Building Customer Loyalty With #Analytics

by Rick Robinson
Originally posted on IBM's Midsize Insider blog on December 27th, 2012.
-------

Building and retaining customer loyalty is one of the biggest challenges that midsize firms face. Conventional wisdom, after all, has it that consumers are inherently fickle. They are hard to win over and all too easy to lose. They may love you one day and turn their backs on you the next.

But the conventional wisdom is mostly wrong. Customers, by and large, would like to be loyal. After all, sticking with a trusted company or brand makes their life a good deal easier. To walk into, say, a grocery store to buy a new product is to be confronted with too many choices. How do you choose among dozens of similar products or services? Far easier to just go in and get a brand you know you can depend on.

For companies, however, this does not make loyalty easy to build or keep.

Customer by Customer, Analytics Add Up

Establishing and retaining customer loyalty is all about listening to your customers. For a small storefront business this can be relatively simple, if not always easy. Customers will come right up to the counter and give you an earful.

For midsize firms it can be more complicated. The most important customers may not be the most vocal ones. But analytic solutions from IBM can help make the listening process more reliable and effective.

Analytics tools can help a company determine what makes for satisfied--or dissatisfied--customers. And analytics can provide an ongoing picture of customers and their reactions. Potential problems, or opportunities, can be identified and tracked in real time. Thus, firms can act promptly to retain customers at risk or identify new customers who can be brought into the fold.

Likewise, analytics can help to identify your best customers, and help you build a stronger relationship with them.

Detecting Subtle Signals

Analytics are powerful because they don't just track what customers say, but also what they do. Big data has become a popular buzzword in the tech world. When it comes to customer behavior, however, big data is a reality as well as an opportunity that midsize firms should not ignore.

From subtle trends in buying behavior to comments on social media such as Facebook or Twitter, customers and potential customers are constantly sending signals about what they like and what they want more of. Combining these different signals can provide information that would have otherwise remained undiscovered.

IBM's analytics tools can help you hear what your customers are thinking, so you can respond to their needs more quickly.

New England Systems Meets the Healthcare Challenge: Improve Patient Care & Operational Efficiency with Analytics

By Katy Dallas at New England Systems, an IBM Premier Business Partner
Originally published at NESystems.com on December 5th, 2012

With the explosion of data in every industry today, healthcare is no exception.  In fact, the new healthcare regulations require these organizations to harness their data to streamline costs, operations, and ultimately to lead to better patient care.   As a matter of fact, their “lives” may depend on it, since hospitals that fail to meet this challenge will lose some percentage of their federal funding.

The basis for these new regulations lies with the recent Supreme Court decision upholding The Affordable Care Act (ACA), which mandates that healthcare providers develop or upgrade their clinical and financial data marts and integrate them more closely with EMRs.  Further, the ACA states that healthcare provider reimbursements will be tied to quality metrics in accordance with the Accountable Care Organization (ACO) model.

ACA compliance and establishing ACO improvement measurements can seem like an overwhelming process. However, small steps can achieve lasting, scalable results.  NES’s experience has been that the best way for healthcare providers to begin the journey to analytics is to first determine:

• What data is available
• The quality of that data
• An area of the organization to be targeted first
• Well-defined goal/s.

Through NES’s Analytics Health Check we can help answer these questions to determine a provider’s readiness for analytics. Once we have a clear understanding of the environment and goals, using thoughtful selection and the best analytics technologies, NES will develop an “Analytics Blueprint” specific to your organization. The approach will describe what it will take to get you from where you are today to where you want to be tomorrow. Choosing a scalable, flexible solution approach will allow you to leverage the architecture created for one department, and as priorities dictate, expand it across the entire organization.

For more information on the Analytics Challenge for Healthcare, please download NES's datasheet on the latest regulations and the NES/IBM approach to managing data and using analytics to meet this challenge.

Healthcare Analytics Datasheet

WSJ: Big Data Is on the Rise, Bringing Big Questions

by Ben Rooney

This article was originally published at The Wall Street Journal at Online.WSJ.com
on November 29th, 2012.

The next Next Big Thing is Big Data. Evangelists claim it has the power to reveal hidden truths about our companies, about our lives, about society as a whole.

So important is it that last week's Silicon Valley Comes to Oxford annual event was built around the topic.

