Analytic Competitors
Running head: Analytic Competitors
Analytic Competitors
Lev Mallinger
Grand Canyon University
BUS 606: Quantitative Methods
August 24, 2012
“A wise man is strong and a knowledgeable man increases in his strength” (Proverbs 24:5)
Introduction
An analytic competitor may be described as an organization engaged in the committed activities of accumulating data, organizing and analyzing it into meaningful information, and following through with business decisions and activities informed by that information. An uninformed layperson may assume most businesses operate as an analytic competitor. This, however, may not be so.
Many time business decisions are made through anecdotal or subjective non-quantitative means. An example of this might be a person wanting to open up a restaurant in town. He sees there are no 24 hour diners in the town, so he figures that since he likes diner food, other people must also and without competition he will have a good chance to succeed. It is very possible that he will succeed, but his chances of success might improve if he were to do some research beforehand. Perhaps he could gather data that informed him more about his potential customer base. How interested are they in diner food? Do the town’s people engage in night time activity that would have them out of the house during the night and early morning hours? Buy collecting data and analyzing it the restaurateur can better plan his offerings and hours of operations. While being an analytic competitor does not guarantee success, it will raise his chances of success.
We have been taught in American society that if one builds a better mouse trap, the world will beat a path to their door. Perhaps once it was this simple; today not so. While there is value in having a better product to sell than the competitors, it is not a guaranteed path to success.
We think a better mouse trap is the answer, but perhaps a less expensive mouse trap will earn more revenue. Or one that is
Analytic Competitors
Lev Mallinger
Grand Canyon University
BUS 606: Quantitative Methods
August 24, 2012
“A wise man is strong and a knowledgeable man increases in his strength” (Proverbs 24:5)
Introduction
An analytic competitor may be described as an organization engaged in the committed activities of accumulating data, organizing and analyzing it into meaningful information, and following through with business decisions and activities informed by that information. An uninformed layperson may assume most businesses operate as an analytic competitor. This, however, may not be so.
Many time business decisions are made through anecdotal or subjective non-quantitative means. An example of this might be a person wanting to open up a restaurant in town. He sees there are no 24 hour diners in the town, so he figures that since he likes diner food, other people must also and without competition he will have a good chance to succeed. It is very possible that he will succeed, but his chances of success might improve if he were to do some research beforehand. Perhaps he could gather data that informed him more about his potential customer base. How interested are they in diner food? Do the town’s people engage in night time activity that would have them out of the house during the night and early morning hours? Buy collecting data and analyzing it the restaurateur can better plan his offerings and hours of operations. While being an analytic competitor does not guarantee success, it will raise his chances of success.
We have been taught in American society that if one builds a better mouse trap, the world will beat a path to their door. Perhaps once it was this simple; today not so. While there is value in having a better product to sell than the competitors, it is not a guaranteed path to success.
We think a better mouse trap is the answer, but perhaps a less expensive mouse trap will earn more revenue. Or one that is