Category: Business

Cloud-hosted services square up

Running your business requires choosing the right tools for you and your employees. In order to streamline work-related productivity, many organizations are migrating to cloud-based office suites. Specifically, Microsoft’s Office 365 and Google’s GSuite (now known as Google Workspace).

Both products boast a variety of helpful productivity tools and the latest remote collaboration technologies. While it’s impossible to say which one is “better”. This head-to-head comparison can help you decide which office suite is a better fit for your business.

What is Workspace & Office 365?

Office 365 and Workspace (previously GSuite) are packages, of powerful business tools that facilitate your day-to-day tasks using the cloud. They even provide business emails along with apps for creating documents, spreadsheets, presentations, video conference calls, shared calendars, and notes.

In addition, storing information on Google or Microsoft servers, rather than your own via these suites, can also save your business a lot of money.

Plans and Pricing

First, let’s look at plans and prices. It’s important to note that Microsoft requires an annual commitment, while Google offers you the option to make monthly payments if you prefer.

Contact us to get a formal quote for your business

Cloud packages head-to-head

Email

While both Office 365 and Workspace offer web and mobile apps (Outlook and Gmail, respectively) for email. There are, however, some subtle differences.

One advantage to Office 365 is the desktop version of Outlook, which is incredibly feature-rich and lets you sort and group emails with ease. Gmail, on the other hand, is widely used throughout the world. For this reason, a variety of third-party app options (e.g. WordPress) can be linked to it to enhance its capabilities.

Cloud Data Storage

For the entry-level plans, Office 365 Business Essentials wins out with 1 TB (terabyte) of storage per user, while the Workspace ‘Basic’ plan only offers 30 GB. GSuite includes emails in this storage limit, whereas Office 365 provides extra storage for email files with added archiving.

However, Workspace’s upgraded plans beat out most of Microsoft’s storage offerings. So long as your business has more than five employees, Workspace Business and Enterprise provides unlimited cloud storage. Although, businesses with less than 5 employees on the “Business” plan are capped at 1 TB. Only Microsoft’s E3 plan and higher offer the same unlimited cloud storage.

Applications

Applications are the cornerstones of a suite’s functionality. Workspace and Office 365 offer you a variety of comparable apps for word processing, creating spreadsheets and presentations, all on the cloud!

This means every user gets a free desktop version of the Office suite (i.e. Microsoft Word, Excel) to download.

These feature-rich apps expand far beyond the capabilities of the mobile and online versions, and are available on every plan except the ‘Business Essentials’.

While both services offer mobile and online apps, one major benefit of Office 365 are its desktop applications.

Collaboration

These online applications make both suites ideal for remote collaboration. Microsoft Teams lets facilitate this with tools like real-time co-authoring, mentioning users by name and chat capabilities while working on OneDrive. Microsoft now lets you collaborate using its desktop apps, too, although the updates to shared files are a bit sluggish compared to its online apps.

Similarly, GSuite offers Hangouts for chats and Google Drive for real-time collaboration. Google’s online and mobile apps were created with cloud collaboration in mind, so some might find them a bit more user-friendly.

For remote meetings, GSuite and Office 365 both offer group video conference calls. If you plan on large-scale video conferences, then Office 365 offers far more for your money: most plans have a 250-participant limit, while the E3 plan increases to an astounding 10,000-person limit.

Meanwhile, GSuite’s Google Meet allows up to 25 participants on the “Basic” plan, 50 on the “Business” plan, and 100 on the “Enterprise” plan.

Security

Cloud services are running into a variety of security issues, and these suites are no exception.

A 2019 Barracuda Networks’ report found that a large percent of ATO (account takeover) attacks were targeted at Microsoft Office 365 accounts after businesses migrated emails to the service.

These attacks prompted the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to issue a set of best practices. The aim was to help organizations migrate their email services while avoiding risks and vulnerabilities.

Meanwhile, Google recently announced that a cloud storage feature for encrypted passwords on its “Enterprise” plans was faulty. As a result, some user passwords were stored in plaintext on Google’s servers!

While cloud computing has its risks, the two suites do have impressive security features. GSuite is comparable to Google’s own level of security and offers AI detection of suspicious activity, Two-Factor authentication, and data leak protection—in which admins can block outgoing communication determined by set keywords.

