Mobile Enterprise Analytics in 60 MinutesTo better service today’s on-the-go decision makers and inform their need for proactive planning and strategic execution, organizations must deliver anytime/anyplace data access and analytical capabilities to a vast array of mobile devices. Read on to see how your organization can build this capability in record-setting time.

Executive SummaryThere is a mobility arms race underway in business, and if you are reading this white paper on your computer, you may already be behind.

One of the most exciting opportunities on the horizon for enterprises of all kinds is tied to the emergence of rich digital experiences through increasingly small and powerful mobile devices. Mobile technologies are changing the way people communicate, work and play. In fact, much of the innovation we are seeing across industries is driven by the adoption of mobile apps.

According to IDC,1 the world’s mobile workers will number 1.3 billion by 2015 — representing 37.2% of the global workforce. And the percentage of individuals with mobile access to the Internet is expected to grow exponentially (see Figure 1).

Mobility is now front and center for businesses, governments and other institutions as they seek to accelerate decision making and extend their reach to customers and constituents across channels. And since user demands typically outpace development cycles, it is imperative to have a process in place that enables a detailed glimpse of the “to-be” application. Nowhere is

this more critical than in the emerging space of mobile analytics, where IT teams must quickly pilot and deploy new ways of delivering business intelligence to keep on-the-go decision makers up to speed in areas like budgeting, selling and marketing, and better inform strategic decision making.

As enterprise mobility grows, businesses are jumping in feet first — although they are not nec-essarily prepared. At the same time, the increas-ing use of smart devices and tablets is making mobile analytics a key component of organiza-tions’ IT strategies. The good news is that some of today’s more sophisticated and advanced business analytics platforms can deliver ad hoc analyses on mobile devices, including tablets.

This white paper offers an outlook on the forces driving enterprise mobility, along with insights to help enterprises embrace mobile analytics capa-bilities quickly and effectively.

Why Mobile Analytics is ImportantGiven the ubiquity of mobile devices and the role they will play in analytics, it is important to under-stand how their capabilities will affect the organi-zation (see Figure 1, next page).

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• Improving the end user experience: Mobile Web analytics should be conceptually familiar to marketers who work with traditional Web analytics. Both are useful for understand-ing how customers consume content, and what changes can be made to optimize their browsing behavior.

Performance is often seen as the biggest problem for mobile users; therefore, establish-ing very specific “cause and effect” scenarios via analytics reports can show which segments need attention in order to improve the overall customer experience.

> Native apps or HTML5? While native apps may still hold an edge in performance, includ-ing enriching user experiences and afford-ing opportunities for monetization, HTML5 offers advantages in other areas, such as cross-platform deployment of mobile appli-cations, control over distribution, and the ability to overcome platform-fragmentation challenges.

• Real-time data collection: Data is the corner-stone of engaging business campaigns. Mobile analytics harnesses the power of data to create more relevant, engaging messages that can increase ROI. Given mobility’s fast-changing and dynamic nature, real-time relevance is what matters most to enterprises. Constant monitoring can deliver up-to-date knowledge to perpetually refine the user experience through features such as interactive visualiza-tion, an interface to apply filters and various views of data.

A complete lifecycle perspective on how individu-als use reports/apps to improve user engage-ment is key to succeeding with mobile analytics.

Moreover, doing this in real time differentiates winning companies.

• Delivering custom content: Customized reports provide a more organized way for enter-prises to look at their data. Once businesses have established the programs and features that work for their customers, they can better justify future investments. With the addition of data on the connecting device, mobile sites can be increasingly optimized to suit the specific interests of each consumer. Customization and personalization is a great way to convert visits into sales; organizations should use this ability to their advantage.

Custom reports can also be incredible time savers if the right reports are generated. Rather than spending time searching for important metrics, organizations need analytical data that is neatly separated into columns. This allows for deeper assessments, which can lead to more meaningful, more actionable insight.

Mobile Analytics in 60 MinutesAs a result of the rising number and types of mobile devices, laptops have been replaced by “smart” devices such as tablets and smart-phones. Increasingly, business people — especially executives — are demanding the ability to perform meaningful analytics activities from their mobile devices on the go, without the burden of cumber-some carry-ons.

However, as with any greenfield initiative, there are likely to be obstacles in the road. Any adoption of mobile analytics technologies must be predi-cated upon how well they fit the business, and how well they are integrated into the enterprise

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Figure 1

Percent of Global Internet Traffic from Mobile Devices

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 20140

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15%

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6%2.4%1%

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information architecture. As with most elements of mobility, speed is of the essence. There are many analytics tools that fall into multiple cat-egories. They can differ significantly, and can serve a variety of purposes within areas like content marketing. For example, Marketing AI2 provides analytics that inform content optimiza-tion for B2B marketers. Google Analytics3 allows companies to customize reports, measure the impact of social media and mobile applications on Web site traffic, and calculate conversion rates. Likewise, Japersoft4 Mobile BI allows business-es to create highly interactive reports; provide online and cross-tab sorting, filtering, conditional formatting and column move/hide, along with format changes that can be saved for re-use.

