Organizations big and small will have to find ways to keep up with the digital footing or else will find themselves struggling to survive.
Business environments are becoming more aggressive as technology and its benefits reshape the way we think about performing occupations. In this virtual age, the phrase “adapt or perish” is no longer applicable only to organic life forms, it is now a law that encompasses even the business strategies we choose. A rephrasing would go along the lines of “adapt or cease operations.”
Knowledge is power, and knowledge can be found in the illusive chaos of unorganized data… and by data we mean customer data. Companies are becoming more and more interested in harvesting this information, and as such, other companies are more than willing to track and report trends, website traffic, hashtags, or keyword searches. Back in the day, corporations had to wait for customers to approach them through complaints or 800 numbers. Now-a-days, this information is readily available even through social media.
This data recompilation has a big downside, though; the bigger the business, the more information it has to compile and store. Think of multinational corporations that have millions of customers overseas, how could they manage to compile, store, and analyze such gargantuan volumes of data? To understand this, we must first take a look at their IT infrastructure.
Hosting
Corporations need a place to host these vast amounts of information and to digitize their pre-existing pen-on-paper data. A practical up-and-coming solution is to use hybrid IT. In hybrid IT, businesses store some of its most confidential data on private servers, while they use cloud storage to store other types of data. It’s the best option when it comes to accessibility and security. Even so, the problem regarding information volume still remains. Imagine trying to migrate terabytes upon terabytes of data from one place to another if the circumstances required it. It could take days, even with the best internet speed available. So, corporations tend to store data and not move it. Data centers tend to invest large amounts of money in IT infrastructure because of this; they need to prepare as they host more and more information. A single data center might keep enough data for the lifetime of a company; which is why a web host, or a collocation provider, are rapidly becoming a necessary outsource.
Data Gravity
Data Gravity is a term coined by software engineer Dave McCrory. Since large amounts of data tend not to move from their hosting space, other software tools gravitate towards it in order to start the statistical process.
Digital Transformation
Once data has been properly processed, the business is finally ready for a digital transformation. In short, the business uses its digital technologies to create new, or alter pre-existing, practices. These include marketing approaches, customer services, business models, or products. All of these must change in order to adapt to or predict, how the digital market will evolve according to the information their data processing unearthed. Ever wonder how movie streaming services can “suggest” options for you? Well, this is it. In the process of digital transformation, there might not be a better digital footing than customer interaction, whether direct or indirect.
How Will Data Gravity, Digital Transformation and Hybrid IT Infrastructure Define the Future?
Bluntly said, they already are. Businesses that are unable to keep up with customer information will find themselves having a hard time competing against those that do. In the future, much like in the past, those who understand the value of information will be the best to adapt to changes. Webline-Services can help you adapt to these changes. Our industry expertise allows us to be your business partner, not just a service provider, who can provide solutions relevant to your organization’s needs.