A study from New York-based information firm 1010data Inc. shows that while retailers are facing challenges in delivering the reporting functionality that business users need to enable data-driven decision-making, they are optimistic about big data’s ability to provide breakthroughs in analysis capabilities across a number of retail processes.
In fact, almost all surveyed executives (96 percent) agreed that big data initiatives are important in helping retailers stay competitive. They said big data insights are most beneficial for merchandising (53 percent) and marketing (48 percent), followed by store operations (42 percent), e-commerce (42 percent), supply chain (27 percent), finance (23 percent) and loss prevention (21 percent).
“This study shows that while the retail sector is being impacted by big data today, there are still many more opportunities for retailers to use big data analytics to optimize demand forecasting, merchandising, promotions, and loyalty program management,” said Sandy Steier, co-founder and CEO of 1010data, in a press statement. “When retailers truly embrace data discovery, they quickly move beyond intuition and guesswork and instead rely on data-driven decision.”