Inevitably the real world crashes into digital utopia. According to Peter Tufano, the dean of Oxford's Said Business School, which played host to the event, while awareness of the topic was high among enterprises, only about 6% of companies have got beyond a pilot stage, and 18% are still in one.

"That means three-quarters of industries are looking at this and saying 'what is this all about?'"

Why aren't they looking at Big Data? "The answer across all business," he said, "was 'we don't know what the business case is.'"

But according to speakers at the event, the business case has already been answered. Michael Chui has extensively researched the area for McKinsey Global Institute. His conclusion is emphatic: "The use of data and analytics in general is going to be a basis of competition going forward for individual firms, for sectors and even for countries. Those companies that are able to use data effectively are more likely to win in the marketplace."

MGI's research showed that in just one field—personal location data—some $100 billion of value can be created globally for service providers through use of data. He suggested at a talk last year that the benefits for consumers could be six times that. "We find that Big Data tends to accelerate the capture of surplus [value] by consumers." In other words, not only do companies do well, but customers do even better.

And if companies need even more persuading, what about the claim at the conference that Big Data played a part in re-electing Barack Obama to the White House? John Aristotle Phillips, Chief Executive of Aristotle International—a nonpartisan company that applies technology to politics and political communication—said the use of data analytics had a material effect on outcomes.

"This was the first presidential election campaign where all of the data that was coming into the campaign was successfully collected and centralized," he said. "The Obama campaign did a successful job with that; the Romney campaign did not."

Mr. Phillips was quick to add: "The election was not won because of Big Data, but it played a very important part."

According to Mr. Phillips by bringing together all of the information about individuals it was possible to build a much more accurate picture of a voter and so focus efforts on them in a much more targeted way than simple crude TV electioneering.

So if Big Data can get a man into the White House, how can companies use the same, or similar tools, to achieve those productivity gains that McKinsey was suggesting?

Stephen Sorkin, vice president of Engineering for the U.S.-based Splunk, a Big Data analytics company, suggested that often companies overlook one really important source of information that they are already sitting on—computer log files. Computers generate huge log files that record all manner of information. A Web server, for instance, keeps very detailed records of every thing it does. His company provides tools for customers to mine that data.

"That data is often used just to troubleshoot problems, but you can do a whole lot more with it—it is a categorical record of everything that has happened."

Mr. Sorkin said this gave companies "the opportunity to know, at a very fine grain what customers are doing, how they are doing it and perhaps why they are doing it."

One false promise that some proponents of Big Data hold out is that somehow vast oceans of digital data can be sifted for nuggets of pure enterprise gold.

Mr. Sorkin quickly shoots such hopes down. "It is not going to happen magically. The software only finds correlations, not causations. In order to find causal relationships you have to do work.

"If you take any sufficiently large data sets, you are going to find correlations," he said. "You need a human in the loop to work out which are important."

So given the evidence and the success stories, why are so few companies actually embracing the opportunities?

Andrew Grant, Chairman of Satalia, a U.K. university spinout that applies algorithms to optimize Big Data, suggests cultural obstacles are the biggest impediment.

"At this time you would think companies would be saying we need to innovate our way out of the financial crisis. What seems to be happening is the opposite—everyone is retrenching. But there are real opportunities here."

There are a raft of other obstacles, including a regulatory framework that was designed for a different data world and a lack of skills to actually do the work.

There is also the "creepy factor" says Mr. Sorkin. "The richest examples of Big Data are to understand consumer behavior and optimize your product for it. That is where the danger can lie."

He suggests thatunless companies are careful, optimizing a product can end up putting consumers off, like ads that follow you from site to site. "Companies will customize some aspect based on the consumer and the consumer can think it is a violation of their privacy, or it can just feel creepy. I can make something perfect, but perfect may not be what the consumer is looking for."

Write to Ben Rooney at ben.rooney@wsj.com

Corrections & Amplifications: 
MGI's research showed that in just one field—personal location data—some $100 billion of value can be created globally for service providers through use of data. A previous version of this article said that $100 billion of value can be created in the U.S. alone.

