3 ways to use an enterprise data hub effectively

In some ways, an enterprise data hub (EDH) is a lot like a key finder. While your car may be in strong operating condition outside, it is useless without the keys.

Data is the same way. You can have insightful data that you've gathered from your customers, but if you can't access the information when you need it, then it is useless. According to a survey from Experian, 97 percent of organizations feel compelled to turn their data into insights, yet 91 percent said that managing data is a challenge. One of the secrets to effectively managing and leveraging data is having an efficient data storage system so you're not left hunting for pieces of data, like you may hunt for your keys in the morning.

To this end, telecommunications companies are turning to enterprise data hubs, which use Hadoop as their data storage model, to increase efficiency and handle large volumes of inconsistently formatted data. The benefits of using these systems include being able to combine different data types, keep data in the same location and increase processing speed. However, you must be able to use the capabilities of your enterprise data hub if you want to reap the rewards. Purchasing and deploying an EDH is not enough.

The following are three affordable ways to use an enterprise data hub in your telecommunications company.

1. Develop a complete view of customers

When using traditional storage models, pieces of data are often missing or in an incompatible format. By using an EDH, your telco can combine information in one place and create complete profiles of your individual customers. This information can then be used to create customized experiences for each person.

For instance, your billing department's data may suggest that customers prefer communicating via email, but the marketing department may find that customers like to receive offers on their smartphones. Since both accurately reflect customers' preferences, neither is a correct insight on its own. However, when the data is put together in an EDH, you can analyze the information, create a complete view of customer preferences and develop personalized communication strategies that will hit the mark with each and every recipient's unique situation.

IT Pro Portal noted that this strategy of unifying data from different departments can also help redefine the company's most valuable performance indicators. For instance, telcos may discover that they can gain more customer conversions from tracking the success of individual social media posts than they did from simply measuring levels of social media engagement in general.

2. Create customized reports

One of the biggest benefits of data analytics is accessing real-time information. However, if you cannot receive consistently formatted reports about customers' phone usage, social media discussions and call center patterns, you are essentially leaving money on the table.

For example, if your analytics system flags a sharp decline in mobile payments, you'll know to check your payment system for issues. According to The Stack, Hadoop's self-reporting capabilities provide different types of reports for different users. It can give a marketing analyst detailed customer information while pointing the vice president of marketing to high-level campaign information.

3. Add new data sources

It was previously time consuming and expensive to gather new data types because the information had to be converted to a consistent format. However, Hadoop can process data in variety of formats, so conversion is no longer an issue.

To get the most value from your EDH, you should add new data sources that may not have been compatible before, such as social media information and call center records. Customer Experience Report explained how one telecom used social media sentiment to determine that customers were dissatisfied with the company's appointment windows. The company tested new time frames for appointments and monitored feedback on social media to track which windows were best received by customers.

By both setting up an enterprise data hub and using it to the fullest capacity, you'll be able to develop more comprehensive customer profiles, create tailored reports and integrate more information to improve overall revenue.

Are you using predictive analytics to understand who your subscribers are, how they use your services and what will entice them to stay with your service? To learn more, visit the solution pages.

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