – https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/how-to-get-the-usa-to-carbon-netzero/
· Worried about Russia? This data visualisation shows the impact of Russian energy supplies on the world – https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/ukraine-russian-war-infographics-data-visuals/
All of these are from the fantastic team at Information is Beautiful and if you love data visualisations, you should sign up for their newsletters at https://informationisbeautiful.net/ or buy one of their beautiful books.
Have you seen any examples of data craziness you want to share? Please drop me a line.
DATA QUOTES
My favourite data-related quote ever is from Rhys Williams at Quietroom, one of our amazing clients – as copywriting and comms experts, it shouldn’t be a surprise how eloquent Rhys and the team are! When I was describing what we do for our clients, in way too many words to be helpful, Rhys said to me – “you help businesses to check on their performance like they’d check on the weather.” Boom! Yes, we do. Exactly. I love this quote so much that I use it all the time…ALL the time! It perfectly describes what we do, in a super simple way. With the added bonus that I started my career at The Met Office working with weather data, so it’s like I’ve come full circle!
In future issues, I’ll share more quotes I hear, quotes I read, quotes you tell me about, and more – what’s your favourite data-related quote? Let me know and we’ll find a data-related prize for the best one.!
DATA FREEBIES
We have loads of data-related freebies to share with you this time…
1. FREE videos with SME business leaders – what can you do with your data? Be inspired by the amazing people who have joined our vodcast, including leaders in marketing agencies, retail experts, financial services, and more. Watch them on Data3 TV at https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLcTAocJN1ji_ACY2vBIqnHO-g8wmmxTDR
2. FREE BI tool training videos – want some help getting started with Power BI, Tableau or Google Data Studio? Watch our training videos on Data3 TV at https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLcTAocJN1ji8E4xRETNRANoDZmH2GHcTj
In future issues, I’ll share more links to super useful, completely FREE videos, guides, templates, and similar…so, there are loads more freebies to come.
Thank you for reading…I’ll be back soon with more data news. And, if you’re in data hell, I’m data Hels!
Recommend a friend or colleague to join our mailing list for DATA DATA DATA – hello@data-cubed.co.uk or connect with me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/helentanner/