Real World Applications of Big Data -Big Win or Big Mess?

In response to a previous comment made on the Big Data and personal information as the new currency blog, I decided to explore the type of companies that are using Big Data to fuel marketing, environmental sustainability, business process optimisation, healthcare and several other strategies for the greater good and how poorly executed Big Data analysis have led to question the real value of Big Data . I consider that it is fair to say that as consumers, we are more inclined to share information and personal data if there is value returned. Researching the benefits of Big Data analytics for organisations could incentivise the adoption of open information.

Some of the samples covered by ReachForce and Greenbiz are:

1. Arby’s — Using Big Data to determine best targets and communication channels for advertisement campaigns.

2. Starbucks — Determining potential success of every new franchise location.

3. Capital One — Ensuring success of all customer offerings.

4. T-Mobile — Reducing their customer turnover rate.

5. Made in a Free World- A non-profit using Big Data to track and identify materials and goods associated with slave labour.

6. World Resources Institute — Created a Global Forest Watch division which provides interactive tools for users to identify deforestation and the destruction of natural habitats.

7. AstraZeneca — Conducted real-world studies to determine the most effective and economical treatments for some chronic illnesses and common diseases.

Based on the previous cases, it is possible to visualise the value of sharing data. A good and not so distant example of Big Data coming into play was presented on the movie Minority Report with a tech-enriched vision of the future. In the scene where John Anderton (Tom Cruise) enters a shopping mall, he is immediately welcomed to the store with a series of advertisement campaigns, most of them might appear irrelevant until he visits the GAP store where the character is greeted by a personalised hologram based on previous purchases produced after performing some sort of retina scan. The added benefit of personalised marketing campaigns is bi-directional as both consumers and corporations are able to gain value from Big Data analytics.

Although Big Data has great potential when it comes to predictive and behavioural analytics. The real problem with Big Data lies in its analysis, an article from Fortune.com exhibits some cases of poorly applied analytics. Amazon.co.uk advertised a shirt with the statement ‘Keep Calm and Rape a Lot’. The company that made the shirt was not completely aware that this design was selling online. A coding error from libraries of words that merge into popular phrases such as ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ and finally gets dropped onto a template of a T-shirt that is then posted as an Amazon item for sale was the cause of the problem.

An article published in Harvard by Lazer D, et al. highlights another case of poorly implemented Big Data analytics. According to the article Google Flue Trends (GFT) was predicting more than double the proportion of doctor visits for influenza-like illness than the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which bases its estimates on surveillance reports. The primary cause of the algorithm calculation errors is the fact that once the flu was in the news, people became more interested in the subject ultimately leading to more searches.

A statement from the previous article that I found particularly interesting is the fact that quantity of data does not mean that issues such as measuring, construct validity and reliability are not to be found when analytics are applied to it. These are the type of problems that the article refers as “Big Data Hubris” as organisations become more reliant on figures obtained from automated analytics tools.

Real World Applications of Big Data (Big Win or Big Mess?) is the second blog from a series of four that aim to explore different sides of Big Data analytics applied in the industry with extraordinary success or epic failures.

To facilitate the discussion of this topic, a few questions to consider are:

· Is Big Data the force that will drive innovation in the future?

· What type of strategies should be implemented to mitigate the errors associated to Big Data Analytics?

· Are you OK with the concept of targeted marketing campaigns?

· Are you aware of any example of Big Data being misused?