Business analytics

Lets understand Business Analytics in layman language. If I say business analytics involves
the use of conceptual layer in business logic in order to resolve problems,I might be correct
but you will not be able to understand it clearly.The biggest responsibility of a business
analyst is to explain the complex process in the simplest way.

Lets take example of Mr. X, who owns a chain of restaurants, is facing a business challenge
as he observes a significant decline in profit margin at his Bangalore location. To identify the
root cause of this issue, he plans to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the purchasing and
sales data from the Bangalore restaurant and compare it with the data from his other
restaurants in Delhi and Kolkata. This analytical approach is a means of examining business
data to gain insights and make informed decisions.

Through this analysis, Mr. X aims to detect any patterns, trends, or potential factors that
might have contributed to the drop in profit margin specifically at the Bangalore joint.
Various aspects such as sales volume, customer preferences, menu items, pricing, costs,
marketing campaigns, and operational efficiency will be scrutinized to pinpoint the reasons
behind the decline.

The first step: Describe

Mr. X looks at all the spreadsheets kept by the employees at the different branches of his
restaurant chain. He has the data in front of him. He can see what offers had been run; how
many plates of poha were sold; how many new customers visited the joints (they keep the
phone numbers of customers); how many old customers did not make a visit; everything.

Mr. X examines the comprehensive collection of spreadsheets maintained by the employees

across his various restaurant branches. With the data readily available, he gains access to a
wealth of information. He review the details of past promotional offers that were run,
including the specific offers and discounts provided. Additionally, he ascertained the quantity
of poha plates sold, enabling him to assess the popularity and demand for this particular menu
item.

The point is that Mr. X can now describe what has been happening at the restaurants for the
last month.
Indeed, the initial examination of the data Mr. X is conducting, where he reviews and
analyzes the spreadsheets from his restaurant branches, falls under the category of descriptive
analysis. Descriptive analysis involves summarizing and interpreting historical data to gain
insights and understand patterns or trends.
Step 2 : Diagnosis
In the realm of business, it is not uncommon to experience financial losses or a decline in
overall performance without being able to pinpoint the exact cause. This situation is akin to
feeling bodily discomfort without being able to identify the precise source of pain. However,
just as medical diagnostics aids in identifying the root cause of physical ailments, diagnostic
analysis serves a similar purpose in the field of business.

By conducting diagnostic analysis, business analysts can delve deeper into the available data,
review historical performance, assess key metrics, and apply statistical methods to uncover
patterns, correlations, and anomalies. They scrutinize factors such as sales data, operational
processes, marketing campaigns, customer feedback, and market trends to identify potential
gaps or weaknesses.

Similar to a medical diagnosis, diagnostic analysis serves as a critical tool in business

decision-making, helping organizations understand the underlying issues and take appropriate
remedial measures to restore profitability and success.

Business analysts do not only look at the business data but also a variety of structured and
unstructured data from various sources.

They could look up what people are saying about Mr. X’s food joint on different social media
platforms. Now, you must realize that this is easier said than done. Textual data is
unstructured, unclean and often deceptive so, these are perilous waters. However, after a fair
bit of deliberations and pondering the analyst point fingers at a number of variables that
might be the cause of the losses.

Prediction
Once the analysts have delved deep into customer buying patterns, they acquire valuable
knowledge about popular snacks and their timing of high demand. They also identify
inventory items that are not selling well and may spoil. Utilizing this data, the analysts
employ predictive analytics to make accurate predictions and recommendations for inventory
management. By leveraging historical data, statistical models, and machine learning,
predictive analytics helps forecast future demand, enabling informed decisions on inventory
stocking. This ambitious step allows businesses to optimize inventory levels, reduce waste,
and meet customer demand, thereby improving efficiency and profitability. The utilization of
predictive analytics represents a significant advancement in the analyst's approach to
leveraging data for decision-making and gaining a competitive edge.

Prescriptive analytics
The analyst Mr. X had hired now knows what is happening in the company. She has
identified the problem and made some predictions. The next step would be to think of a
situation where certain positive changes can help sky-rocket the profits.

The hired analyst has identified the problem, made predictions, and now it's time to consider
changes that can greatly increase profits. These changes can include pricing adjustments,
menu modifications, or even relocating the business. Solving Mr. X's problem may take time,
but what matters is that he prioritized data and analysis over intuition..