On the other hand, Office 365 has the option of Multiple Factor Authentication (MFA), along with the detection of malware, viruses, and suspicious activities. Microsoft also provides data loss protection, and admins can restrict access to company-issued devices only.

Ease of Use

So, which is easier to use? Well, it depends on who you are, and your ability to grasp software quickly.

If you’re accustomed to working with MS Word or Excel documents, and edit them for work on a regular basis, then Office 365 and its desktop-to-online formatting compatibility will probably be your best bet. This is especially true if your company solely computes with Windows PCs.

However, new users might find GSuite apps easier to learn, as the tools are a bit simpler and straightforward.

So, which is best for you?

Firstly, Office 365 offers feature-rich apps, and most of its plans come with a desktop version of MS Office applications. This is a definite advantage over its competitors.

Its entry-level plan is far more generous in terms of data storage than GSuite’s “Basic” plan. In addition, businesses that already exclusively use Windows technology are likely to find Office 365 better-suited for their needs.

With that said, GSuite was originally designed as a cloud collaborative productivity tool. Therefore, its features might be easier for collaboration and can be used among a wider variety of Windows and Mac devices. In addition, GSuite’s Business’ plans and above outdoes Microsoft when it comes to unlimited cloud file storage. <- This has changed since the article was first published.

Unfortunately, I can’t tell you which of the two is “best.” But, with this knowledge in mind, you can make an informed decision to choose the best cloud suite for you.

3 June 2019
Smoother Online Shopping

As a small online business, it makes sense to ensure that what you are selling is very easy to access. This is especially important when offering something that is common. The purchasing process should be practical and aesthetically pleasing to your clients.

Your online shopping cart software creates that important connection between you and your customers. It must therefore help you achieve three goals:

-Deliver the best and most secure experience for your users;

-Make it simple and desirable for them to complete transactions;

–Minimize common ecommerce hurdles (such as shopping cart abandonment).

Customers expect consistency, reliability, and speed. Most users are now accustomed to the speeds facilitated by broadband Wi-Fi and omnipresent LTE mobile networks.

Research indicates that 78 percent of ecommerce consumers completed a purchase on their mobile device in 2016.

This percentage has probably increased since then. Therefore, delivering experiences that embrace mobile best practices has to be one of your primary concerns as you choose a solution.

Some other salient things a good online shopping cart solution should pay attention to:

TRUSTis obviously a huge part of establishing a valuable relationship. Your shopping cart software is an extension of your brand, and your buyers must trust it with their personal and financial information.

As buyers avoid using direct credit card purchases (due to increasing fraud and data breaches) in favour of more secure methods. Your company must be prepared to offer new payment options.

Customers appreciate the SECURITY and ease of mobile wallet payments, such as Apple Pay and Google Pay. This is because they can complete purchases using a single-use virtual credit card number.

Give them the ability to use these alternative payments and if possible, do not exclude Cryptocurrency!

It would also need to link up to your MARKETING and customer service platforms to provide a holistic customer experience.

Naturally, you also want a system that tracks product sales and customer activity with as much detail as possible, and that can also sort transaction data across a multitude of categories.

So, where does one get such software?

Read more about how to get a good shopping cart software here.

7 May 2019
Open Banking – too exposed?

As a human race, we are constantly striving for easier ways of doing things: simpler, faster, and more practical. Thanks to better tech, you can now interact with people globally and instantly with the click of a few buttons.

Likewise, you can also physically move quickly due to advances in transportation technology. When it comes to the age-old practice of banking – the same is now happening.

Provided you have the necessities, a passport, residential address and a mobile phone, you can now open a bank account within minutes. This is brought about by a Fintech offering better known as Open Banking.

Open banking uses APIs that enable third-party developers to build applications and services around the financial institution.
Wikipedia

It is ultimately about giving you a better, secure, and flawless service experience. This comes with the opportunity to gain access to excellent financial products.

Online security expert and Chairwoman of Zortrex, Susan Brown reflects on the advent of the new offering:

“Just over a year ago when Open Banking came into the limelight for the Fintech world. CMA9 were effectively mandated to make their banking platform accessible for third party companies.”

