1. WHITE
PAPER
Developing a
Complete Data
Strategy —
Filling the
“Content Blind Spot”
2. WHITE
PAPER
Developing a Complete Data Strategy — Filling the “Content Blind Spot”
A Complete Data Strategy of the “big data” landscape is being missed. The “blind spot”
in many companies’ data strategy revolves around semi-
At no time has the phrase “Every Company Is A Data Company” structured data that is contained in content like reports, EDI
been more accurate. In today’s economically challenging, streams, PDF files and many other valuable sources.
customer-driven business environment, it has become critical
for organizations to drive every possible efficiency from their Understanding the “Content Blind Spot”
business models, while still keeping a strong customer focus.
IT organizations are now recognizing the critical nature of the
The only way to get the insight necessary to continually tune information contained in their “content blind spot” and have
your business is to leverage every shred of data available. This begun to incorporate it into their overall data strategy. Why
means companies must use data that comes in every format have they begun to focus their attention on it? Simply, it is
and from every source, to gain a comprehensive view of their already a vital part of the decision culture in their organization
business. and it is also an important link to past decisions. Additionally,
companies have come to realize that these sources are
growing at a tremendous rate; they have become the language
Big Data Technologies — Managing Multiple Vs
of business for many industries like healthcare, financial
services and retail sales.
So where do you find these rich sources of information and
what do they look like? The answer to the first question is easy
— they are everywhere and in vast quantities. As companies
have added systems like ERPs and CRMs, they have also
added thousands of “standard reports.” With EDI exchanges,
businesses are accumulating commerce data. Through the
development of Excel spreadsheets, information is being
enriched. As PDF versions of invoices and bills of lading are
exchanged, vital data is being saved. All of these sources
represent semi-structured data that holds vital business
insight fitting into a company’s “content blind spot.”
Additionally, the information that has been accumulating in
enterprise content management (ECM) systems to track
corporate history and statutory reporting offers a historical
perspective that also fills this rich source of information. So, as
For most IT professionals, this has meant focusing a lot of
time and resources dealing with accessing the structured data
sources inside the organization. Projects associated with data
warehousing and business intelligence have been the focus
of many companies; these companies have yielded some
insights into the business. Unfortunately the sources are only
the tip of the data “iceberg” inside most companies. For that
reason, forward looking CIOs and IT organizations have begun
to try to deal with other sources of information to get a more
comprehensive view of their business. Many have started to
develop strategies for dealing with what is being described as
“big data” problems.
The focus of these projects has been on trying to gather and
analyze highly unstructured data like websites, tweets and
blogs to determine trends that might impact the business.
While this is certainly a step in the right direction, another part
3. WHITE
PAPER
Developing a Complete Data Strategy — Filling the “Content Blind Spot”
you can see, the quantity, value and perspective provided by
this rich source of information is undisputable. The question
is what to do with it and how does it fit into the overall data
strategy of an organization. To deal with these issues, many
IT organizations and business departments have turned to
a new class of software to offer them the ability to leverage
semi-structured big data in their decisions. This new class
of software is called INFORMATION OPTIMIZATION and it is
greatly expanding the traditional business analytics landscape.
Information Optimization Software
This new class of software is specifically designed to allow
structured, unstructured and especially semi-structured
data sources of all sizes to become an integral component
of a company’s overall big data strategy. Additionally, this
software links the power of semi-structured data analysis with
traditional decision-making technologies like spreadsheets
and business intelligence systems to offer a comprehensive As you can tell, the ability to deliver this level of functionality is
decision making environment. not easily achieved, that is why there have been few vendors
willing to tackle this problem. One has begun to set itself apart
To accomplish this, information optimization systems start in this growing sector, that vendor is Datawatch.
by ingesting semi-structured data from sources throughout
organizations and mapping these sources to models that Datawatch – The Leader
allow the sources to be combined, restructured and analyzed in Information Optimization
in different ways. While this sounds like a relatively straight
forward process, it requires the software to possess an in- Datawatch, a global company headquartered in Chelmsford,
depth understanding of the structural components of the Massachusetts, has devoted almost 25 years to addressing
content types being ingested and an ability to break these the issues of deriving analytical value from semi-structured
down into atomic level items that can be combined and mapped data and is the leader in delivering information optimization to
together in different ways. enterprises of all sizes. With over 40,000 customers leveraging
Datawatch Information Optimization solutions, they are
“By the way, that’s the easy part. The tricky part is making it providing powerful insights into businesses of every type.
simple enough so that users across every level of an enterprise
can build and deploy these new analytical assets themselves.” Datawatch’s Information Optimization solutions are
Successful deployments of information optimization systems empowering IT organizations to provide a more complete
are seldom stand alone; but work in tandem with both analytical experience for individual users to the largest
enterprise content management systems (to access and utilize enterprises. Datawatch is specifically focused on helping
information housed there) and BI systems (to allow structured organizations fill their “content blind spot” with a solution that
and semi-structured sources to be linked together for richer is designed to deal with the diverse types of data that are
analytical insights). trapped in these sources and also, the velocity and volume that
this data moves at in real-world scenarios.
The final key to the success of systems like this is their ability
to work in high-volume and high-velocity environments. This Customers leveraging the Datawatch solution, often in
means being able to put data into a production environment conjunction with other analytical tools like Microsoft Office
that supports scheduling and automation of these processes. and leading BI tools, have been able to gain greater insights
into issues like improving auditing and compliance,
strengthening procurement to pay management and
enhancing operational reporting.