Evolution of Business Analytics

Business analytics has undergone significant advancements in recent times, facilitated by
automation and big data. Initially, it was primarily utilized by major multinational
corporations, focusing on tasks like report generation and data entry using applications like
Microsoft Excel. However, as technology progressed, more advanced tools and techniques
emerged, including add-ons like PowerPivot in Excel, enabling multi-dimensional data
processing and analytics. These advancements have been driven by the increasing availability
of big data and the need to extract insights from diverse datasets. With automation playing a
vital role, businesses can now leverage powerful analytics tools to analyze and interpret data
more effectively. The evolution of business analytics has expanded its reach, allowing
organizations of all sizes to harness data for informed decision-making and gain a
competitive edge.Once the concept of BI was introduced into the market, corporations around
the globe wanted their hands on it. BI used various digital instruments, technologies, and
metrics to evaluate business performance and helped companies get valuable insights. This
facilitated more informed decision-making and ensured that all the important organizations
during that time adopted software such as Tableau, SAS, or Microsoft Power BI to support
their business activities and operations. With BI, concepts such as ‘web questions,’
collaboration, data security, and sourcing data from databases and distributed file systems
came into mainstream use as well. By now, business analytics was not just used by large
MNCs and conglomerates but also medium-level and much smaller enterprises as well. This
introduced the world to an era where analytics helped create research models, design models,
and simulators that further helped companies use data to forecast and predict future outcomes
more accurately than ever.

Business Analytics Historical Facts

. Analytics and visualizations have been used throughout history without the support of
computers and software. This was done by manually plotting graphs using statistical methods
and manually recording data. This was quite different from the business analytics that we
recognize and know about. The more modern version of business analytics was only used
much later in the 20th century to identify trends during the Second World War. This process
of identifying trends helped code-breakers use data from encrypted messages such as
destination (recipients of the messages), origin, and the time and date of these messages to
find out what information these contained. This is a more modern use of analytics to predict
information. However, we have also seen business analytics being used a bit earlier in
history. Sir Henry Furnese, a well-documented banker, had been extensively using data
during the 1860s to stay ahead of his competition

Here are some more historical facts about business analytics:

 During the early 1900s, Henry Ford, inspired by Frederick Taylor’s scientific
management system, hired him in order to measure the performance of the
assembly line of his famous Ford Model T. This led to a series of events that had
transformed the manufacturing industry and production lines across the world.
This also helped Henry Ford make his assembly line as efficient as possible.

 In 1956, IBM introduced the first hard disk drive that allowed users to store data
that can be used for business or corporate purposes.

 During the 1970s, Bill Inmon started discussing the concept of a data warehouse
to solve the problem of storing vast amounts of data for business intelligence.

 During the 1980s, the first business data warehouse was developed by IBM
researchers Barry Devlin and Paul Murphy.
  In this period between the 1990s and early 2000s, various solutions and software
were introduced, such as business intelligence tools by companies like SAP,
Microsoft, SAS and IBM alongside relational databases.

 After the early 2000s, common people started using data more proactively for
personal purposes. This also led to more corporate use of data through
employees extensively using organisational data. More tools were also
introduced during this time with which individuals can use business intelligence
tools without extensive training. Eventually, Google Analytics was introduced
that allowed website owners to analyse statistics about their website, such as
trends in website visits.

 After 2010, business intelligence and analytics truly took off, being adopted
worldwide by companies and businesses around the world. This also pushed us
to an era of cloud computing and extensive use of Artificial Intelligence or
automation.

Recent Evolution in Business Analytics

The recent evolution that business analytics has experienced can be fundamentally traced
back to the introduction of automation in analytics and the concept of big data. The advent of
big data meant that analytics along with various data sources should become more scalable
and more powerful. This helped in introducing more advanced tools and systems that are
compatible with large volumes of data. The emergence of cloud technologies also meant that
data did not need to be on-site. There was also a huge demand for automating analytical tools
by this time due to the massive amount of data that needed to be worked upon. All of this
motivated companies to upgrade their existing software into more capable applications that
can process massive datasets rapidly and from multiple sources such as from the cloud and
distributed file systems rather than just the traditional RDBMS. Business analysts were also
now armed with predictive and forecasting abilities that were now more accurate than ever
with the help of modern business analytics. This is where businesses truly understood the
importance of data analytics in business. All this technology had already existed, but the
industry’s growing requirement encouraged businesses of all sizes to start incorporating data
analytics into daily operations.
There have been four main spheres where business analytics has evolved greatly, these
are:
 Artificial Intelligence and Automated Analytics

 Predictive Analytics

 Real-time Analytics

 Big Data

Business Analytics Process

Step 1. Defining the business needs

The first stage in the business analytics process involves understanding what the business
would like to improve on or the problem it wants solved. Sometimes, the goal is broken down
into smaller goals. Relevant data needed to solve these business goals are decided upon by
the business stakeholders, business users with the domain knowledge and the business
analyst. At this stage, key questions such as, “what data is available”, “how can we use it”,
“do we have sufficient data” must be answered.