A comprehensive global report commissioned by Accenture emphatically highlighted growth and talking points about the emerging industry in 2017.

MS Office package

This is all wonderful, innovative, and promotes transparency within the financial services market. There is only one drawback:

“Consumers really do not know what Open Banking means, there has been a lot published about the benefits that are to be had from Open Banking. At the same time, consumers have become very aware of the negative aspects around sharing their data.”

Scourge of hacks & breaches

Daily, you hear more and more about hacks, and data compromises. With the UK’s Lloyds Bank breach last year; the trust by its consumers to share their financial and personal information, some would say, is completely gone.

In addition, you go onto a site to review products and before you know it, you are bombarded with adverts on the products that you have been looking at elsewhere. This has led some consumers to abandon shopping carts and refrain from using online retailers.

If not adequately protected, the newly established Fintech system might suffer a similar data breaches.

Visa and Mastercard for one, are among the established firms threatened by Open (Mobile) Banking. And so, they should be according to Brown.

“As consumers knowledge grows about their data and the security around their financial data has not been secure as shown with the Marriott hack.”

Naturally, new systems pose a huge threat for banks. They become the digital gateway channel connection to the financial sector. This eliminates the direct relationship between consumers and banks.

This is not a bad thing as banks are overwhelmed and cannot always keep in touch with everyone.

An added layer of protection

The solution for failing global acceptance would be for a new Fintech company to gain the trust of its new customers. They would naturally also be able to chip away at the market share of other expensive financial institutions.

What you as a consumer know and want is privacy and security. Currently, only banks can make this happen – but at a high cost.

With a new digital tokenisation system like Zortrex vault, you can concurrently let your consumers reap the awards on their transactions.

They can as a result, gain redeemable tokens for patronising your services. This can occur while both you and your partners offer them products globally.

“Don’t be a gateway for the challenger banks be in control of your omni channel for your consumers,” Brown advises

Read more about Zortrex’s solution to privacy here.

This contains excerpts from Susan Brown about Open Banking initially published on her LinkedIn page.

15 April 2019
Sell easily with the aid of smart tech
Practical online software can – without a shadow of a doubt – help your business (large enterprise or Start-up) get on top of its operations.

The most common operational tasks most of us use are sales and customer support. Though very important they cannot, however, be used in isolation to other business processes.

There are also other ‘bits’ and ‘bobs’ that can be built-in or integrated to ensure that your business processes are fully automated. And automation saves you time and therefore, money!

Core operations that a good ERP can manage for your business are not limited to the following:
- Sales (the lifeblood of your business)
- Customer Support (now extended to Customer Engagement)
- Accounting and Finance (all your banking, invoicing, payments and taxation)
- Supply chain and logistics management (Cataloguing, Inventory, stock management, warehousing, storage and deliveries)
- Retail (B2B, eCommerce, Point of Sales)
- Human Resources (Staffing, holiday bookings, Salaries and wages, recruitment).
- Marketing (Branding, campaign management, targeted ads etc.)
Can you imagine these have been in use since the industrial revolution and the introduction of chain stores?

Trade with IQOption

ERP is the abbreviation for Enterprise Resource Planning and is basically the software your business uses on PCs/cashier systems, scanners, and all points of sale devices.

One of a kind

We identified and reviewed a specialized ERP called SmartSaleERP. It is an integrated tech platform targeted for retail business owners to help you get in control of your business.

Granted, there are hundreds of ERP solutions out there including those from known brands such as Microsoft Dynamics, Salesforce, Zoho etc.

A distinguishing feature on SmartSaleERP however, is the kind of technology they use over and above the traditional features and user interfaces (UI).

This ‘edge’ comes from the use of biometric and smartcard tech to provide you with a better customer/user experience. The sales experience can be derived from both the customer and the business side.

Read the full feature to find out more about this distinct ERP here.
2 April 2019
Digital Dribs & DApps!

We have barely scratched the surface with the Internet (from the early eighties) and it is already seemingly being threatened with the competition. A possible replacement by a new phenomenon.

Well, for lack of a better word, “replaced” has connotations of a dying Internet. This is far from accurate. This new phenomenon – fostered by blockchain technology, will change the way we use and consume the Internet as a service.

