Best Embedded BI Tools

BI (business intelligence) tools are a type of application software. They collect and process unstructured data from both internal and external systems, including documents, books, journals, files, health records, emails, videos, images, and other business sources. BI tools are not as flexible as business analytics tools, but they allow users to find information from among amassed data, primarily through queries. They also help to prepare data for analysis so that users can create dashboards, reports, and data visualizations. The results of these analyses assist users in accelerating and improving decision-making, increasing operational efficiency, pinpointing new potentials for revenue, identifying market trends and genuine KPIs (key performance indicators), and identifying new business opportunities.

BI tools are generally used for straightforward reporting of business data and querying. They can combine a wide range of data analysis apps, which may include real-time BI, mobile BI, operational BI, open-source BI, cloud/software as a service BI, collaborative BI, enterprise reporting, ad hoc analysis and querying, online analytical processing (OLAP), location intelligence, and data visualization software. BI tools may also include tools for building BI dashboards.

The benefits of embedded business intelligence include:

• Boosts adoption of BI by users and increases ease-of-use.
  
• Boosts BI effectiveness, linking analytics capabilities and reporting to operational processes, which helps users to attain relevant data-based insights more quickly.
• Supports and enables the pervasive use of BI, facilitating the development of an organizational culture rooted in fact-based decision-making.
  
• Helps users understand the relationships between business data and operational processes, enabling them to react faster to business opportunities and/or threats
  
• Facilitates process automation, thereby boosting organizational efficiency and effectiveness.
  
• Enhances the value and marketability of your core applications and therefore your products.

Consider embedding analytics in your organization’s products and services for the following reasons:

1. A shift toward data-driven decision-making helps your business model adapt for this digital-first world.
2. It will create a seamless user experience, improving your customers’ experience with your app and improving customer retention.
3. Built-in analytics capabilities allow users to securely share data and insights with employees, suppliers, and partners, which speeds up processes and allows for easier optimization.
4. Embedding an existing BI solution into your product (as opposed to building your own) saves time and resources.

When choosing an embedded BI tool, consider the following criteria:

• Data access, data integration, and data management
• Functionality of end-user analytics
• How analytics are embedded within the user interface
• Security and deployment
• Customization, extensibility, and transparency
• Complexity of features
• Identify performance requirements and scalability
• How long it will take to integrate the tool
• Support, training, and services provided by the vendor
• Will third-party consultants need to be brought in to configure, integrate, and deploy the solution or does the vendor have integration specialists who can assist with implementation?