9 min read
The Hidden Bazinga of Dirty Data
Article summary: What can you do when the hidden Bazinga of dirty data plays tricks on your company’s bottom line? More...
9 min read
3 Unexpected KPIs that Drive Manufacturing Success
Article summary: Looking for new ideas for tracking real progress at your company? Check out these three unexpected...
7 min read
3 Mistakes Good Leaders Make
Article summary: Can you avoid the top 3 data mistakes good leaders make? Read on to find out.
Topic: Leadership Trends
2 min read
Jon Thompson Guests on: The Manufacturing Executive [Watch Now]
Watch the Video Now
{% video_player "embed_player" overrideable=False, type='scriptV4', hide_playlist=True,...8 min read
Healthcare HQ™ Trendwatch [Doctor Demand, Telehealth, and Ransomware]
Article summary: Healthcare HQ™ Trendwatch spotlights trending developments in the medical industry and offers...
6 min read
Adam Coffey and The Private Equity Playbook [Cover Story]
Article summary: Adam Coffey, CEO of CoolSys, shares business intelligence secrets from his bestselling book, The...
5 min read
Data Wins Championships [The Mahomes Factor]
Article summary: Data helps your company compete to win. Those that understand how data wins championships (“The...
3 min read
Jon Thompson Guests on: The Manufacturing Executive [Listen Now]
Prefer to watch the video? Click Here
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3 min read
Why Data Intelligence is THE Critical Path to Growth for Business
For many private equity firms, managing a portfolio of companies can feel more like controlled chaos than strategic...
4 min read
Power BI and Google Analytics: A Match Made in Big Data Heaven
Matches made in heaven, or power couples as we called them in college, only come along once in a while. I'm...
5 min read
The Latest from Harvard: Motivate Employees with Your Data
At Blue Margin, we’ve experimented with various tactics to motivate our employees and executives (we sometimes feel...
10 min read
What Is Business Intelligence for Private Equity?
If you believe better data is one of the top drivers of growth, you're not alone.
According to a 2019 survey, "Fortune...
3 min read
Why BI for Small Businesses?
Why does the average small company need business intelligence? Almost without exception, every business produces a lot...
3 min read
Two Big Data And Dashboard Mistakes Private Equity Firms Make
Data is trending, and while private equity deal teams increasingly give lip service to the importance of data-driven...
6 min read
The Dirt on Big Data
There are always some phrases we use without really knowing what they mean - think "The Cloud", "Quinoa", or...
2 min read
The 2nd Cause of the IN-Visible Enterprise
Information Silos. It can be argued that information is the life-blood of any company and that business success...
2 min read
The #1 Flaw of the IN-Visible Enterprise
First, let’s consider the preeminent responsibility in running a business: defining the goals of the business, then...
1 min read
Streaming Data Sets in Power BI Just Got Easier
Microsoft just made streaming datasets a whole lot easier in Power BI. For the past year, users have been building...
2 min read
Reaching New Business Heights with The Dashboard Effect
What is The Dashboard Effect?
In its purest form, The Dashboard Effect is a company that defines its key performance...
2 min read
Is Excel the Next Killer App for Business Intelligence?
While companies use a variety of different business intelligence (BI) tools and technologies, almost everyone still...
3 min read
Private Equity Turns to Business Intelligence to Maximize Investments
Private Equity investors make investment decisions based on balance sheets and P&L statements – typically in Excel, the...
2 min read
Power BI, Microsoft's Outlier on the 2017 Gartner Magic Quadrant
Power BI now outranks Tableau, Qlik, Domo, Cognos . . . heck, everyone.
For the tenth consecutive year, Microsoft has...
3 min read
Power BI Solves Seattle Bar's Operating Inefficiencies, Saves $30k/yr
What could your business do with an extra $30,000 a year? By implementing Microsoft Power BI business intelligence on...
7 min read
Power BI Dashboard Case Studies for Private Equity Companies
Business intelligence is one of the hottest topics among industry leaders. Private equity firms are no exception....
3 min read
Power BI and the World Cup: What's Better Than That?
We at Blue Margin, like most of the world, have World Cup fever. There's nothing quite like it- where the whole world...
4 min read
Power BI and Gartner's "Magic Quadrant"
There's BIG news in the BI world, of the magical sort.
Gartner just released their Magic Quadrant for Business...
1 min read
Power BI & Sharepoint: Quite Possibly the Best Integration Yet
Folks, we’ve been waiting for this feature release!
Microsoft just announced Power BI’s integration with SharePoint...
3 min read
Our Hometown of Fort Collins: Beer, Bikes, Bands, and Adventures
Why is Blue Margin headquartered in Fort Collins instead of Denver (since one of our partners lives in the Denver area,...
4 min read
Our "Secret Sauce" for Creating Power BI Dashboards that GET ADOPTED
Fact: The difference between dashboards that just "look good," and those that get adopted is subtle.
More Important...
4 min read
News Flash: BI is Essential For Business
Countless articles have been written about the growth of data analytics and business intelligence and their impact on...
4 min read
Moneyball for Business: How Dashboards Transform Companies
Let’s recap.