So, what is this new Internet-like system creating waves online? And why is it making online marketers quiver at the prospect of them losing out on the exponential revenues they have previously enjoyed?

Well, without hyping it up any further, it is called Distributed Applications or ‘DApps’ for short.

A brief history of Apps

Before we delve further into its meaning and use in the cyber world, perhaps some background context is required.

The way we use online or mobile applications software or “Apps” has changed how we consume products and services online. Companies jumped onto the bandwagon when they discovered that we mostly use Smartphones for the Internet.

App developers were then subsequently sought after to create mobile Apps for practically anything. What started as something mainly for gamers moved quickly onto applications for practically any commercial activity.

We now use Apps for our shopping; fitness; traveling; online bookings and banking. Developers now create customized software to help us with practically, anything.

In addition, we now have App stores for every significant tech provider – Microsoft, Google, and Apple to mention a few. This has naturally fattened the pockets of software companies and created an additional stream of income for them.

The ‘catch’ for using mobile apps is that even though it costs you nothing to download, using them still requires you to register with your personal details. You can also do this by linkingyour existing social media accounts.

The benefit to App providers

These Apps, which are integrated with social media services, create a data goldmine for marketers to study and track browsing habits. Through them, marketers can gain valuable insights into your interests and then customize their products/services to sell to you.

The impetus behind a distributed application system is that it serves to distribute plow some of the wealth garnered from your data via application providers back to you.

Data mining has become more lucrative and accessible because of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning. Do you ever notice how after browsing online or having a conversation or a chat application like WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger? You go online later, and you see Ads displaying the items you discussed? Creepy isn’t it? Well, that is the future of Web 4.0 for you!

Staying ‘woke’

Luckily for us, there is a school of knowledgeable and security-conscious programmers who are not ‘giving in’. They help us understand how the Internet has become a cesspool for marketers to harvest our data. Social media platforms, search engine providers, and mobile application providers facilitate them immensely with this.

Image Courtesy of blockgeeks

Imagine getting paid to surf the web for hours. The way you get paid for taking on a survey, partaking in a social experiment, donating an organ or sperm?

This is the way distributed apps are touted to work. They reward you for the use of specific applications (in a peer-to-peer review setting) with cashable tokens. Seems only fair right?

Now you can imagine how companies like Cambridge Analytica would react to having to pay you for their use of your data. They would surely be reluctant and that’s why they preferred to work clandestinely. But if they could pay companies like Facebook for the use of data, why not pay us directly?

Early adoption

Joining the ‘DApps revolution’ is a no-brainer. Those at the forefront of building and supporting DApps will end up with a more substantial chunk of the market.

DApps primarily provide you with the use of payment systems. These are specifically known as Smart Contracts and Proof of Work systems.

There are currently also web-browsers (built as DApps on blockchain platforms such as Ethereum or EOS) that will reward you for merely using their DApps.

For instance, you are rewarded in cashable tokens to surf the net over applications like Google Chrome, or Mozilla Firefox.

It is only a matter of time that this form of Internet-browsing and use of applications becomes the norm.

The Internet revolutionized the way we communicate, socialize, learn, shop, and do business online. DApps however, will determine the way you get compensated for doing the things you love to do online.

11 December 2018
3D Copy and Paste!

The bizarre-sounding digital printing phenomena called 3D-Printing has been mulling around from the past. Recently, has been in the limelight; specifically in the press for the wrong reasons.

Read about the new craze and get ideas for Xmas via 3D Copy and Paste!

15 November 2018
Digital Fundraising

The latest abbreviation in the finance and crypto-world is ‘ICO’. This word, however, gives global financial authorities like the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) nightmares for several reasons.

Not to be confused with Initial Public Offering (IPO) which is used by firms to raise cash through the issuing of shares to the public. An ICO (Initial Coin Offering) works like crowdfunding, but for digital currency and tokens.

We recently covered a feature on raising funds and capital for a business but missed out on one relatively new method. Many companies are using ICOs to raise capital for their businesses.

Why ICOs?

The concept of an ICO works similarly to how a company raises capital through shares in that it is all based on contrived value.

