Why Online Spreadsheets for Data Management?

Today, we are more connected than ever.

Social technologies are revolutionizing the way we communicate and interact with others. They enable us to connect with people all over the world. They are transforming how we do business, keep in touch with friends and family, and access information.

In the past, if you wanted to communicate with someone in another country, you would have to send a letter or make a phone call, which could take days or weeks. But today, with a few clicks, you can instantly send a message to anyone anywhere in the world. Businesses are also using social technologies to connect with customers and clients in new and innovative ways. For example, many companies use social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter to provide customer service, build customer relationships, and create brand loyalty.

And as more and more people connect, the potential for social technologies to change the world is endless. Social technologies are becoming an essential part of the workplace. It improves the productivity of employees. They can now communicate and collaborate more effectively and access information and resources quickly. 

As a result, businesses can get more work done in less time and achieve better results.

Three significant factors are contributing to this trend:

1. Social technologies are becoming more and more user-friendly and accessible. 

2. Businesses realize the potential of these technologies and are investing in them more.

3. Employees are becoming more comfortable using these technologies and find that they can improve their workflows.

According to Mckinsey's report, businesses can increase the productivity of their employees by 20 to 25 per cent.

As social technologies improve daily, data management plays a vital role in every business. But you might be thinking, what does data management mean?

Data management is collecting, managing, protecting and storing data so organizations can use it to optimize business processes and make better business decisions. They can collect data from various sources, including customer interactions, website analytics, and sales transactions. And to store this data, they use databases, online spreadsheets, and files. But, nowadays, businesses find it challenging to organize data, as it's hard to know how to structure it and where to put it. 

Here are a few tips that can help businesses keep their data organized:

First, businesses should create a system for naming and labelling their data so anyone who needs to access it can do so quickly and easily.

Second, businesses should create a storage system that is organized and easy to search for. Again, online spreadsheets are the best where data can be easily retrieved and updated as needed.

Third, businesses should create a system for using data. This system helps businesses decide and take action based on the collected data.

Now, you've understood the importance of data management. However, there are still a few more challenges with data management that hinder the growth of your business. 

• There has been a drastic increase in data in the last few years, and handling such massive data is a big problem many organizations face.

• The need for proper systems to synchronize the organization's data is one of the significant problems. Businesses need to keep everything in sync to get quality data.

• Another challenge in data management is managing data growth. As businesses collect more and more data, it's challenging to keep track of all of it and ensure that it is organized and accessible. 

• Even so, most businesses need to take advantage of data management tools to tackle all these challenges and grow their business. And that's what we're going to discuss in this eBook.

You'll learn how to grow your business and improve productivity by effectively managing your data through online spreadsheets.

Ready? Let's dive in!

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Data & Big Data - Impact in the modern business world
• Roadblocks to Unlocking Data’s Full Potential
• Why is Proper Data Management Important?
• Benefits of Proper Data Management
• Traditional Data Management Methods
• Cons of Traditional Data Management
• Modern Data Management
• Pros of Modern Data Management
• Data Management - Where to start with?
• Modern Data Management Use Cases
• How to Start Proper Data Management with Retable 
• Conclusion

Introduction

Social technologies are having a profound impact on the economy. By enabling people to connect and collaborate more effectively, they are helping to drive economic growth and innovation.

According to a study by McKinsey Global Institute, the potential value of social technology transformation is up to $1.3 trillion across four industries. 

1. Consumer packaged goods
2. Consumer financial services
3. Professional services
4. Advanced manufacturing

For businesses, the potential is still untapped as social technologies are providing new ways to reach customers, create value, and drive growth. 

The impact of social technologies:

• Over 1.5 billion social network users
• 80% of online users interact with social networks regularly
• 70% of companies are using social technologies
• 90% of companies are gaining benefits using social technologies

An organization has adopted social technologies faster than any other technology. As a result, it helps businesses to connect with potential customers and clients. 

Today, consumers use social technologies to research and evaluate online products. But, according to a McKinsey report, 16% of shoppers use social media before purchasing decisions, and only 2% rely on social communities to get advice. Social technologies are used to connect with customers and promote products and services. And collaborative online tools are helping businesses to improve productivity and efficiency.

Also, businesses can use social media platforms to create and distribute their content to their consumers. Thus, it allows you to gather insights into consumer behaviour and preference to make better business decisions.

Social technologies make it easier for businesses and workers to connect, communicate, and collaborate. As a result, it results in a more dynamic and innovative economy.

Data & Big Data - Impact in the modern business world

The term “Big Data” is not new to most businesses. You’ve probably heard it somewhere before. But what exactly is big data?

