Gain actionable business insights from data

 Data is the information you collect from the system. For example, in a fleet management process, you may need data on driver behavior, fuel consumption, maintenance alerts, etc. Insights are the value you get from analyzing your data. You can use data analysis to identify trends and patterns in the retrieved information. Analysis helps understand data. Information is the product of distilling this data and giving it structure and context. This way, you're not staring at a bunch of random numbers on spreadsheets and documents. Actionable insights are where the magic happens. This is the part where businesses use data analysis and discovery to take action and improve operational efficiency. There are many online tools available for understanding data. In the fleet vehicle tracking industry, software platforms are gaining popularity. Advanced technology is in place, with powerful insights and integrated analytics – all designed to give you the reporting you need. Let’s take a deeper look.

Gain actionable business insights from data

Fleet managers can use fleet management systems or platforms to gain and leverage actionable insights.

  These are accompanied by advanced software technology that helps businesses strategize to make informed decisions.

You can choose Cartrack as a provider and get actionable insights such as:

Find out the challenge now. This will enable you to make immediate changes during working hours and throughout your business. When you put out fires quickly, your business can continue to grow with increased productivity levels.

Receive contextualized metrics. Maybe you need specific context for a specific reporting requirement, such as cost per job. Operational, administrative, and financial data costs can be adjusted to allow you to analyze this specification. Receiving metrics from these three metrics, the exact cost of each job can be determined and price comparisons made. Maybe one is more important than the other, creating a cost imbalance, so you may need to make some cost changes there. Plus, compare accurate metrics to see if your route is optimal and understand how other costs impact your bottom line.

Use comparable metrics. Compare driver and vehicle metrics to pinpoint price differences in the cost of each task, or differences in the behavior and maintenance costs of the vehicles they drive. If a driver's vehicle costs significantly more to maintain than others, managers can assist with their driving behavior and provide them with support if needed. Use it to evaluate driver productivity. Find out how much time your drivers spend on the road and how much work they complete in the required time.

Get important insights instantly. There may be an urgent issue that requires your immediate attention, prompting you to set up a meeting with the relevant parties. Assuming you don’t have time to spend hours analyzing data; the platform will let you visualize your fleet’s fuel consumption, unproductive idling, safety and utilization on a dashboard, all with just one click. You can filter data by time or vehicle to increase flexibility and speed in pinpointing challenges. This way, you can be ready for the meeting without having to do too much preparation.

What are data insights for business decisions?

We know that actionable data helps you take immediate action and make business decisions.

 However, we should extend it and ultimately use it in a way that best suits the business. In other words, use it to drive workforce optimization, which includes administration as well as task, team and change management.

 Fleet owners need a solid business structure and strategy to lay the groundwork for fleet managers, drivers and all other employees. From there, we can create meaning from the insights.

 But let’s start with the basics.

Actionable insights into business considerations

• Have the right people in your corner

  It’s important to hire the right people who can understand data insights. Investing time and effort in finding the wrong people is expensive, not only financially, but also in terms of business processes. For example, fleet managers should be hired based on fleet experience to understand the meaning of system data.

• Communication and team planning

  The importance of communication and planning for businesses and teams has proven to be one of the most important task management strategies. With a fleet, it goes without saying that you will have a diverse team, often spread out across locations. Therefore, you need to plan, manage, follow up on tasks, and create a space for them to perform well. One way to achieve this is to establish communication channels to increase driver productivity and ensure efficiency. Fleet software applications provide this functionality.
  

• Set KPIs

  These are used to evaluate an organization's performance against its objectives. They aid decision-making, assist in setting strategic goals and enable effective processes. This will motivate employees and help them improve their performance.
  
  

• internal action

  Managers and teams need to create actions in task management and delegate tasks to team members. Set reminders and complete updates, and once the task is completed, they can move on to the next one. This is also part of the communication channel chosen.

• Competitive Advantage

  Companies should capture, manage and analyze their data to improve their business intelligence. They can then seize the opportunity to outperform their competitors by providing excellent customer service.

How to turn data into meaningful insights?

1. define your goals

   Your goals should be top of mind before choosing the right fleet management software. Goals give more meaning to daily tasks and clarify the reasoning behind company decisions. Without these, there is not much effort to lead to stagnation and struggle to achieve. Goals are the steps to achieve an end result and are part of every business plan.

   Fleet managers can set operational goals such as fuel cost savings and increased driver engagement. With this in mind, they can go directly to the part of the platform that provides this insight. Maybe the marketing team's goal is to bring more leads to the business, which will require a higher budget. Saving fuel costs and working toward this goal will directly generate more revenue for the company.

   If this does come to fruition, the data will indeed be a meaningful insight against which to measure goals.

   Now you'll be able to ask the right questions and figure out which questions you want your data to answer. Before you unpack your data, it will ensure you don't spend your time on the wrong things.

2. Segment your data

   Breaking the data into parts can help you understand it better. The fleet software platform works the same way as Google Analytics. You can customize the platform to suit your needs and extract enough specific data for reporting. For example, maybe you have a management meeting about driver behavior and productivity. You can create a segment for it on the platform and then forward feedback only on it.

3. Use visuals to simplify data sets

   Visuals are a great way to represent data in an easy-to-understand way. Especially when presenting, you should not use raw data to convey information, but rather use visuals to showcase your findings. The software's reporting features will be the starting point before you create the perfect presentation for your meeting.

4. discover context

   Without the right context, you either don't get the full story or you get the wrong information. Depending on your predetermined goals, you need a comprehensive understanding in order to create meaning from the results or visuals. You should ask questions like: Who in your fleet is responsible for this? Or why does this happen? In what ways does it impact the business?

5. Find the right pattern

   Up, down, and zigzags in between, this is what you often see in visual representations. From this, you can identify patterns or trends in the data about certain events. You can identify when there's an up or down trend, visualize the relationship between two factors, and more. They are all tailored to reveal the story behind the data.

6. Identify assumptions and action plan

   You’ve done your research, now it’s time to start developing a plan of action. Perhaps, vehicle maintenance issues are a common trend in driver misconduct. Perhaps you need to delegate this issue to more team members who will dissect this reporting feature in more detail.
   

6 key attributes of actionable insights

We know you may move frequently. Want to quickly learn how to get actionable insights? Get these out and take action.

1. Make an alliance

   Connect your insights to established business goals to drive action. Align them with your KPIs to create a sense of urgency.

2. context

   You need background information or comparisons to provide insightful context for your data. Otherwise, there will be more unanswered questions than plans.

3. association

   Deliver insights to the right people at the right time and environment. They need to contact key decision makers to take appropriate action.

4. specificity

   If you're going to highlight actions, then you need to explain them in detail so people understand. Explain why something happened to take more action.
   
   

5. novel

   Provides interesting insights. Insights do not need to be repeated, but given new developments, creating more growth and challenges. We turn to information if we feel it reinforces rather than challenges and adds to our existing knowledge.
   
   

6. clear

   Insights need to be clear and understandable. People need to understand the reasons behind it and how it will help them. Visualization will aid in the retention of information.
   

in conclusion

Need some meaningful insights? Cartrack offers hundreds of reports to promote your business. Contact us today and receive automated reports directly to your inbox to match your workflow.