Understanding Business Analytics

The following was originally published on IBM's "Midsize Insider" blog
by Sharon Hurley Hall on November 19th, 2012.
---
Many company owners wonder how business analytics can help them. The truth is, it's the best way to keep your business healthy. Every business has streams of data generated from both internal and external operations. This type of analytics helps you to aggregate and explore data in order to make better business decisions. It is a key part of gaining business intelligence and can allow you to address multiple areas from product creation to customer retention and everything in between. Any analysis must be tied to business goals.

Types of Analytics

There are many ways of thinking about analytics for your business. Some analysis will concentrate on what has happened in your business in the past, using that information to identify patterns. That's called descriptive analytics. When you use the data you have to think about what might happen in the future, that's called predictive analytics. Many companies also use the data to do predictive modeling to improve the decisions they make.

Comparative analytics compares similar metrics, such as sales, and looks for variables that might affect the figures. Some businesses also think about analytics in terms of whether it is affecting operational, tactical or strategic goals. Using analytics is an ongoing process as every iteration of analysis throws up new areas to explore. As well as mining the data for patterns to uncover the reasons for events and predict whether they will occur again, analytics can also help businesses plan for the unexpected.

Getting the Data Out

One of the most important aspects of business analytics is finding a solution that crunches all the data yet supplies only the information needed to the right people. IT administrators can do this by enabling solutions which provide visual dashboards and reports to employees and managers at different levels. Analytics allows companies to get a holistic picture of their business and to gain insight on historical, real-time or future business events. Done right, it results in a better informed workforce, reduced business risk, and better strategic planning and decision-making, with a corresponding impact on performance and finances. It can help midsize businesses optimize their operations to assist their growth.

The Role of IT Administrators

IT administrators have a significant role to play in the implementation of any business analytics system. This ranges from establishing the parameters of the data needed, to managing data harvesting, storage, and mining as well as creating and deploying systems company-wide and educating users on analysis and reporting features. And, as a recent Midsize Insider article suggests, they may need to increase their skills in data analysis to help businesses evaluate the data and find trends.

Upcoming #Webcast: 5 Great Business #Analytics Opportunities for #Midsize Businesses

Thursday, November 1, 2012 at 1:00 PM EDT

Many midsize organizations are collecting large amounts of data but lack the resources to mine much value from it. Technical complexity and cost have been major limiting factors, and the result is missed opportunities, wasted time and redundant effort. All of this hits the bottom line and has historically put midsize companies at a disadvantage.

But all that is changing. New tools are emerging that make analytics accessible to almost everyone, and you don't need a Ph.D. in statistics to use them. This session will discuss and demonstrate how midsize organizations can dig into data about their customers and their business and put this insight into action to reduce costs and generate revenues.

Mark Morton describes the revolution in business analytics that's making capabilities that were once available only to large corporations accessible to companies of all sizes. He'll outline the five top opportunities he sees for midsize companies to apply analytics to business success.

The session will also include a demonstration of the powerful but inexpensive offerings from IBM that can be used to analyze customer information, understand who is likely to buy and to focus marketing efforts on most promising market segments. Mark will also share examples of real success stories for midsize businesses in operations and finance in a variety of industries.

About the Speaker

Mark Morton, Senior Manager. Product Marketing, IBM Business Analytics

In his 20+ years at Cognos and IBM Mark has held positions in IT, development, product management and product marketing. He currently has worldwide responsibility for IBM Cognos Express.

Click HERE to register.

Where does Big Data Come From? #smarteranalytics #bigdatastudy #bigdata

Webinar: Smarter Analytics with IBM Cognos Express

Date:  November 7, 2012      |      Time: Noon to 1pm EST

How are we doing? Why? What should we be doing?

For a small company, it's easy to answer these critical questions.  But growth begets complexity -- more employees, customers, partners, products -- and a tidal wave of information.  The right answers become tougher to find.  IBM Cognos Express changes all that for you.