Step 2. Explore the data

This stage involves cleaning the data, making computations for missing data, removing
outliers, and transforming combinations of variables to form new variables. Time series
graphs are plotted as they are able to indicate any patterns or outliers. The removal of outliers
from the dataset is a very important task as outliers often affect the accuracy of the model if
they are allowed to remain in the data set. As the saying goes: Garbage in, garbage out
(GIGO)!

Once the data has been cleaned, the analyst will try to make better sense of the data. The
analyst will plot the data using scatter plots (to identify possible correlation or non-linearity).
He will visually check all possible slices of data and summarise the data using appropriate
visualisation and descriptive statistics (such as mean, standard deviation, range, mode,
median) that will help provide a basic understanding of the data. At this stage, the analyst is
already looking for general patterns and actionable insights that can be derived to achieve the
business goal.

Step 3. Analyse the data

At this stage, using statistical analysis methods such as correlation analysis and hypothesis
testing, the analyst will find all factors that are related to the target variable. The analyst will
also perform simple regression analysis to see whether simple predictions can be made. In
addition, different groups are compared using different assumptions and these are tested
using hypothesis testing. Often, it is at this stage that the data is cut, sliced and diced and
different comparisons are made while trying to derive actionable insights from the data.

Step 4. Predict what is likely to happen

Business analytics is about being proactive in decision making. At this stage, the analyst will
model the data using predictive techniques that include decision trees, neural networks and
logistic regression. These techniques will uncover insights and patterns that highlight
relationships and ‘hidden evidences’ of the most influential variables. The analyst will then
compare the predictive values with the actual values and compute the predictive errors.
Usually, several predictive models are ran and the best performing model selected based on
model accuracy and outcomes.

Step 5. Optimise (find the best solution)

At this stage the analyst will apply the predictive model coefficients and outcomes to run
‘what-if’ scenarios, using targets set by managers to determine the best solution, with the
given constraints and limitations. The analyst will select the optimal solution and model
based on the lowest error, management targets and his intuitive recognition of the model
coefficients that are most aligned to the organisation’s strategic goal.

Step 6. Make a decision and measure the outcome

The analyst will then make decisions and take action based on the derived insights from the
model and the organisational goals. An appropriate period of time after this action has been
taken, the outcome of the action is then measured.

Step 7. Update the system with the results of the decision

Finally the results of the decision and action and the new insights derived from the model are
recorded and updated into the database. Information such as, ‘was the decision and action
effective?’, ‘how did the treatment group compare with the control group?’ and ‘what was the
return on investment?’ are uploaded into the database. The result is an evolving database that
is continuously updated as soon as new insights and knowledge are derived.

What Is the Data Analysis Process?

Data analysis starts with identifying a problem that can be solved with data. Once you’ve
identified this problem, you can collect, clean, process, and analyze data. The purpose of
analyzing this data is to identify trends, patterns, and meaningful insights, with the ultimate
goal of solving the original problem.

The Data Analysis Process

Following are the steps to be followed in Data Analysis Process:
Establish the Purpose of the Process
It is considered as the most critical step as it deifnes the purpose of analysis. The purpose is
often defined as a business question or problem statement related to your organization’s
goals. Examples include:

 Would customers respond positively to the launch of X product?

 What are some ways to reduce employee attrition?
 Will incorporating AI tools reduce production costs?

Data Collection
Once the problem has been defined, then you can start collecting data. Broadly speaking,
there are three different categories of data, and the ones you use will depend on the nature of
your problem. Most data analysis problems require a combination of the three.

First-party data : It includes data from one’s own organization. Oftentimes, this is data
about previous customer interactions that can be used to make accurate predictions about
your customers’ behaviour in the future.

Second-party data—data that’s generated by external sources, but is based on one’s own
company precisely. This can include what customers are saying on social media platforms or
review websites.

Third-party data comes from groups like think tanks and government sources and is more
concerned with the nature of one’s customer base, rather than a specific interaction that a
customer has had with the specific company.