Funding raising in effect boils down to sales! If your actual product or service has nothing substantial or intrinsic to offer a client base, then it is nothing more than a scam.

Launching an ICO is quite easy, and to an extent, many tech companies are now catching onto it.

An ICO is the cryptocurrency space’s rough equivalent to an IPO in the investment world. ICOs act as fundraisers of sorts; a company looking to create a new coin, app, or service launches an ICO.
Investopedia

If you still do not believe it is possible, just listen to this testament from someone who did it after unsuccessfully knocking on the doors of conventional funders.

The alarming spurt rate of ICOs often brings with it a scourge of potential scammers. The SEC and other institutions have to step in to monitor and regulate them.

Social media platforms like Facebook and Google – which house a bounty of users (potential investors) have banned ICOs ads due to possible prey on unsuspecting investors; exposing them to con artists.

Basically, the scammers use fancy websites, laden with impressive figures and terminology to con users into buying into their coins or tokens.

Though the tokens barely even cost a cent, it adds up if they have millions of people buying in. Once they have reached a certain amount in funding – they close shop and disappear!

To create a new digital coin:

Create a product concept or Business Plan for the coin or what is called a Whitepaper. This describes in great detail what the coin or token aims to do; the core technologies behind it; the team and their qualifications; the product’s lifecycle/growth path etc.

Once completed and water-tight, the whitepaper would be submitted along with an application to one of the best Cryptocurrency Exchanges for review.

Naturally, you would need some initial working capital for liquidity. Some of this is raised through your savings and others through institutions (via loans etc).

You must then assure your investors of a solid return on investment (ROI) and deliver – which goes back to sales. Unless your offering is a scam, you actually need to do some work!

This assurance comes via regular updates (marketing campaigns can have a tremendous or adverse impact on the uptake and price) on milestones reached.

The updates are also necessary to keep your investors abreast with progress and might convince them to increase funding.

Growing interest and the addition of more funds create demand for the coin/ token which, in turn, drives up the price and market capitalization.

Most successful ICOs of all time

NEO:

Known as “China’s Ethereum”, and backed by Microsoft, Alibaba and the Chinese government, NEO uses smart contract applications. It does so, however, with the addition of decentralized commerce, digitized assets and identification.
It enjoyed a considerable hike in token value from $0.03 to $88.20, NEO has big things coming with a 294,000% ROI.

Ethereum:

Unlike Bitcoin, the second-most valuable cryptocurrency in the world has more functionality than just being a coin. Its ledger technology is used to build and deploy decentralized applications a.k.a. “smart contract” technology.
Ethereum’s ROI has been nothing short of jaw-dropping at 230,000%. Having sold its tokens at $0.31, an Ether token now sits at a whopping $713, second in value only to Bitcoin.

Spectrecoin:

The “premier privacy-focused cryptocurrency” enables users to send and receive currency worldwide with total anonymity. It is currencies like SpectreCoin that have most government tax offices quaking in their boots.
If you had repurchased a token in November 2016, that puny $0.001 would be worth $0.64 today, or an ROI of 64,000%.

Ark:

With Ark, collaboration is the name of the game. The platform’s SmartBridge is a lightning-fast ecosystem designed to integrate other cryptocurrencies into its blockchain.
Investors were eager as any to buy in, and they have made a 35,400% gain given today’s token price of $3.54.

DigixDAO:

DGD, which stands for Digix Decentralized Autonomous Organization, is a self-governing community. It gives out grants to different projects which will promote the growth of the DGX network.
At a current value of $346.88 per token, this gives them a return of 10,722%.

Quantum (QTUM):

QTUM is an open-source value transfer platform which focuses on mobile decentralized apps or Dapps. QTUM is the world’s first proof-of-stake smart contracts platform.
They hosted a highly successful ICO in March 2017, and since that time has seen an ROI of 6,400%.

Source: investinblockchain.com

In conclusion

The prospect can be daunting for a cryptocurrency investor looking to make money off new investment opportunities while remaining cushioned from fraudulent ICOs and dodgy coins and tokens.

As there is no guarantee that any cryptocurrency or blockchain-related start-up will be genuine or successful.

You simply need to be vigilant and take steps such as getting to know the core team, poring over the whitepaper with a big magnifying glass. Naturally, you should be monitoring the progress of the token sales.