Join LPA Systems for a free webinar and see how IBM Cognos Express will help you manage mounting piles of information and turn it into the knowledge you need to:

• Manage costs more closely and improve efficiency
• Find new opportunities and trends
• Deliver better customer service
• Drive greater profitability and revenue growth
• Do more with less

In an information-packed hour, they will:

• Articulate the opportunities that a dynamic economy presents to midsize companies that are agile and adaptable enough to take advantage
• Explain why the business model in place at most midsize companies actually resists growth
• Demonstrate how IBM Cognos Express is uniquely built to empower faster, smarter decisions and fuel growth.
• Show you the simple steps you can take to minimize risk and deliver greater business efficiencies
• Demonstrate how you can extend the familiar spreadsheet-based user interface for better budgeting, planning, and forecasting
• Share with you the "Think Big, Start Small" strategy that's paving the way for midsize customer success

RSVP today and discover how you can have better reporting, analysis and planning to help your organization thrive!

Existing Cognos Express 9.5 Customers - Attend this webinar to learn more about the Cognos Express 10.1 Capabilities.

Join LPA Systems on November 7th from 12 PM to 1 PM ET. RSVP Today.

IBM Connections Merges Social Business w/ Big Data Analytics

by Darryl K. Taft
Originally published at eWeek.com on September 13th, 2012

IBM has announced a new version of its IBM Connections software, the company’s enterprise social networking platform—with support for iPhone 5.

As part of the announcement, IBM unveiled new software and services that bring the power of big data analytics into the hands of today's social-savvy workforce any time, any place. Now, organizations can apply analytics to their social business initiatives, allowing them to gain actionable insight on information generated on networks and put it to work in real-time, IBM said.

IBM announced the availability of IBM Connections 4, which incorporates analytics capabilities, real-time data monitoring, and faster collaborative networks both inside and outside the organization, whether on premise, in the IBM SmartCloud or using a broad range of mobile devices, including the new iPhone 5.

IBM also announced that leading companies around the globe, including Bayer MaterialScience, Colgate-Palmolive Company, LeasePlan, Primerica and Teach for America, are using its social software to achieve returns on their social business investments.

Big Blue officials said for three consecutive years, IDC ranked IBM No. 1 in enterprise social software. And more than 60 percent of the Fortune 100 companies have licensed IBM social software. IBM says its position in analytics has been established through a strategy that required the expansion of R&D, acquisition, and business initiatives across its hardware software and services portfolio.

The rise of social media is prompting business leaders, from the chief marketing officer to the chief HR officer to the CIO, to evaluate how to create opportunities that drive business transformation through the use of social technology, creating real business value, IBM said. According to Forrester Research, the market opportunity for social enterprise apps is expected to grow at a rate of 61 percent through 2016.

At the same time, business leaders lack the tools to gain insight into the enormous stream of information and use it in a meaningful way, IBM says. According to IBM's CEO Study, today only 16 percent of CEOs are using social business platforms to connect with customers, but that number is poised to spike to 57 percent within the next three to five years. A recent IBM study of more than 1,700 chief marketing officers reveals 82 percent plan to increase their use of social media in the next three to five years.

"To truly realize the full potential of a social business, leaders need to empower a company's most vital asset—the information being generated from its people," said Alistair Rennie, general manager of social business at IBM, in a statement. "Now is the time for business leaders to embed social into their key business processes to shift their business from the era of 'liking' to 'leading.'"

IBM Connections integrates activity streams, calendaring, wikis, blogs, a new email capability and more, and flags relevant data for action. It allows for instant collaboration with one click and the ability to build social, secure communities both inside and outside the organization to increase customer loyalty and speed business results. The new Connections mail capability provides simplified access to email within the context of the social networking environment.

The new software enables users to integrate and analyze massive amounts of data generated from people, devices and sensors, and more easily align these insights to business processes to make faster, more accurate business decisions, IBM said. By gaining deeper insights in customer and market trends and employees' sentiment, businesses can uncover patterns to not only react swiftly to market shifts, but predict the effect of future actions, IBM argues.

"I am thoroughly enjoying the ability to engage with a variety of employees through micro-blogging," said Patrick Thomas, CEO of Bayer MaterialScience, in a statement. "I can get information out quickly, but even more importantly, I can encourage two-way communication and stimulate an open-communication culture by breaking through barriers."

The new capabilities in IBM Connections empower employees from every line of business, such as marketing, human resources and development, to gain actionable insight into the information being generated in their social networks.

For example, the Connections landing page features a single location that allows users to view and interact with content from any third-party solution through a social interface, right alongside their company's content, including email and calendar. The embedded experience of the news feed, also known as an activity stream, allows employees from any department inside an organization to explore structured and unstructured data such as Twitter feeds, Facebook posts, weather data, videos, log files, SAP applications; electronically sign documents; and quickly act on the data as part of their everyday work experience.


