Business intelligence systems enable users to interactively view and analyze their
data to make timely, accurate, information-based decision.
They give you in-depth knowledge of your business, at your fingertips; at the exact
moment you need it. It transforms your data to help you make better decisions, lower
expenses and increase your competitive advantage.
MCI WorldCom
Marketing Information and Sales Analysis
The MCI Lead "TrueUp" system is designed to dramatically increase the efficiency
of managing MCI Telemarketing leads.
The system helps analysts ensure that there are enough Telemarketing leads to meet
planned sales goals. Using the system analysts can quickly analyze and estimate
the data needs required to meet cycle goals in Telemarketing centers.
The system uses a combination of software products. MS Access and Visual Basic were
used to acquire data from both SQL databases and MS Excel spreadsheets. This data
is then feed into TM1 (a multi-dimensional database) using CarpeDatum's Transport.
Transport facilitates the integration of metadata and data into the iTM1 TrueUp
System.
The user interface to the system is a combination of Applix iTM1 and MS Excel. Data
is extracted from disparate sources including; two Telemarketing lead inventory
databases (DEC & SmartCall), two different sales tracking systems (Red Green an
SQL database and a customized mainframe extract that provides completes data.),
a lead generation system called “CONI”, a MS Excel worksheet that contains Cycle
plan information (Placements) and various hand entered statistics. The system combines
this information with complex business rules to arrive at “snapshot” and “TrueUp”
reports.
MCI
Revenue Analysis for the Mass Markets Division
MCI Mass Markets Division is the consumer element of MCI Telecommunications. Mass
Markets also accounts for $6 billion of MCI’s revenue.
Mass Markets needed a way to analyze the sources of revenue in order to properly
arrange their customer service, telemarketing and direct sales forces efficiently
and effectively and ensure a consistent and reliable revenue stream. MCI had 5 analysts
and a manager reporting, budgeting and forecasting high-level revenue data in relational
databases and spreadsheets (Focus, Access and Excel) prior to the integration.
CarpeDatum Consulting programmed Transport to interface with the legacy MCI system
that delivered over 300 MB of transaction data per month - translating to 3.6 GB
per year. Transport is able to efficiently translate and load each month's data
building the proper dimensions and resolving any and all new leaf elements and their
respective roll ups. The result was an 8-dimension iTM1 data cube with plenty of
detailed and accurate data.
After the successful integration, only 4 analysts (including the manager!) were
needed to dissect the data that contained much more detail than ever before. Consequently,
Mass Markets is able to forecast more accurately disconnect rates; future installs,
and even minutes! This translates into better business decisions regarding scheduling
customer service reps, more intelligent telemarketing and direct marketing information
and most importantly, budgeting and forecasting the considerable revenue stream.