Data Cleaning
The data collected by any firm may not be fit to be used ass it is. Rather there will be a need
to discard the data points that are irrelevant, duplicated, inconsistent, or outdated.

This is called data cleaning. When combining multiple sources of data, you’ll likely wind up
with duplicates and outliers. And when you’re dealing with millions of data points, as is often
the case with data analysis, you can’t comb through each piece of data on your own to find
the duplicates or outliers. Data analysts estimate that the time spent cleaning data consumes
about 70-90% of the data analysis process.
At this stage, you can also do an exploratory analysis, which is an initial and cursory data
analysis. Exploratory data analysis will also assist with identifying other data points you may
need.

Data Processing
Once you have all the relevant data, you can begin to process it. This entails organizing the
data, sorting the data into relevant categories, and labeling them for easy organization. Now
the data is prepped for analysis.

Data Analysis
Data analysis can be done in numerous ways. One way is to use algorithms and mathematical
models to manipulate data variables, which helps extract relevant information and valuable
insights that tie into the problem defined in the first step.

Types of Data Analysis

Let’s look at the various data analysis techniques, which can be used in combination,
depending on your problem.

Descriptive Analysis
As the name suggests, descriptive analysis describes or summarizes the data and its
characteristics. It doesn’t go beyond explaining what has happened. You use this type of data
analysis to deliver a narrative of what has occurred. Descriptive statistics and analysis present
scattered data into digestible pointers. You can also do a part of this at the stage of
exploratory data analysis.

Diagnostic Analysis
With diagnostic analysis, you begin to focus on the “why,” and diagnose why something is
occurring. At this stage, you are not looking for solutions or predictions. The goal is to
understand the factors that are contributing to the problem. You use this technique when you
want to go into issue identification mode.

Predictive Analysis
Here’s where you start generating forecasts based on your data. Data analysts
perform predictive analysis when they want to establish a situation in the future. This
prediction helps stakeholders gauge business performance.
Prescriptive Analysis
This kind of analysis brings together all of these data analysis techniques to offer
recommendations. These form the basis of data-driven decisions.

Inferential Analysis
With this technique, you derive conclusions based on the data you have collected and
analyzed, such as, “lack of employee training is a cause of employee attrition” or “employee
attrition affects customer satisfaction.”
Data Engineer vs Data Scientist vs Business Analyst

What makes a data scientist different from a data engineer? Most data engineers can write
machine learning services perfectly well or do complicated data transformation in code. It’s
not the skill that makes them different, it’s the focus: data scientists focus on the statistical
model or the data mining task at hand, data engineers focus on coding, cleaning up data and
implementing the models fine-tuned by the data scientists.

What is the difference between a data scientist and a business/insight/data analyst? Data
scientists can code and understand the tools! Why is that important? With the emergence of
the new tool sets around data, SQL and point & click skills can only get you so far. If you can
do the same in Spark or Cascading your data deep dive will be faster and more accurate than it
will ever be in Hive. Understanding your way around R libraries gives you statistical abilities
most analysts only dream of. On the other hand, business analysts know their subject area very
well and will easily come up with many different subject angles to approach the data.

The focus of a data scientist, what I am looking for when I hire one, should be statistical
knowledge and using coding skills for applied mathematics. Yes, there can be the occasional
unicorn in a very senior data scientist, but I know few junior or mid-level data scientist who
can surpass a data engineer in coding skills. Very few know as much about the business as a
proper business analyst.

Which means you end up with something like this:

Data scientists use their advanced statistical skills to help improve the models the data
engineers implement and to put proper statistical rigour on the data discovery and analysis the
customer is asking for. Essentially the business analyst is just one of many customers — in
mobile gaming most of the questions come from game designers and product designers —
people with a subject matter expertise very few data scientists can ever reach.

But they don’t have to. Occupying the space between engineering and subject matter experts,
data scientists can help both by using skills no one else has without having to be the unicorn.

What Does a Data Scientist Do?

The first role of a data scientist is to understand a business problem. You can only interpret
data after you understand the business problem. A data scientist also gathers raw data—
structured and unstructured—from different sources such as web servers, databases, and
online repositories.

After that, data preparation follows, which includes cleaning the data you’ve gathered and
transforming it into useful data. At this stage, you’ll look for inconsistent data types, missing
or duplicate data types, and misspelled attributes.
Data scientists have to remove these errors to get a comprehensive pile of data, which is why
data preparation is one of the most complicated parts of being a data scientist. Once data
cleaning is done, a data scientist will modify and transform the outcome into readable data
that stakeholders can interpret using the best data visualization methods.