IBM Looks to Differentiate Itself From Others in Social Media 

With its recent $1 billion acquisition of Kenexa, market leadership and thousands of customers, IBM is aggressively going after the emerging social business market to differentiate itself from others in this space. This is another example of how IBM is identifying higher-value growth opportunities, such as business analytics and Smarter Commerce, and building and acquiring capabilities across the company to go after them. IBM officials said they believe the rise of enterprise social networking is becoming the next IT battleground. And IBM is fielding competition from the likes of Microsoft, Oracle, Salesforce.com, Google and others that are currently tapping this market or beginning to creep into it.

Meanwhile, IBM said there is strong demand for Big Blue’s social business platform in regulated industries, with 41 percent of Connections 4 beta participants in banking, finance and health care institutions.

For example, Primerica, a leading distributor of financial products in North America, will use Connections and WebSphere Portal, to transform how its agents engage with its 2.3 million policy holders on the fly, to provide increased value for its customers. The company plans to use social business software to improve the overall client experience, drive competitive edge and stay on the forefront of innovation in the financial services industry.

LeasePlan, a leading vehicle leasing and fleet management company, is using IBM's social software platform across the organization's 40 subsidiaries, in 30 countries and over 6,000 employees. With nearly 800 communities formed, 400 blogs and more than 800 forums, the platform has become an integral component to business operations for the organization, increasing efficiency, enhancing knowledge retention, increasing innovation, and helping to improve customer care and insight.

"By collaborating with IBM, we've been able to transform our business processes,” said Wim de Gier, senior global project manager for corporate strategy and development at LeasePlan, in a statement. “Our internal social network allows employees to find experts faster, leading to better customer service, superior workforce effectiveness, and enhanced product and service innovation. It's allowing us to transform our organization into a social business."

To support the burgeoning demand for social business solutions in growth markets, in the fourth quarter of 2012, IBM will open two social business customer support centers to serve its Asia-Pacific and Latin American clients: one in Manila, the Philippines, and one in Sao Paolo, Brazil, to support the rapid adoption of social business tools in these growth markets. The Philippines and Brazil centers join a roster of IBM social business centers in North America, Dublin, Japan, China and India.

IBM's growing business partner network of more than 39,000 business partners is bringing new capabilities to IBM's social platform every day in areas including gamification, video, compliance, project management and mobility. For example, Actiance provides compliance capabilities to thousands of organizations globally, SugarCRM helps sellers use social networking and analytics for effective selling, and Bunchball provides gamification capabilities to IBM Connections.

Smarter Marketing: The Changing Role of the CMO #smarterplanet #smartermarketing #ibm

At the IBM CMO CIO Leadership Exchange in New York, a group of CMOs, CIOs, and IBM experts discussed how much control customers have over brands.

To learn more about Smarter Marketing, visit http://www.ibm.com/smartermarketing.

@IBMWatson On #Smartphones Will Lead To Business #Analytics Unchained

This article has been excerpted from the original which was published in full at Forbes.com
on September 7th, 2012 by Trefis.
-------

International Business Machines is trying to put a voice-based analytics engine powered by Watson in the hands of smartphone users. The aim is to drive its business analytics division to $16 billion in sales by 2015. Watson is an artificial intelligence system capable of answering questions posed in natural language. It was developed by IBM’s DeepQA project and is one of IBM’s top supercomputers. The offering is likely to resemble Apple’s Siri, but on major steroids, for corporate users. IBM hopes to answer complex questions with its application that focus on finance, health care and telecommunications.

Machine Learning and Power Consumption Key To Success

Analytics that run on a supercomputer consume a lot of power and one of IBM’s biggest challenges is to deliver Watson’s processing power on smartphones. Even with the computation occurring at a data center, a Watson smartphone application would still consume too much power to be practical today. Watson is also based on machine learning and to master a subject, it takes a significant amount of time and data.

For example, researchers are trying to “teach” Watson oncology by feeding the machine with answers to relevant questions. Then, to make the machine “understand”, they ask it to answer similar questions by analyzing documents, websites and books at 66 million pages a second. After several iterations and teaching the machine what answers are accurate, it is expected that Watson will develop enough expertise to assist a doctor in a practical situation.

