Next Generation Point of Sale Analytics

Over the last few months I've been exploring the features I want to see in a next generation platform for point of sale analytics: It's simpler, faster and cheaper, supports rapid blending of new data sources and is powered up with real analytic capability. Looking back there are a lot of posts on this topic so here is a quick summary with links back to the detail.

Note

• I have no immediate plans to build such a system for sale but I do use systems with many of these features for ad-hoc analytics as they are flexible yet relatively easy to set up and tear-down without incurring substantial overheads. Consider this series more of a manifesto/buyers-guide.
• I do see changes in the marketplace suggesting that a number of DSR vendors are at least considering a move in this direction. As to which one will get there first, I think it will be whoever feels least weighed down by their existing architecture.

Database technology has moved on dramatically over the last few years. For this scale of data, analytic solutions should be columnar, parallel and (possibly) in memory. This enables speed, scalability and a simple data structure that makes it easy to hook up whatever analytic or BI tools you wish.

• Data handling
• It's all about speed
• Scale out
• Structured BIG DATA handling with RedShift
• more Redshift
• Analytic Freedom

If the only data you have in the system is pos sales for a single retailer, you can build a reporting system ("what sold well last week") but you will struggle to understand why sales change. Bringing in other data sources: multi-retailer, demographics, weather information, promotional calendars, competitor activity, socio-economic trends, Google trends, social media, etc. allow for much more insighful analtyics. It's not easy to do this though, particularly if your source database is locked down so that it takes a software engineer to add tables

• True multi-retailer capability
• Data blending
• Data blending (part 2)

The term "Analytics" in general use covers a lot of activities most of which involve little more than reporting. In some instances you can slice and dice your way through a dataset to find insight, reporting is not without value but it's not analytics. Not even close.

• Reporting is NOT Analytics

Can you buy good analytics? Yes, but there are also a number of pseudo-analytic solutions in the market that have little to no analytic power - caveat emptor!

• An Analytic name is not enough

To get to real, deep insights you need real analytic tools. Depending on the taxonomy you are used to, we are talking about predictive and prescriptive analytics,machine learning, statistics, optimization or data science. Most of these tools are not new but they are not generally found in standard BI offerings and even when they are (e.g. reporting level R integration) you may struggle to apply the analytic tools at scale.

• Analytic Power
• Bring the analytics to the data

Finally, whether you build your own analytic tools or buy them in to run on your platform, clever math is not enough. If a user cannot comprehend the tool or it's suggestions due to poor user interface design and /or bad visualization choices it's worth precisely ... squat.

• Analytics are for everyone

Next Generation DSRs - An Analytic name is not enough

You need not always build your analytic tools, sometimes you should buy in. If the chosen application does what you need that often makes good economic sense... as long as you know what you are buying.

Let's be clear, an Analytic name does NOT mean there are any real Analytics under the hood.

For many managers, Analytics is akin to magic. They do not know how an analytics application works in a meaningful way and have no real interest in knowing. At the same time, there is no business standard for what makes up "forecasting", "inventory optimization", "cluster analysis", "pricing analysis", "shopper analytics", "like products" or even (my favorite) "optimization".  Don't buy a lemon!

Business Analytics - The Right Tools For The Job

Whether your analytic tool of choice is Excel or R or Access or SQL Server or ... whatever,  if you've worked a reasonable range of analytic problems I will guarantee that at some point you have tried to make your preferred tool do a job it is not intended for or that it is ill-suited for.  The end result is an error-prone, maintenance nightmare and there is a better way.

Recommended Reading: Supply Chain Network Design

I've done a lot of  supply chain network design projects and consider myself to be an expert. Had I had this book from the start, I may have got to expert status a lot faster.

With experience in supply-chain and an academic background that includes mathematical-optimization, when the need arose to build supply chain network optimization models I just did it.  Then I learned many, valuable, real-world lessons the hard way- by getting it wrong.

There are a number of books available that cover this area: I have dipped into a few, as needed, and I have not read most of them so I really can't say this is the best book available on the subject.  I can say this is one of the very few analytic books on any subject that I have read cover to cover.  

Truckload Transportation - are you paying to ship air ?

How full is a "full" truck?   Not sure?  That's a shame, because when you contract for truckload freight, you pay for the whole vehicle, whether you fill it or not.   As I'll show you, the regulations around what constitutes "full" for weight are very complex.  In addition, the 3D jigsaw puzzle to pack product into the trailer space, distributing weight correctly and minimizing damage is exceptionally challenging.  Get it wrong and you are paying to ship air.