You would also employ exploratory data analytics methods to create models and algorithms
used in data mining from big data stores. A process that includes defining and refining
cleaned data, and selecting features and variables for data mining. Some aspects of data
science require programming, so you’ll need to be familiar with basic programming
languages.

What Does a Data Engineer Do?

The role of a data engineer is pretty straightforward. While a data scientist is responsible for
turning raw data into simple and readable forms, data engineers are responsible for building
systems that help with these modifications.

A data engineer’s job is to take complex datasets from an application or third-party tool and
process them in a way that makes it easy for data analysts and scientists to access and use.
Therefore, data engineers focus on building system infrastructures that help pull data, making
them ready for use by data scientists.

Data extraction is typically done through data pipelines built by data engineers. One of the
ways to pull data is by using API (application programming interface). As a data engineer,
your role is to write a series of codes that make an API call that interacts with the server of
the sources they are pulling the data from.

This way, data collection begins in a streaming fashion or batch process. It is therefore
crucial to understand complex programming languages as a data engineer. The next step in
data engineering is to transform the data to fit your data storage.

The main difference between a data scientist and a data engineer is that the former designs
the model and algorithm for interpreting raw data, while the latter maintains and creates a
system for collecting raw data. A data engineer builds the backbone and infrastructure used in
data science.
1. Education

A data scientist needs a bachelor’s degree in data science or a related field to start their
career. However, most employers prefer an individual with a master’s degree. A graduate
degree can help you stand out.

You may also need to join a data science boot camp to gain some knowledge and experience
in this field. A data scientist also needs a deep understanding of data mining, big data
infrastructure, statistics, and machine learning algorithms.

On the other hand, a data engineer needs to have a strong background in software engineering
and excellent analytical skills from studying applied mathematics, physics, and statistics. For
better exposure, you should also join internship programs where you can practice what you
have learned.

Unlike becoming a data scientist, you don't need a master's degree in data engineering. A
bachelor's degree is sufficient, but you'll need to take courses in data structure, coding, and
database management.

2. Skills

A data scientist needs to hone different skills peculiar to data science. Some of these are data
visualization, data wrangling, mathematics, and programming. You need vast knowledge of Python,
JavaScript, SQL, and Scala for programming. You’ll need them to create models and algorithms.

Meanwhile, a data engineer needs skills like data analysis, data warehouses, basic machine
learning, and knowledge of operating systems. They also need soft skills like communication,
critical thinking, and collaboration skills. A data engineer also needs to be skilled in
programming languages like Java, Python, C, and C++.

Finally, a data engineer needs to be familiar with Python ETL tools and data-pipeline tools
like Fivetran, Talend Open Studio, and IBM DataStage. These ETL tools are very much
needed to extract data from various sites.
3. Salary

According to Indeed, the average base salary for a data scientist is $97,678. This salary range
can go as high as $188,972, including other cash bonuses, profit shares, tips, or commissions.

Most employers in the US offer 401(k) non-cash benefits in addition to offering insurance,
wellness programs, and work-from-home permissions. However, these benefits depend on
your employer and your level of experience.

Conversely, data engineers make an average base salary of $112,680, according to Indeed,
which can go as high as $218,627 yearly. They can also enjoy privileges like an employee
discount, insurance, and non-cash benefits like 401(k) and 401(k) matching. These benefits
also depend on your employer, experience level, job role, and qualifications.

4. Experience

You can apply for entry-level roles with at least a year of experience in data science.
However, you’ll need to have switched from a related field like information technology to
perform well in these roles.

But if you’re starting from scratch, earning a master’s degree and getting relevant experience
as a data scientist would earn you better positions. Therefore, to become a full-fledged data
scientist, you’ll need around 3-5 years of quality experience working in internship roles and
as an entry-level data scientist.

A data engineer also has at least one year of experience to get an entry-level role after a
bachelor’s degree in data engineering. However, these roles are usually rare. You can also
switch from a data-related role to data engineering. But you’ll need 4-5 years of relevant
experience to get better jobs as a data engineer.

5. Career Opportunities

There are rich career opportunities for data scientists based on your experience. Top-rated
companies like Meta, Ford Motor Company, and HP employ the expertise of data scientists.
They will also find opportunities in health, academia, information, and the government.
A data engineer also has career opportunities that widen according to their experience level.
Companies like Netflix, Apple, and Capital need data engineers to assist data scientists. Data
engineers work in large companies and in business-related fields. They also fit into academia
and information and technology; anywhere that requires data handling.