IBM also has an image recognition software which can be added to the analytics app in the future. It already uses image recognition in a retail analytics application and can use this expertise to add eyes to Watson.

In a potential health-related scenario, a patient can access Watson through a smartphone device to explain his or her problems and symptoms. And based on the symptoms, Watson could provide an initial recommendation as well as access the patient’s medical records to make adjustments to the answer depending on factors like pregnancy or diabetes. It could also provide information about nearby medical facilities, if needed, and contact healthcare facilities.

#BigData: Why It is a Big Deal to Your Business

IBM and NES present

"Big Data:  Why It Is a Big Deal to Your Business"

Wednesday, October 3rd, 2012

WHERE: The Westin Waltham Hotel 70 Third Avenue Waltham, MA DRIVING DIRECTIONS WHEN: Wednesday, October 3rd, 8:30 am to 11:30 am EDT >Get more information >Register Now! NES has over 30 years' experience with IBM business solutions across a wide range of businesses and industries and is prepared to answer questions specific to your needs. Katy Dallas katy.dallas@nesystems.com 617-372-6061

Every day, we create 2.5 quintillion bytes of data - some of it structured, most of it, unstructured. This is Big Data. While Big Data presents a challenge, it also offers an enormous opportunity for new insights into your business and your customers. Today, IBM's Big Data platform leverages leading-edge technologies to open the door to a world of possibilities. IBM's premier Big Data solution is Netezza, a purpose-built, standards-based data warehouse that architecturally integrates database, server and storage into a single, easy to manage system. Netezza is designed for rapid analysis of data volumes into the petabytes, delivering 10-100X performance improvements, at one third the cost of other options available from traditional database vendors. Please join us for a breakfast seminar to discuss our Big Data strategy and to discover how your organization can gain a competitive advantage with IBM's Big Data solutions. Topics to be covered include: Business Value of Big Data & Customer Case Studies Getting Started w/ Big Data  Unlock your Big Data sources Simplify your warehouse with deep Big Data analytics Reduce costs with Hadoop Analyze data in motion for real-time insight Analyze raw data in its native format  Why Netezza & Big Data Analytics  Exploit the power and simplicity of a purpose-built appliance for high-speed analytics Improve the quality and timeliness of business intelligence Query data at lightning speed efficiently and economically

What is #Analytics?

#Tennis and #Technology Hit the Courts @USOpen

by Rick Singer, VP Sponsorship Marketing @ IBM

Originally published on ibm.com.

The end of summer brings one of the most popular global sports events of the year - the U.S. Open.

More than 700,000 fans are expected to attend the matches at the USTA's Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Queens, making the U.S. Open the most-attended, single sports event in the world. Even more viewers are expected to watch this year's tournament on TV, topping the 53 million viewers who tuned in last year on CBS and ESPN.

And a record number of fans are expected to follow the U.S. Open matches on their mobile devices, or seek out the latest match results, news or live streaming of tennis matches at www.USOpen.org on their computers at work or at home. We're expecting to easily top the 15.5 million visitors who caught the action last year via the tournament's website. These are big numbers all around.

You might not realize, however, that major sporting events like the US Open are not only exciting to watch and follow, but are also a living lab for how "big data" can translate into big business. This year, the USTA is using business analytics to improve the experience for everyone: fans, tennis players, event organizers and broadcasters.

We're all asking the same questions about the 2012 Open. What does Sam Stouser have to do to repeat last year's women's victory, or how can past winners Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova reign again? What can we expect from the men's side? With Rafa Nadal sidelined by injury, will past U.S. Open winners Novak Djokovic or Roger Federer win the men's title? Or will Andy Murray break through, fresh from winning his gold medal at the Olympic Games in London. How can each of them outplay the others to bring home the trophy?

Answering those questions while connecting tennis fans to the action on the court requires a unique digital experience powered by analytics and cloud computing technologies. By offering deeper analysis and a better understanding of how players are performing and ensuring that USOpen.org can handle peak traffic when website demand picks up, my company is helping the USTA serve up an engaging and interactive experience.

