Unlocking the Real Benefit of Big Data: 4 Real World Use Cases and Reference Architecture
Big data is everywhere. Businesses have loads of it. The problem is knowing what to do with it!
The key to unlocking the value in your data is in the analytics. With good data analysis, the insights you can mine from your data are extremely valuable. That’s why some people are calling it the 'New Oil': the black gold of the 21st century.
Once you know what to do with it, big data can help you to understand your business and your customers in a way that was previously impossible.
How so?
We’ve put together A Short, No-Nonsense Guide to the Real Benefit of Big Data, which goes into detail on the real benefit of big data, and includes loads of real-life use cases and some reference architectures from enterprises in the real world.
Here's a sneak peek of 4 use cases and real-world examples that showcase what your data can bring to the table.
Use Case 1: Transport for New South Wales
Businesses can use big data to predict how external factors will impact how people use your product or service.
Transport for New South Wales (TfNSW) gathers real-time transport usage data from across their network as well as data from weather apps and historical passenger data to drive real-time predictions. They can predict in real-time how external factors such as the weather or public events will affect transport usage and respond accordingly. This ensures the service continues to run smoothly, keeping customers happy as well as the executives thanks to a near real-time dashboard of network activity. Read more about how Contino helped TfNSW unlock the value in their data.
Use Case 2: American Express
Data analytics can be used to identify key touch points along the customer journey that lead to customer churn.
American Express forecasts potential customer churn using data from historical transactions and 115 variables. With this information, they can identify 24% of accounts (in the Australian market) that are going to close within four months.
Use Case 3: NHS
Predictive analytics and machine learning capabilities can be used to detect fraud by providing automatic alerts a pattern is detected that matches any known fraud schemes.
The National Health Service (NHS) recently deployed a new analytics infrastructure that has allowed it to identify roughly £100 million in potential savings following a reduction in benefit fraud and the risk of human error.
Big Data Reference Architecture: An Education Organisation
Let’s take a look at this highly scalable and actionable data insights platform that facilitates actionable business intelligence, driving targeted enrolment, agent and retention strategies.
It enables the organisation to generate insights on the lifecycle of international student applications and enrolment from multiple data sources using AWS native tools and services.
The disparate data sources - from their student and admissions systems - are ingested into a single source in AWS using AWS Lambda. The data is catalogued using AWS Glue before being funnelled into AWS Athena for analysis. Tableau and AWS Quicksight allow the end user to query and visualise the catalogued data.
The insights gathered can then be used to create highly-targeted enrolment campaigns, improve planning for student enrolment and enhance socioeconomic modelling.
For more big data use cases and reference architectures, download A Short, No-Nonsense Guide to the Real Benefit of Big Data!
