Big Predictions for Big Data

Oh, yes, it’s holiday list time. We found a great one, “Four Things Big Data Needs for the Holidays” where author Howard Baldwin rounds up some research and articles and “gifts” us the highlights of what Big Data needs:

1. Press/public relations. Big Data needs better marketing within organizations to explain the “value proposition” of why it is good for businesses and to overcome institutional resistance to change.
2. Big data analytics have to prove relevance. Discipline, parameters, collecting and coding can harness large amounts of data to make them applicable to business goals. “Adding an incrementally higher level of insight to analytics potentially means adding more certainty to the result.”
3. Perspective and personalization. Big data is for the big picture. Enterprise-wide solutions (not silo) need to be enacted to maintain perspective on how big data solutions impact business goals and enhance customer retention and nurturing through personalization.
4. “Patience.” Starting and stopping big data solutions will yield bad results. Companies have to commit to big data processes for the long term; and test, analyze and repeat/fine-tune its use to improve their overall marketing strategy.

And while we’re projecting into the New Year, Al Urbanski shares some insights from a recent International Data Corporation (IDC) report, which bolster our beliefs about Big Data—that it will continue to get bigger. “Spending on data-related software, hardware, and services will hit $125 billion. Rich media analytics surrounding video and audio campaigns will drive more Big Data projects, and Data as a Service (DaaS) offerings will grow in number and importance.” IDC also predicts that the Cloud services (with sales of $120 billion) will become more crowded, but with more services launching and new partnerships emerging to serve it. China will be a stronger force, in retail in particular, in the upcoming Year of the Goat.
The best thing about year-end and holiday roundup advice lists is that they are useful all year long. Keeping Big Data at the top of the New Year’s resolutions will keep marketing strategies and company goals in line.