For example, SlamTracker is an online dashboard that serves up statistics and information for every match being played. Not only can fans follow live scores, point by point, but they can click on a point on the match's timeline for additional details.

But most importantly, a SlamTracker feature, "Keys to the Match", provides insight into what each player needs to do in order to have a higher likelihood of winning. We analyzed 39 million data points covering Grand Slam matches over the past seven years to provide analytic assessments of players and what they need to do to succeed.

Based on head-to-head games in the past, the system filters and ranks the top three keys to the match for each player. Examples might be the need for an individual player to return a certain percentage of second serves in order to win or whether longer points favor one opponent over the other. Take a look at the keys before the match, then follow a player's performance against them as the sets progress. You'll see in real time that they keys are a great predictor of success.

Use of this technology is not limited to sports. The same analytic software is being used by hospitals to monitor babies in prenatal wards, police forces to prevent crime and financial services companies to improve customer service and cut costs.

Dating back to 1992, when my company became the official information technology provider, the U.S. Open has embraced this type of cutting-edge technology in order to improve tennis fans' enjoyment of the sport. And 2012 is bringing even more ways for fans to follow the action.

This year a new free iPad app has been added to the iTunes Store. It joins the existing US Open iPhone app, US Open Android app, and mobile version of www.USOpen.org at m.usopen.org to provide the latest news and scores. Last year, fans viewed a record number of 84 million pages from their mobile devices.

And while sports writers like to predict who they feel are the most likely to win the U.S. Open, we'll use the IBM Social Sentiment Index to measure what fans are saying and expressing about the tournament on Twitter. Later in the tournament, we'll reveal unique insights based on our analysis of fan sentiment.

Enjoy the tennis no matter how you choose to follow it, since the experience will be immediate and insightful, thanks to technology.

For more information about IBM's work with the US Open, click here: www.usopen.org/ibm

Think BIG @ibm_iod 2012: Oct. 21-25. Las Vegas.

Information On Demand 2012 is THE place to learn how you can "think big" and make a difference in your organization.  Learn more and register at ibm.com/events/informationondemand

Thousands of Hospitals Across the Country to Pay Penalties for Redamissions #healthcare #analytics

http://www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/morning_call/2012/08/report-dozens-of-metro-atl-hospitals.html

What to do?  

If you are in the New York or New England area, there is an innovative solution regarding patient readmission only offered by IBM and one of our premier business partners, New England Systems.

The solution centers around predictive analytics designed to find patients who are likely candidates for readmission. Patient data is analyzed to determine the probability of who would be a likely candidate for readmission. This information is returned in an "executive dashboard" for easy review and analysis.

Having fact-based, predictive, readmission statistics allows healthcare organizations to take proactive measures to reduce the likelihood of a patient returning to the hospital for the same condition. This readmission solution can either be implemented at your organization or easily managed as a service, eliminating the need for additional technology infrastructure.

We would like to give you an opportunity to learn more about this amazing new technology and the possibilities it brings to the Healthcare Industry.

Contact me today at http://www.ibm.com/myrep/jagaeta to set up a consultation with New England Systems.

Discover the Real #Value in Large Volumes of #Data

Every day, our world creates 2.5 quintillion bytes of data. How businesses discover the real value in large volumes of data is key to their success. In this video, four IBM customers demonstrate how Smarter Analytics has helped them deliver the right product, prevent fraud, make informed and timely decisions and ultimately transform their organization.

To learn more about IBM Smarter Analytics, visit www.ibm.com/SmarterAnalytics.  Or, you can contact me at www.ibm.com/myrep/jagaeta.

#IBM Launches New Class of #Analytics #Software to Improve Decision Making #smarteranalytics #in

Explosion of Data #ibmsoftwarestory #in

Harness Big Data to Develop New Offerings

• 1.8 trillion gigabytes of data exists in the digital universe.
• 55% year-to-year growth occurs in enterprise data.
• The same amount of data generated between the dawn of civilization and 2003 is now created every two days.

What if... you could use analytics to help you predict and negotiate the optimal deal - even in a highly volatile environment?

ConAgra Mills did.

Great news- @IBM Smart #Analytics System 5170 is now eligible for the Solution Accelerator Incentive #ibmpartners #ibmsmb

Click HERE.

Sunnier Sentiment on Memorial Day Travel