The Layered Look – Stylin’ Your Data Wardrobe

This post is part of the Talk Data to Me series exploring relationships—the data and business intelligence type.

I loathe the cold. LOATHE IT.

The last couple weeks of winter weather have been brutal, slapping much of the United States with snow, freezing temperatures and plenty of flu to go around. We bundle up and brace it, piling on layers of Under Armor, boots, hats, scarves, gloves and maybe even slipper socks for extra warmth (you know who you are). I feel an analogy coming on, so humor me.

Despite the fact that our grounds are still white with snow, we all know that in a month’s time, spring will greet us with sunshine and warmer days where we’ll actually want to be outside! With this change of seasons, we start making adjustments to our attire as well. A misty day may call for an extra layer of a rain jacket, a windy day, a hoodie, a warmer day, a t-shirt with a jacket (just in case). Figuring out which layers to wear requires a little bit of preparation and awareness.

Your association’s membership database is a lot like our seasonal apparel. It’s layered with data about each of your members: demographics, engagement and buying habits, certifications, training and event participation, monetary donations, and plenty other insightful data “garments.” To uncover which layers are most valuable, it’s important that your association focus on understanding your members—learning about their unique stories and exploring their past, present and futures, their values and aspirations… Essentially, discovering the humanity residing in the data.

Data discovery is however an area where many associations get stuck. Perhaps these challenges resonate with your experience. You’re unsure about which data elements will be the most valuable for helping achieve membership goals and business objectives. Or, your team is lacking the right person or people who can move the process forward and deliver the actionable knowledge you need to make better, smarter or more effective decisions.

A recent Forbes article¹ by Allison Hartsoe, a digital analytics expert and consultant, put it this way. “Most companies are sitting on a horde of untapped customer insights…despite all this promise, there remains a huge gap in analytics leadership and vision.”

Hartsoe suggests executive leadership in data is a unique opportunity and career path…Ready and waiting for women to take the lead. Consider this quote from her Forbes’ article:

When a woman exercises executive leadership in data, she blends instinct and science. She thinks of people before page views. She wants to know who is a good customer and who is a bad customer and what those groups have in common. She wants marketing and operations to respond appropriately to these groups. She also considers how to move more mediocre customers into the valuable group.

These are smart, intuitive qualities I’m sure any association would value in its leadership, no matter the gender (although I’m in full support of more female executives). The challenge for associations right now is creating and recognizing the need for this role in the first place.

Hartsoe goes on to say that when executives apply pressure, people step up, engage more, use the tools that have gone underutilized, and data connections take shape. This provides customer or member-centric insight your association can use to measure results and devise a strategy.

Business intelligence at its finest… Data stylin’ in the real world.

At ACGI, we’ve seen how associations use business intelligence to gain valuable insights into their operations and members. Four things are needed to make this happen:

• Centralized data – it seems obvious, but often when we’re sitting down with prospective customers we find they struggle to make sense of disparate data throughout their organizations. So, yes, if you want to find those insights, you need access to allyour operational and member data in one place.
• Strategy or vision – this is where executive leadership comes into play. Someone has to recognize the potential for improvement or transformation, and be willing to fund the effort to bring the discovery and analysis to life. This is an executive or board-level function.
• Data analysis tools – you’ve got data, you’ve got vision. Put that data to work. Data analysis and data visualization tools will let you rapidly analyze your data, test business models and present findings in various formats to prompt understanding and action.
• Data analyst – even though tools like BusinessObjects, which is incorporated into Association Anywhere for business intelligence/data discovery, are easy to use, a power user with a good understanding of your organization’s data structure is a useful resource who can collaborate with executives and other business leaders in your organization to refine reporting and accelerate discovery.

So what are your association’s business intelligence challenges? Are you still trying to figure out which data “garments” are most valuable? In need of an executive leader to step up and guide your team to make wiser decisions with your data? For answers to these questions and additional BI insights, stay tuned and follow the Talk Data to Me series as we check in with executives and data analysts about their experiences pursuing the power of data discovery. We’ll be sharing on Twitter @ACGISoftware, #TalkData2Me.

Sources: Forbes¹