Big data is a term that refers to the large volume of structured, semi-structured, or unstructured data that organizations generate daily. This data can come from different sources, including social media, online transactions, and sensor data.  Big data is essential for businesses and organizations, as it is used to gain insights into customer behaviour, trends, and patterns. For example, a retailer might use big data to track customer purchase patterns and adjust its inventory accordingly.

But how does big data affect modern business? First, big data help companies to get insights into customers to improve their marketing message and business operations. 

With the help of big data, organizations can improve revenue and profits by improving the customer experience.

3 benefits of big data:

Improve operations and efficiency

Using big data improves operational efficiency. You can collect customers' data, such as feedback, trends, or patterns, and automate mundane tasks to save your employees' time so they can focus on other business goals. 

Cost reduction

In the current business landscape, managing big data effectively has become a critical competitive advantage. Companies that can harness the power of big data can gain insights that can help them improve their operations and reduce costs.

For example, by analyzing customer data, a company can reduce the churn rate by identifying patterns when customers are likely to churn. 

Identify market trends and opportunities

With the help of big data, you can track customer behaviour, preferences, and spending patterns. This information helps you decide where to focus your marketing efforts and how to allocate your resources. 

By understanding the trends in your industry, you can stay ahead of the competition and capitalize on new opportunities. 

The impact of big data on businesses is enormous. It helps make better decisions and analyse the data, leading to better output.

Roadblocks to Unlocking Data’s Full Potential

The big data market is growing at a rapid rate. Every business needs data to function properly. But with the increase in a large volume of data, there are some limitations to big data. Let’s understand in detail:

• ‍Lack of proper understanding of data

Most companies need to provide their employees with more knowledge and understanding of data. Without a proper understanding of data, they can’t store or analyze it. When professional data teams do not know the importance of data and how to use data, they cannot retrieve vital data when required.

• Data security issues

Data security is a significant issue in the modern world. With the increasing reliance on technology, more and more data is being stored electronically. This data is vulnerable to security breaches, whether by malicious hackers or accidental leaks. Therefore, the organization needs to assess to secure vast sets of data.

• Shortage of skilled data professionals

One of the biggest roadblocks to big data is the need for more data professionals who can quickly understand and analyze big data sets. As a result, organisations must invest in training and development programs to ensure their workforce has the skills to compete in the data-driven economy.

• Weak data management

A common problem due to weak data management is that decision-makers may need access to the data they need to make informed decisions. As a result, it can lead to sub-optimal decision-making and, sometimes, even disastrous consequences.

• Data integration

Much data is being generated daily from different sources, such as your employees' websites, social media, emails, and reports. Still, most organizations don’t have the correct data integration tools to combine all this data.

Why is Proper Data Management Important?

In today's world, data management is a critical part of any organization. It helps to keep track of information and helps to make sure that information is accurate and up to date.

As we've discussed, data management is defined as collecting, storing, protecting, and organizing data to be available when needed. 

Data management aims to provide accurate data to make better decisions, optimize marketing campaigns, get insights about trends, reduce operation costs, and ultimately improve the business's profits. Proper data management is essential because it helps to improve efficiency and productivity by reducing the time spent searching for data. In addition, it makes it easier to find and use the data when needed.

Data management can also reduce the risk of data loss and improve the efficiency of data retrieval. Proper data management can bring several benefits to a business:

First, it ensures the accuracy and integrity of your data. It is essential because accurate data is necessary for making informed decisions. 

Second, proper data management helps you to avoid data duplication and inconsistencies, which can lead to confusion and errors. 

Third, it helps you to maintain control over your data and to ensure that it is organized and easy to access.

Proper data management is essential for any business that wants to stay competitive and efficient. Effective data management can also help organizations comply with legal and regulatory requirements related to data privacy and security.

By keeping track of important information and keeping it organized, businesses can make better decisions, improve communication, and avoid costly mistakes. Proper data management is essential for maximizing the value of an organization's data and ensuring the organization's success.

Benefits of Proper Data Management

A proper data management strategy helps businesses improve operations efficiency, gain competitive advantage, improve customer relationship management, make better decisions, and reduce data loss.

Here are the 5 benefits of data management:

1. Increase organizational efficiency

Data management improves efficiency and productivity by streamline their operations and make better use of the resources.

2. Improves decision-making

Data is the fuel behind today’s business. Proper data management helps businesses improve decision-making by providing up-to-date information, trends, patterns of customer behaviour, tracking key performance indicators, etc.

