2011 Readers' Choice: Demand Data Analytics
Activity in the Demand Data Analytics market is on the rise as consumer goods companies are trying to define outside-in processes, and retailer data is paramount to accomplishing this goal. As for the rankings, Oracle and Teradata jumped a number of spots on this year’s list, and we can guestimate that this is due to their DSR offerings. According to Altimeter Group Partner Lora Cecere, there is one major omission on this list and that’s IBM, which acquired data warehouse vendor Netezza as well as web analytics solution and services provider Coremetrics last year. Here, Cecere offers some additional perspective on the state of this growing market.CGT: What trends do you see in this area that will impact the CG industry? Which ones are worth exploring?
Cecere: We are slowly starting to see the use of downstream data, but it’s primarily in pilots. We are also starting to see the growth of the enterprise data warehouse (EDW) market in consumer products. I expect to see more growth in predictive analytics to use the data in 2011 and the consolidation of the technologies that use downstream data to produce sales reports for sales account teams.
CGT: What obstacles may be holding CG companies back from large scale deployments in this area?
Cecere: We are still in a pilot phase. I keep waiting for companies to take the leap of faith and redesign and redefine their systems in order to become more demand-driven.
There are three primary issues: Change management and the redesign of supply chain processes to use downstream data in supply chain processes; the evolution of predictive analytics to use the downstream data; and the redesign of processes from the outside-in. Companies that are the most advanced in the use of downstream data report savings within six weeks and incremental return on investment each additional six weeks. As a result, these leaders are building data sharing programs into bracket pricing programs with retailers.
BREAKOUT FAVORITES
Customer Experience: Shiloh Technologies
“Shiloh customer support is professional, courteous and responsive. They are knowledgeable and dedicated when resolving our service requests. They have helped us maximize Shiloh to its full intended use. We can rely on them in all instances.” -- Joel Pambid, Manager, Sales Planning & Analysis, Sony Computer Entertainment America
SMB Market: The Nielsen Company
A recent joint venture, Nielsen Catalina Solutions, aims to help consumer goods packaged companies match the right audience with the right media by leveraging purchase data from the world’s largest frequent-shopper database — more than 60 million households.