Choosing the Right Career Path for You

Both careers are rich and solid. They provide maximum exposure and allow you to work with
top-rated companies. However, you need to do your homework to find the perfect data-
related career. It would also help to write down your interests, so you can choose a career that
resonates with your goals.

Data Engineer

The role of a data engineer is pretty straightforward. While a data scientist is responsible for
turning raw data into simple and readable forms, data engineers are responsible for building
systems that help with these modifications.

A data engineer’s job is to take complex datasets from an application or third-party tool and
process them in a way that makes it easy for data analysts and scientists to access and use.
Therefore, data engineers focus on building system infrastructures that help pull data, making
them ready for use by data scientists.

Data extraction is typically done through data pipelines built by data engineers. One of the
ways to pull data is by using API (application programming interface). As a data engineer,
your role is to write a series of codes that make an API call that interacts with the server of
the sources they are pulling the data from.

This way, data collection begins in a streaming fashion or batch process. It is therefore
crucial to understand complex programming languages as a data engineer. The next step in
data engineering is to transform the data to fit your data storage.

The main difference between a data scientist and a data engineer is that the former designs
the model and algorithm for interpreting raw data, while the latter maintains and creates a
system for collecting raw data. A data engineer builds the backbone and infrastructure used in
data science.
1. Education

A data scientist needs a bachelor’s degree in data science or a related field to start their
career. However, most employers prefer an individual with a master’s degree. A graduate
degree can help you stand out.

You may also need to join a data science boot camp to gain some knowledge and experience
in this field. A data scientist also needs a deep understanding of data mining, big data
infrastructure, statistics, and machine learning algorithms.

On the other hand, a data engineer needs to have a strong background in software engineering
and excellent analytical skills from studying applied mathematics, physics, and statistics. For
better exposure, you should also join internship programs where you can practice what you
have learned.

Unlike becoming a data scientist, you don't need a master's degree in data engineering. A
bachelor's degree is sufficient, but you'll need to take courses in data structure, coding, and
database management.

2. Skills

A data scientist needs to hone different skills peculiar to data science. Some of these are data
visualization, data wrangling, mathematics, and programming. You need vast knowledge of
Python, JavaScript, SQL, and Scala for programming. You’ll need them to create models and
algorithms.

Meanwhile, a data engineer needs skills like data analysis, data warehouses, basic machine
learning, and knowledge of operating systems. They also need soft skills like communication,
critical thinking, and collaboration skills. A data engineer also needs to be skilled in
programming languages like Java, Python, C, and C++.

Finally, a data engineer needs to be familiar with Python ETL tools and data-pipeline tools
like Fivetran, Talend Open Studio, and IBM DataStage. These ETL tools are very much
needed to extract data from various sites.
3. Salary

According to Indeed, the average base salary for a data scientist is $97,678. This salary range
can go as high as $188,972, including other cash bonuses, profit shares, tips, or commissions.

Most employers in the US offer 401(k) non-cash benefits in addition to offering insurance,
wellness programs, and work-from-home permissions. However, these benefits depend on
your employer and your level of experience.

Conversely, data engineers make an average base salary of $112,680, according to Indeed,
which can go as high as $218,627 yearly. They can also enjoy privileges like an employee
discount, insurance, and non-cash benefits like 401(k) and 401(k) matching. These benefits
also depend on your employer, experience level, job role, and qualifications.

4. Experience

You can apply for entry-level roles with at least a year of experience in data science.
However, you’ll need to have switched from a related field like information technology to
perform well in these roles.

But if you’re starting from scratch, earning a master’s degree and getting relevant experience
as a data scientist would earn you better positions. Therefore, to become a full-fledged data
scientist, you’ll need around 3-5 years of quality experience working in internship roles and
as an entry-level data scientist.

A data engineer also has at least one year of experience to get an entry-level role after a
bachelor’s degree in data engineering. However, these roles are usually rare. You can also
switch from a data-related role to data engineering. But you’ll need 4-5 years of relevant
experience to get better jobs as a data engineer.

5. Career Opportunities

There are rich career opportunities for data scientists based on your experience. Top-rated
companies like Meta, Ford Motor Company, and HP employ the expertise of data scientists.
They will also find opportunities in health, academia, information, and the government.
A data engineer also has career opportunities that widen according to their experience level.
Companies like Netflix, Apple, and Capital need data engineers to assist data scientists. Data
engineers work in large companies and in business-related fields. They also fit into academia
and information and technology; anywhere that requires data handling.