3. Enhances data security

In today’s digital age, where data breaches and data losses are expected, proper data management ensures that data is stored securely. It also helps to prevent data breaches by making it more difficult for unauthorized individuals to access data.

4. Eliminate data redundancy

Sometimes there are multiple versions of one file, which leads to data redundancy. A proper data management system ensures that there is only one version of each file to get accurate data. 

5. Decrease in loss of data

There are many benefits to proper data management; one of the most significant benefits is the reduction in the loss of data. When data is managed correctly, it is easier to track and locate. In addition, it reduces the risk of data loss because of system failures or accidents. You can recover data in a disaster by backing up data and keeping it organized.

Traditional Data Management Methods

Traditional data management refers to storing, organizing, and accessing data in a structured and controlled manner. Structured Query Language(SQL) is used to manage and access data.

Nowadays, every organization needs to collect and manage large volumes of data for longer, which is difficult with traditional data management. 

Some of the key drawbacks in this context include:

1. Inflexibility and lack of scalability

Traditional data management systems are often inflexible and can't handle large volumes of data. In addition, they are not designed to support the complex data structures and formats required in modern big data applications.

2. Inefficient and poor performance 

Traditional data management systems are often slow and inefficient when dealing with large volumes of complex data queries. It makes it difficult to access and analyze big data in real-time or near-real-time. For example, big data applications, such as real-time analytics, fraud detection, or event-based decision-making

3. High cost and complexity 

Traditional data management systems can be expensive to implement and maintain, especially for organizations with large amounts of data. They also need specialized knowledge and skills to manage and use effectively, which can be a challenge for organizations that need more in-house expertise.

4. Lack of integration and interoperability 

Traditional data management systems are often isolated, which makes it challenging to integrate and share data across different systems. As a result, it can limit the ability of organizations to gain insights and value from their big data and prevent them from leveraging the full potential of their data assets.

Traditional database systems are not relevant and helpful in addressing today’s data challenges.

Cons of Traditional Data Management

Traditional systems need help with big data because they are not designed to handle large volumes, high velocity, and varied data types.

These systems are typically based on traditional data management models, such as relational databases, which are optimized for structured and well-defined data. As a result, they need to be better suited to the complex, dynamic, and unstructured data common in big data environments.

Here are 5 cons of traditional data management:

1. Traditional data management systems can only deal with structured and logical data.

2. They do not support the complex and growing data structures, data formats, and data processing requirements of modern big data applications. Also, they need to catch up with the high data volumes and data rates typical in big data environments.

3. ‌Traditional data management systems are often costly for organizations that want to use big data to drive business value and innovation. These systems also require specialized knowledge and skills to manage and use effectively.
   
4. Traditional data management has complex storage systems and database administrators. It is difficult to run and handle data with such complex systems.

5. ‌Data redundancy is one common problem most organizations face when using traditional systems. Thus, information updated in one place cannot be replicated because the data is stored only in a single database.  
   

So, traditional data management systems are not convenient for tackling the challenges of big data. It lacks the flexibility, scalability, and performance required to support big data applications.

Modern Data Management

Organizations need to adopt modern data management processes to address this, as the data volume is increasing daily.

Modern data management is changing the industry by providing new methods for storing, organizing, and accessing data. It is scalable, flexible, and efficient.

These methods and technologies enable organizations to gain insights from their data to drive innovation and gain competitive advantage through data-driven decision-making and analytics.

Some of the key ways in which modern data management is changing the industry include:

• Modern data management methods and technologies enable organisations to improve their data quality and accuracy. It provides tools and techniques for data cleansing, transformation, and governance. It helps businesses to reduce errors and inconsistencies in their data. And increase the reliability and trustworthiness of their data-driven insights and decisions.

• Modern data technologies make it easier for organizations to access and share data across different systems and applications. It helps organizations to collaborate with data quickly. 

• Also, modern data management helps to improve security and privacy to protect confidential data. It helps organizations reduce the risks of data breaches and other security incidents and ensures that their data is safe.

• Modern data management technologies help organizations to improve their data analytics and business intelligence capabilities. They provide tools and platforms for data warehousing, mining, and visualization. 

Pros of Modern Data Management

Today, organizations are hiring extensive data management services to manage workflows and moving from the traditional approach to the modern approach of data management. 

Here are a few benefits of using modern data management tools:

• Improves security: The risk of thefts and data breaches is increasing as more information is digitized. Modern data tools automatically track data to detect potentİal data breaches on time.

• Scalable and flexible: Modern data systems allow them to store and process big data effectively.

