KXEN EMEA User Conference -- Day 1

I am in Windsor, UK, attending the KXEN EMEA User Conference. The theme for this event is "Success in Business Analytics". This seems such a relevant topic. Analytics had moved from an academic and research world to the business work a couple of decades ago. This also defined the success of companies such as SAS. Incidently, SAS still retains the "Institute" label in its name. Does that mean it still has flavour of academic and research ... maybe.

Statistics managed a transition into business applications. In some cases, it defined the survival of the organization. The best example is actuarial function for an insurance. A hard core statistics driven function that is at the core of an insurance business.

For other functions, such as marketing, it is still regarded as a "good to have" approach. Marketing is still focussed on mass media, on having the most creative ads, on winning the Lions award and in some cases on being the PR for the CEO (see my post on this).

Even the concept of database marketing seems to be wrong. I meet a lot of people who claim to be doing database marketing. Unfortunately, their understanding of database marketing is that there is a "list or database" of people and they send out communciations to this list.

So while statistics managed to cross the divide between academics and business, it is still not accepted and made welcome in the business world.

I hope to capture ways in which analytics was made a success in business during this conference.

The conference is yet to start, since I am an early breakfast person, I decided to use the time to pin down my thoughts. I will be returning with my take at the end of the day. For now, see the beautiful autumn in front of my room balcony.