Data analysts and data scientists

One of the biggest differences between data analysts and scientists is what they do with data.

Data analysts typically work with structured data to solve tangible business problems using
tools like SQL, R or Python programming languages, data visualization software, and statistical
analysis. Common tasks for a data analyst might include:
 Collaborating with organizational leaders to identify informational needs
 Acquiring data from primary and secondary sources
 Cleaning and reorganizing data for analysis
 Analyzing data sets to spot trends and patterns that can be translated into actionable
insights
 Presenting findings in an easy-to-understand way to inform data-driven decisions

Data scientists often deal with the unknown by using more advanced data techniques to make
predictions about the future. They might automate their own machine learning algorithms or
design predictive modeling processes that can handle both structured and unstructured data.
This role is generally considered a more advanced version of a data analyst. Some day-to-day
tasks might include:
 Gathering, cleaning, and processing raw data
 Designing predictive models and machine learning algorithms to mine big data sets
 Developing tools and processes to monitor and analyze data accuracy
 Building data visualization tools, dashboards, and reports
 Writing programs to automate data collection and processing
Business Analytics in Practice

In simple terms, business analytics is a method used to convert business data into insights.
This data is collected from various sources, and processed by experts using different
methodologies to draw meaningful conclusions. Today, businesses use high-tech software
and tools for this process.
8 Uses or Applications of Business Analytics
Now that you have a brief idea of what business analytics means, lets look at how business
analytics is used in different fields with some real examples.

1. Business Analytics In Retail

When it comes to shopping online or creating an outstanding in-store experience, how do
experts use analytics? Is it limited to using customer information to create relevant ads?
Fortunately, it isn’t. Targeting customers using data to increase sales is common but not
unusual. Now, businesses are taking it a step ahead.

Zara Adding the ‘Fast’ in Fast Fashion

Zara does not have a fancy strategy or even a budget for marketing. Yet, it is one of the
world’s leading fast fashion retail brands. So, how has Zara established itself as a
frontrunner? The secret lies in making sense of all the data available. While other brands take
a minimum of 2-3 weeks to sketch new designs, Zara is able to sketch, design, produce, and
send all garments to the racks within two weeks.

One way Zara approaches big data analytics is by collecting data from Instagram, surveys,
and social media. All of this data is stored in the central nervous system to understand their
customers’ fashion sensibility in every market. Then, it is compiled in its data center, and
analysts work 24 hours a day to process data to drive new design releases. By knowing its
customers inside out, Zara can produce fashion that becomes a trend as soon as it reaches its
stores.

2. Business Analytics in Banking

Once upon a time, customers dreaded visiting banks due to the long waiting time, time-
consuming processes, and poor customer service. However, with analytics, a few banks have
started enhancing their services to improve the overall experience.

Bank of America A Virtual Step to Serve its Customers

Using its customer data, Bank of America identified that most customers visit the bank daily
just to check their transaction histories and get information about upcoming payments. To
help out customers with such activities, this bank set up a virtual assistant that helps
customers view transaction histories or details on pending bills. So, primarily, it uses data to
provide quick answers and save customers time.

3. Business Analytics In Food & Beverage Industry

With the sudden surge in online delivery and the availability of multiple options, restaurants
are struggling to retain their customers. However, some fast-food chains have been able to
elevate the customer experience digitally without affecting its sales negatively.

McDonald’s From mass-promotion to mass-personalization

McDonald’s has moved on from regular menus to digital screens, where they have complete
control of how, when, and what they show to customers. The food and beverage information
displayed on these screens is decided based on business analysis. This fast-food company
identifies which meals are more relevant, more timely, and have a considerable customer-
appeal. Plus, it personalizes the on-screen content to the individual or based on what’s
trending. This data-driven menu and personalized offers have helped McDonald’s to hold its
position in the market.

4. Business Analytics In Transportation

When it comes to using data in transportation, it is not just limited to analyzing the traffic
patterns and finding the fastest route possible. Now, transportation services are using data to
take their services up by a notch.