• Analytics and backup: Modern data technology provides real-time analytics that allows you to find the data instantly. Also, it has a cloud-based backup system so you can retrieve all the essential data anytime. 

Now you’ve understood the benefits of tools, let’s look at the types of data management tools:

Master Data Management (MDM): It tool helps you create and manage the master data for all business purposes, such as operations, employees, customers, accounts, etc.

Data Warehouse: This tool stores data in one place to access and analyze the data.

Data security: It protects all levels of modern data management from unauthorized access.

Big data: This refers to the use of AI and analytics to handle large volumes of data.

Thus, modern data management systems are more scalable and flexible than traditional systems, and better equipped to handle the challenges of managing large volumes of data.

Data Management - Where to start with?

Getting started with data management for your business can be a daunting task, but it is an important step for the growth of your company. Here are some steps you can take to get started:

Identify your business data:

Your business generates billions of data every day. It is important to identify the types of data your business collects and how it is currently being stored and managed. This will help you understand the current state of your data and identify any gaps or areas for improvement.

Develop proper data processes:

You need proper data management processes that align with your business goals. This process includes the data you collect and how it will support your business.

Choose the right technology:

Now you’ve created the strategy, you need to choose the technology for managing your data. There are many software solutions and tools available for data management, so it's important to choose ones that fit your specific needs and budget.

Retable is one such data management software  that manages all data and projects in one place.

Establish clear policies and procedures: 

With the increase in using data, it is important to create policies for managing and protecting your data. This ensures that your data is handled properly, and it is only used for the purposes you have specified.

Review your data management processes:

You need to monitor the processes regularly to ensure that they are effective and aligned with your business objectives. You can make changes as needed to support the growth of your business.

Modern Data Management Use Cases

Modern data management involves the use of various tools and technologies to collect, store, and analyze large amounts of data. It is being used in different sectors to support a wide range of business activities.

Project management: With the help of data, you can track the progress of projects and identify potential risks or issues. It is also used to develop plans and schedules and to allocate resources.

Human resources: You can manage employee information, including personal details, skills, and performance using modern data management. It is also used to track attendance and absence, and to support employee development and training.

Accounting: Data is useful in managing financial information, including revenues, expenses, and profits. You can also prepare financial statements and reports and to support decision-making.

Operations: With the help of data, you can manage and optimize production processes, including the allocation of resources and the scheduling of activities. 

Logistics: Data is used to manage the movement of goods and materials, including inventory management and transportation. It is also used to optimize the supply chain and improve the efficiency of operations.

Here’s how you can manage a project with modern data management:

• With proper data, you can track the progress of activities, including key metrics such as budgets, deadlines, and milestones. It helps you to take the action to keep the project on track.
  
• You can use data to develop plans and schedules and to allocate resources. It helps you optimize the use of resources and ensure they are in the right place.

• You can use data to identify trends and patterns and to develop insights about the project. It helps you make more informed decisions and improve the project's success.

Modern data management can benefit every sector, including improved efficiency, accuracy, and productivity. Retable is a powerful modern data management tool that manages all your data, spreadsheets, and projects at your fingerprint!

How to Start Proper Data Management with Retable 

Today, you know every business depends on data; hence it is important to get the most out of the data to make better decisions and serve the customers. Some data management tools available can help you manage your data and improve your team's productivity. 

Retable is one tool that uses online spreadsheets to collect and manage your data, automate your workflow, and collaborate with team members from one platform. 

Retable allows you to organize, track, and sync your data without writing a single line of code. You can even share the data with your team members quickly and efficiently.

Here are some key benefits of using Retable:

Fast and effective data collection: Retable offers online spreadsheets to collect, analyze and share data effectively with teammates. And it is simple to use, so anyone with zero technical knowledge can use it.

Efficient and smooth workflow: Retable allows you to automate your workflow to reduce your manual work and ensure the operation runs more smoothly.

View all your data in one place: Retable's form view tool provides real-time data that can be viewed and shared anywhere. This tool allows you to make better use of the data and improve your business.

Real-Time Collaboration: With Retable, you can easily collaborate with your team to share files and projects and get feedback in real-time, decreasing project completion time. 

Role & Access Management: You can easily manage who has access to what data to ensure your data cannot be changed without your permission. 

Conclusion

Retable is a powerful tool that enables you to collect, manage, analyze, and secure your data effectively. Also, the interface is simple and easy to use to manage all your data without confusion. You can signup directly for free and start using it right away.

Retable offers you a month Free trial for PRO plans. If you need to use Retable to collect, manage, and share data within your business. Sign up today for free and try all the PRO features.