Most importantly, you must just use common sense to gauge just how feasible the project is to ensure that you’re not falling for a scam.

Remember, if it’s too good to be true, then it isn’t true!

5 November 2018
Business with brains!
We count on our intelligence to survive. Your IQ level or Emotional Intelligence (EQ) can help you with strategy and sharpen your life-skills. This goes some way in preventing the same fate as Dodo! On a more serious level, intelligence means gaining the upper hand in mostly military warfare; going into war to win against the enemy. Employing tactics as deployed by institutions such as the CIA, KGB, MI5 and Interpol etc. The strategy is to anticipate the next action or event (proactive) being fully prepared to appropriately counter/react to gain the upper hand.

Likewise, in the business environment, it is a crucial requirement to be strategic (SWOT Analysis: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) for the business’ success/survival.

It is no surprise, in today’s technological advancements, that there are tools available to draw up business plans, predict(forecast) both internal and external events affecting its operations – conveniently referred to as Business Intelligence (BI). The function of a business intelligence tool is to mainly assist with forecasting. After all, if you aren’t selling anything like a ‘for-profit’ business – you are out of business!

Using a good business intelligence tool can help accelerate and improve decision-making, optimizing internal business processes, increasing operational productivity and efficiency.

This, in turn, helps generate more revenue with the same resources and can provide a significant competitive advantage over your competitors. BI tools can also help companies identify market trends and spot business problems that need serious attention.

Business intelligence is a technology-driven process for analyzing data and presenting actionable information to help executives, managers and other corporate end users make informed business decisions.

There are a few BI tools out there, but the most usable and compatible ones are what you should be looking for. Compatibility is critical because to use these tools you need to analyse raw data!

Most people use MS Excel to store large (or small) transactions and datasets for sales, stock and other accounting-related reports. This data will need to be imported or accessed directly by the tool to generate real-time graphs, forecasts and reports. A good BI tool should make accessing and processing such raw data a breeze.

As a business intelligence tool user, the one that makes the most sense to use is a Microsoft-based tool called Power BI. This is the one we recommend because it also comes free with a subscription to Office 365 Proplus package (for the latest Office apps incl. Excel) for as little as 12 USD per month.

That means you can dive in straight from MS Excel without having to add-on or pay for another subscription to a third-party software. Naturally, the free version would be essential and there are two other levels which are paid for products designed for professionals ($10 per month) and developers (priced per node).

Some other perks include the following:
- It is cloud-based which means you can use it on mobile apps – practical for users who are always on the move.
- Great visual dashboards to make complex data look comfortable on the eye and allow one to make quick and sensible decisions.
- Connect it easily to other database-driven applications such as Insightly, ClickDimensions, GoogleAnalytics, Dynamics 365 and let#s not mention the advent and use of Artificial Intelligence (AI).
- Sharing and publishing data easily: It is convenient to have an arsenal of data and professionally created graphs and reports. However, without the ability to inform others about the outcomes, it would be futile. Fortunately, the real-time sharing functionality allows for all stakeholders to ‘get the 411’ on trends and forecasts and anything that can impact business operations.
For a Power BI consumer, the five “building blocks” are: visualizations, dashboards, reports, apps, and datasets – sometimes referred to as Power BI content. The content exists in workspaces. You can have several workspaces for different facets of the business to keep it all organized – just like in a factory or real office setting.

A typical Power BI workflow involves all these building blocks and will give the user the ability to visualise the inner workings of a business mostly from a financial viewpoint. So this would be a tool typically used by those in the financial sector – but also by account managers in businesses.

From a personal trading and investment analysis perspective, a BI tool could be the difference between reaping massive or incremental profits based on the real-time trends; following past movements of a stock or Cryptocurrency or making losses because you did not anticipate a dip or market crash. Most of the trading platforms have their own mathematically derived intelligence tools called indicators – but that’s another whole new ball game altogether. A dedicated BI tool, however, will serve you well in your immediate line of work and operations.