Uber Using Data to Identify Look-alike Trips

Uber uses its algorithms to identify rides that start near a similar pickup point, end near, and
are happening around the same time as another ride. This data enables Uber to cater to
passengers willing to have a similar journey but by paying less. This is where Ubers Pool
feature comes into play. Thanks to this car-pooling service, Uber can serve many people at
once, ensure its drivers are occupied, and eventually reduce its overall carbon footprint.
5. Business Analytics in Human Resource Management
The most significant trend in HRM is datafication: using the power of data to transform a
range of HR processes. Technological improvements have made it possible for HR
departments to access and analyze raw data in ways that wouldnt have been possible so long
ago.

Nissan Identifying Talent Using its USP

Nissan is a big name in the world of motorsport. To recruit the new talent, it chose to go to
what is known for doing the best: racing. Through an unconventional recruiting medium,
Nissan decided to hire people using racing video games. This motorsport company partnered
with Sony to create the GT Academy, an annual contest designed to find the best gaming
racers. The objective behind this recruitment channel is to find the best racers and turn them
into real-life racing drivers. Every year thousands of hopeful racers enter the contest. The
winners selected in the past few years are still racing, proving what a useful recruitment
channel this has been for Nissan.

6. Business Analytics in Entertainment

With the internet consumption higher than ever before, entertainment businesses are coming
up with innovative ways to engage its audience and create a more substantial customer base.
The show-biz industry is ready to go all out from creating platform Originals to selecting
shows and movies with more than just a mass appeal.

Netflix Using Data to Increase Watch Time

With over 148 million streaming subscribers worldwide as of 2018, Netflix is a force to be
reckoned with. To stay ahead of its competitors like Amazon Prime and ensure subscribers
dont cancel, Netflix needs methods to increase a users average time spent on the platform.
For instance, the company knows if each user watches 15 hours of content each month, they
are 75% less likely to cancel. To ensure users complete this time, Netflix uses data to enable
post-play, which automatically plays the next episode of a TV show unless the user opts out.
This automatic suggestion does not only encourage users to spend more time but also helps
Netflix understand audience preferences.
7. Business Analytics in E-commerce
Have you ever spoken about a product with someone and out-of-nowhere see the same
recommendation in an app? This does sound somewhat spooky, but it is how e-commerce
giants use predictive and behavioral analytics to understand their customers.

Amazon Using Target Marketing to Enhance Customer Satisfaction

Amazon analyzes what items you purchased previously, your online shopping cart and on
your wish list, your product reviews and ratings, and your search history. For example, when
you add a book to your online shopping cart, similar books purchased by other customers are
also recommended. In this way, Amazon uses the power of suggestion to encourage you to
buy on impulse to increase its sales and satisfy your shopping experience. The aim is to
always leave you with something more than what you expected.

8. Business Analytics in Education

Recently, universities have started using data analytics to gather and update student data
profiles using multiple data points. This includes financial information, academic
performance, demographics, and more.

The University of Alabama Using Predictive Analytics to Reduce Drop out Rates
Using analytics, this university found that students who asked for copies of their transcripts
are at risk of leaving the university. This information helps administrators recognize students
who put in such a request and work towards providing them with even better academic and
campus resources to ensure they stay.

Career in Business Analytics

Top-tier companies usually hire full-time business analysts, while small to mid-level
companies may opt to employ them as business advisors or business consultants due to
budgetary constraints.
LinkedIn data shows that the top companies hiring business analysts in India are Tata
Consultancy Services (TCS), Accenture, Cognizant, Deloitte, American Express,
Evalueserve, Ernst & Young, Amazon, and Flipkart. This data also shows that the major
industries hiring analysts include Information Technology and services, Financial Services,
Computer Software, Management Consulting, Banking, Marketing and Advertising, Internet,
Retail, Market Research and Human Resources.
As far as remuneration is concerned, Business Analysts are some of the highest-paid
professionals in the corporate ecosystem. According to recent industry salary studies, the
average base salary for a business analyst in India is INR 6,44,857 per year. However, this is
just an entry-level estimate, with most analysts earning up to INR 12,00,000 per year,
especially those who are adept at the latest BA software and tools. When it comes to the
higher end of the spectrum, established analysts with the right professional experience can
take home something between INR 25,00,000 to INR 40,00,000 annually.

Business Analytics represents a golden opportunity for young professionals to switch to the
strategic side of the business. While this does involve a lot of hard work and meeting
manager/client expectations, it is also a highly paid and well-reputed job that carries with it a
lot of responsibility and ownership.

This holds especially true in a developing country like India, where businesses are quickly
scaling up to establish themselves at the international level. In order to do this, they need to
rely heavily on Business Analysts to help the company pave the right path to future success.