In our last article, we talked about how “dashboards” (displaying business-critical information in...
2 min read
Microsoft Buys Mobile BI Leader Datazen
In a move that backs up its promise to be "mobile first, cloud first," Microsoft announced on Tuesday that it has...
3 min read
Just Turn It On!
I recently stumbled across a site called notalwaysright.com, which is dedicated to funny/painful stories from...
6 min read
Is There An Olympic Event for Data Geeks?
If you're like us, you're sad to see it go. The only truly global event in existence. Yes, the summer Olympics are...
1 min read
Insights to Your Inbox, Thanks to Power BI
As part of Power BI’s latest release, you can now subscribe to your most critical dashboards and receive a daily digest...
7 min read
How To Implement Portfolio Analytics To Manage Your PE Portfolio
In the race to increase portfolio company value through add-ons, improved gross margins, and operational efficiency,...
4 min read
How To Compare Business Intelligence Software
In recent years, there is no business discipline that has moved to the forefront of the business community’s collective...
3 min read
How To Align Deal Teams and Executive Teams Using Company Scorecards
"Transparency is not just a buzzword; it may be a necessity for business survival in the 21st century." - Glassdoor
...
4 min read
How the Modern Data Warehouse Supports Buy-and-Build in Private Equity
With consistently increasing deal multiples across markets, the opportunity to acquire bolt-on companies in pursuit of...
7 min read
How Manufacturing Uses Dashboards To Increase Profitability
Deloitte provides a clear and simple answer to this question in their “Analytics for Manufacturers” guide. Their...
2 min read
How Private Equity Firms Keep Data Chaos From Depleting Portco Value
Middle market private equity firms share a common denominator: their portfolio companies rely on a menagerie of...
4 min read
How Manufacturers Use Data Intelligence To Increase Accountability
“If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.” – Henry Ford
There’s a lot of hype...
5 min read
Forrester Report: Expert Insights on the BI Industry
What J.D. Power reports are to consumer products, Forrester Wave(tm) reports are to business technology. Using both...
3 min read
Financial Execs Know: Good Dashboards Transform Companies (Part 1)
Perhaps you’ve heard the adage, “You don’t fatten a pig by weighing it.” While this holds true on a farm, if you’re in...
5 min read
Effective BI Is Like A Veggie Burger... (5 Key Characteristics)
Business Intelligence (BI) technology is quickly becoming commonplace in companies of every size, in every industry....
3 min read
Do You Really Need a Data Warehouse? (Part 2)
In case you need to get caught up . . .
In our last data warehouse post, we talked about how data warehouses are the...
3 min read
Do You Really Need a Data Warehouse? (Part 1)
Data warehouses sound like a pain. And if you don't have a data architect on staff (who has the rare gift of...
6 min read
Do BI Dashboards Really Work?
If you’ve read a few of my articles, you know that I love to talk about business intelligence and embracing a...
3 min read
Cutting Through the Noise with Power BI Data Visualizations
"Our ability to make sense of the 'signals' from all the 'noise' in our data is paramount for organisation to undertake...
4 min read
Business Intelligence Won't Help Your Business, unless . . .
We are at an exciting time in the world of business technology. People are becoming more and more connected, making the...
3 min read
Business Intelligence Software: A Quick Comparison
As “Business Intelligence” (i.e., data analytics and dashboards) plays an ever-increasing role in day-to-day business,...
3 min read
Business Intelligence for SMB's? C'mon man!
While we all have our challenges with MS products, (Just image search “Windows 8 memes” if you don’t know what I mean.)...
2 min read
Blue Margin Releases VSTS Solution Template for Power BI
Blue Margin, Inc., Microsoft Gold Partner in Data Analytics and Data Platform just released a VSTS Solution Template to...
3 min read
Blue Margin Named Colorado Companies to Watch Award Winner
The Blue Margin team is excited to announce that we have been named a "50 Colorado Company to Watch in 2018" award...
4 min read
BI For Everyone
Business intelligence is now a profit generating tool for Small to Medium Size Businesses (SMBs). Until recently...
1 min read
Are You Missing the Data Train? HBR Thinks So
That’s right. Unless you work in the retail sector (which has used data analytics to capture 30%-40% revenue and...
5 min read
7 ½ Reasons a Data Warehouse is Worth the Investment
Chances are, if you're reading this article, you're thinking about investing in a data warehouse.
If you are on the...
3 min read
5 Ways Leading Manufacturers are Putting Their Data to Work
Complex logistics, multiple data sources, tight order-to-cash timelines . . . for virtually every manufacturer, these...
2 min read
4 Ways Microsoft Power BI Supercharges Your Business
1. You can’t change what you can’t see.
Power BI takes your vital business data and converts it into practical,...
8 min read
4 Key Benefits of Data Intelligence Available to Midsize Businesses
Business intelligence is a term that has been widely used, but it generally describes a category of business...
3 min read
The Ostrich Problem Applied to Business Performance
I recently read an awesome article by Dr. Christian Jarrett called “The Ostrich Problem” and The Danger of Not Tracking...
