by Ben Atchison, Delivery Lead, VIC
This leading Automotive Retailer was stuck in traffic when looking to make data-driven decisions.
Working with Altis, a strategic review of the use of data confirmed the need to simplify and democratise the availability of data. This “back to basics” strategy has enabled a renewed focus on the customer and the business.
The problem
With a history of tactical, in-house application development and siloed data marts for individual business units, the business was frustrated with the difficulty of obtaining the information they needed.
“We have exhausted the tactical solutions”
“It is too hard and slow to get data”
“It is time for a proper architecture”
“We stopped asking for data because it is too hard”
With fragmented data assets and a non-intuitive business layer, the business was heavily reliant on key individuals who had the technical skills and accumulated knowledge of the business and systems to service requests for insights. This created a risk of dependency on those individuals and prevented the organisation from scaling in its use of information.
The solution
Strategy & Roadmap
The Automotive Retailer engaged Altis to undertake a strategic review of the use of information. Running workshops spanning Sales, Customer Service, Marketing, Finance and Supply Chain, a clear picture of the current state architecture and both its pain points and opportunities was compiled.
Altis created a business data architecture to articulate the key data domains of interest and to assist in business prioritisation of where the best business value was to be obtained.
Altis created a future state modern data architecture design to enable the business vision to be realised in a best-practice and scalable manner.
Drawing on the earlier business prioritisation, a roadmap of technical, business and governance-related initiatives was created and costed to support the business case.
Phased Development
Commencing with the establishment of a best-practice modern data platform, Altis worked with the Automotive Retailer to establish data assets covering areas including Customer, Sales, Customer Satisfaction, Servicing, Stock Control, Parts & Warranty and Supply Chain.
Power BI dashboards were created to answer a broad range of questions such as:
- Where are Sales growing the fastest?
- Do seasonal factors explain the difference?
- Where should stock be moved to be best placed for sale based on known demand?
- Which dealers have the greatest growth in warranty claims?
- Which models / parts are the most subject to warranty claims?
- What percentage of customers booked a service within 7 days of receiving an SMS reminder?
- Do owners of particular models service their cars less frequently?
Users were able to consume a variety of pre-built dashboards guiding them through common data questions and exploration, while more advanced users were provided the ability to self-serve and create their own content, governed by a well-understood security framework and governance model.
Managed Services
Following the strategic aim of enabling in-house resources to focus on high value-add duties, Altis Managed Services support and maintain the day-to-day operations of the solution.
Tangible Outcomes
The Automotive Retailer now possesses an industry-best practice data platform and visualisation tool, significantly broadening access to information to a broad swathe of the business. This has improved the productivity of key staff, allowing them to perform higher value-add analysis, while simultaneously supporting secure and governed access to data to many in the business.
This allows the Automotive Retailer to focus on the most important issue – their customer.