Given market demand for real-time mobile analytics and Jaspersoft’s interactive report-gen-eration capabilities, we used this tool to create a marketing analytics application in 60 minutes. We tried various business-intelligence features of the software, such as dashboard creation, inter-active charts and configuring mobile reports with dynamic input controls, for example. Figures 2 and 3 offer a glimpse of some of the business intelligence features that were created using Jas-persoft’s mobile analytics tool. So successful was this proof of concept that we have applied what we learned to assist a U.S. multinational conglom-erate interested in incorporating mobile analytics using interactive charts and a dashboard.

Among the key features we used to create a solution for our customer were:

• Dynamic parameter: Build a dynamic data store by extracting data from various relational

and non-relational sources, and loading the same for subsequent operations (see Figures 2 and 3).

• Interactive bar chart and tables: Interact with report charts and tables, including on-the-fly sorting, filtering and formatting of column values and headers (see Figure 4 and 5).

• Data virtualization: Integrate multiple data sources into a single metadata view to enable analysis and reporting across disparate sources, without requiring ETL3 or a data warehouse.

Looking AheadMobility’s growing pervasiveness as a marketing channel makes it more critical for organizations to analyze in real time how they attract and reach customers. Mobile analytics puts the brilliance and power of data into the hands of decision makers at the moment of need, and in more useful ways, to derive meaning and enhance decision making.

In 2014, over 30% of the market will use smart-phones as their primary mobile devices (as shown earlier in Figure 1). Clearly, mobile activity is spiking, regardless of an enterprise’s size, industry, marketing spend or mobile platform strategy. Mobile analytics can help organizations of all shapes and sizes deliver the right informa-tion to the right audience, at the right time, and at the right place to advance their business objec-tives.

Increasingly, businesses consider mobile analytics vital to achieving cost savings and productivity enhancements. Interactive reports help business leaders make better decisions. Individuals who

Figure 2 Figure 3

Building a Dynamic Data Store

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regularly use business intelligence (BI) mobile analytics can noticeably improve their everyday operations by incorporating state-of-the-art tools into their assessments and reports. Intuitive solutions enable company administrators to bolster workplace efficiency in shorter periods of time.

Mobile analytics for business intelligence allows teams to quickly review large data sets in formats that are easy to understand. Highly interactive reports enable viewers to identify trends that could help their organization gain a competitive edge. Additionally, business intelligence mobile analytics reports are more scalable than tradition-al reports, and can be integrated across multiple departments to help decision makers more effec-tively evaluate comprehensive materials. The sooner we seize this opportunity, the greater our competitive advantage will be.

To realize the best ROI with mobile analytics, organizations need a strategy that incorporates

specific objectives, key performance indicators, and the methodology and tools for assessing and optimizing the organization’s mobile marketing efforts. No matter how simple the application, analytics gives stakeholders a level of insight that their application might not achieve otherwise. Every mobile portal and business customer requires a different set of metrics/reports. While analytics fundamentally provides data, it is the reports and configurations that really drive business value.

As technology advances, particularly in the software arena, so do the choices of mobile analytics suites. However, keeping up with the complex dynamics of technology advancement and choosing the right candidate can seem a daunting task. As a result, companies should be mindful of the effects mobile analytics has on IT processes, and have the agility to respond to these impacts with viable solutions.

Figure 4 Figure 5

Interact with Report Charts and Tables

Footnotes1 “IDC Predictions 2012: Competing for 2020.” IDC, December, 2011.

http://cdn.idc.com/research/Predictions12/Main/downloads/IDCTOP10Predictions2012.pdf.

2. http://marketing.ai/.

3. http://www.google.com/analytics/.

4. http://www.jaspersoft.com/.

5. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extract,_transform,_load.

About CognizantCognizant (NASDAQ: CTSH) is a leading provider of information technology, consulting, and business process out-sourcing services, dedicated to helping the world’s leading companies build stronger businesses. Headquartered in Teaneck, New Jersey (U.S.), Cognizant combines a passion for client satisfaction, technology innovation, deep industry and business process expertise, and a global, collaborative workforce that embodies the future of work. With over 50 delivery centers worldwide and approximately 166,400 employees as of September 30, 2013, Cognizant is a member of the NASDAQ-100, the S&P 500, the Forbes Global 2000, and the Fortune 500 and is ranked among the top performing and fastest growing companies in the world. Visit us online at www.cognizant.com or follow us on Twitter: Cognizant.

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About the AuthorsGiri Muthusamy is a Senior Associate within Cognizant’s Manufacturing & Logistics Business Unit focused on Java/J2EE projects. His interests revolve around the design of enterprise applications and RDBMS concepts. Giri holds a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering and is also a Microsoft SQL Server certified professional. He can be reached at Giri.Muthusamy@cognizant.com.

Rahul Ramalingam is a Technology Specialist within Cognizant’s Manufacturing & Logistics Business Unit focused on Java/J2EE high-level system design and application development, and building enterprise software applications. He has an engineering degree in computer science and holds various software certi-fications, including IBM Rational solution designer — OOAD and TOGAF 8 Certified Enterprise Architecture Practitioner. Rahul can be reached at Rahul.Ramalingam@cognizant.com.

References

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_web_analytics.

• http://www.marketingprofs.com/.

• Isson, Jean-Paul and Jesse Harriott. “Win with Advanced Business Analytics: Creating Business Value from Your Data.” Wiley. October, 2012.