July 2000 - Volume 1, Issue 08

IN THIS ISSUE

Featured Article: Using Clickstream as an e-Source for the e-Business Intelligence Environment   

• Just Like a Babysitter   
• Satisfying the User   
• Are You Building a Data Shack?   
• The e- Dilemma   

• Using Clickstream as an e-Source for the e-Business Intelligence Environment   
  

  Many data warehouse developers are being asked to integrate into their business intelligence environment a relatively new information rich data source, the web log. The web log contains a wealth of information on the touch point for today’s e-business, the company web site. The web log, or clickstream, records every interaction a customer, or potential customer, has with your business over today’s marketplace, the Internet. The success of a particular marketing or ad campaign can be directly measured and quantified through integration of the web log with other backend operational systems such as sales force automation (SFA), customer relationship management (CRM), and enterprise Resource planning (ERP) applications.
• Just Like a Babysitter   
  

  To own or not to own, that is the question. At least that was the question that came up often during an Information Stewardship special interest group (SIG) that I moderated at the recent conference. To the disgust of the gentleman sitting to my right in this session (he choked every time one of the participants mentioned the word "owner" instead of "steward"), the semantics of information stewardship appeared to drive the conversation. Semantics, and the fact that many a stewardship program works well for a while and fizzles when not managed or not sold properly to business and technical management (this is a related topic reserved for another day).
• Satisfying the User   
  

  In this article you will learn: 1) Techniques to understand the business; 2) How to differentiate and support different types of users; 3) Modes of communicating with the users
• Are You Building a Data Shack?   
  

  Data Warehousing / Business Intelligence projects have taken some strange paths over the past few years. The one common and positive theme that I have seen during this evolution is that the business community was usually at the forefront of the initiative. Decision-makers were experiencing an "information pain" that needed immediate attention. The IT (information technology) group wanted to get out of the report writing business to focus on application and web development. Allowing executives and business users access to data sounded like a quick and easy fix. We soon found out that this so-called "quick fix" needed further evaluation.
• The e- Dilemma   
  

  Over the last several years we have learned a new vocabulary. The "E" vocabulary. e-business, e-commence, e-solutions, e-economy, e-mail, and my personal favorite "business at the speed of e". I would like to add a new term: e-dilemma. This describes the situation that many organizations experience when building their e-business solutions. Companies that experience the e-dilemma spend considerable amounts of development dollars to create an e-business solution that accomplishes only two things – the alienation of existing and potential customers, and becomes the central theme of "what-not-to-do" articles. In this column I will discuss some of the key issues that corporations need to address to avoid the e-dilemma when building an e-business solution.