So, if you haven’t thought of a business intelligence tool yet, now is the time to do so! It can be the difference between tagging along, falling behind your competitors – or leading the pack with great insights and business intel. Be the business James Bond/the General who goes to war to win and get ahead of the game – whatever it is that you play!
1 November 2018
Run your business with brains!
We count on our intelligence to survive. Your IQ level or Emotional Intelligence (EQ) can help you with strategy and sharpen your life-skills. This goes some way in preventing the same fate as Dodo!

On a more serious level, intelligence means gaining the upper hand in mostly military warfare. It is like going into war to win against the enemy.
Employing tactics by institutions such as the CIA, KGB, MI5, and Interpol, etc. would help you anticipate the next action to take to mitigate costs (casualties).

Likewise, in the business environment, it is a crucial requirement to be strategic for the business’ survival.

It is no surprise, in today’s technological advancements, that there are tools available to draw up business plans, and predict events affecting its operations. This is conveniently referred to as Business Intelligence (BI).

The purpose of BI

The function of a business intelligence tool is to mainly assist with forecasting. After all, if you aren’t selling anything like a ‘for-profit’ business – you are out of business!

Using a good business intelligence tool can help accelerate and improve decision-making. It also helps with optimizing internal business processes, increasing productivity and efficiency.

This, in turn, helps generate more revenue with the same resources and can provide a significant competitive advantage over your competitors. BI tools can also help companies identify market trends and spot business problems that need serious attention.

Business intelligence is a technology-driven process for analyzing data. It presents actionable information to help executives, managers, and other corporate end-users make informed business decisions.

There are a few BI tools out there, but the most usable and compatible ones are what you should be looking for. Compatibility is critical because to use these tools you need to analyze raw data!

Most people use MS Excel to store large (or small) transactions and datasets for sales, stock, and other accounting-related reports. This data will need to be imported or accessed directly by the tool to generate real-time graphs, forecasts, and reports.

A good BI tool should make accessing and processing such raw data a breeze.

As a business intelligence tool user, the one that makes the most sense to use is a Microsoft-based tool called Power BI. This is the one we recommend. It also comes free with a subscription to Office 365 Proplus package (latest Office apps), for as little as 12 USD per month.

That means you can dive in straight from MS Excel without having to add-on or pay for another subscription to third-party software.
Naturally, the free version would only allow the basics. There are two other levels which are paid for products designed for professionals ($10 per month) and developers (per node).

Some other perks include the following:
- It is cloud-based which means you can use it on mobile apps – practical for those who are always on the move.
- Great visual dashboards to make complex data look comfortable on the eye and allows you to make quick and sensible decisions.
- Connect it easily to other database-driven applications such as Insightly, ClickDimensions, GoogleAnalytics, Dynamics 365 . Let’s not mention the advent and use of Artificial Intelligence (AI).
- Sharing and publishing data easily. It is convenient to have an arsenal of data and professionally created graphs and reports. However, without the ability to inform others about the outcomes, it would be futile.
- Fortunately, the real-time sharing functionality allows for you and all your stakeholders to ‘get the 411’ on trends and forecasts.
Some BI terminology

For a Power BI consumer, the five “building blocks” are: visualizations, dashboards, reports, apps, and datasets.

The content exists in workspaces. You can have several workspaces for different facets of the business to keep it all organized – just like in a factory or real office setting.

A typical Power BI workflow involves all these building blocks and will give you the ability to visualise the inner workings of a business.
So this would be a tool typically used by those in the financial sector – but also by account managers in businesses.

Another practical use

From a personal trading and investment analysis perspective, a BI tool could be the difference between you reaping massive or tiny profits.

With it, you can follow past movements of a stock or Cryptocurrency or making losses because you did not anticipate a dip or market crash.
Most of the trading platforms have their own mathematically derived intelligence tools called indicators.

But that’s another whole new ball game altogether. A good BI tool, however, will serve you well in your immediate line of work and operations.

So, if you haven’t thought of a business intelligence tool yet, now is the time to do so.

Be the business James Bond or the General who goes to war to win. Get ahead of the game – whatever it is that you play!
1 November 2018
Get more organised digitally!

One often hears the phrase “technology is your friend” To what extent the friendliness/support is, in being a most effective “companion” to assist you to cope with your daily activities or business plans depends on how you embrace it.

Read more via Get more organised digitally!

28 October 2018

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