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Getting the most out of customer data is a major challenge for many business managers. As such, managers around the globe continue to invest in text analytics services in the hopes of generating meaningful business insights. 

But text analytics represents only one piece of the data analysis puzzle. In fact, managers who rely solely on text analytics may struggle to gain the insights they need to make informed business decisions. 

What Are the Limitations of Text Analytics?

Text analytics delivers an outstanding data collection service. It allows business managers to quickly and effortlessly obtain customer data from many online sources, including blog posts, web polls and surveys and social networks. 

Furthermore, text analytics helps managers keep track of customer data over an extended period of time. Managers can use text analytics to retrieve customer data regularly and organize this information into data sets. Meanwhile, managers have the flexibility to add to these data sets and review customer data any time they choose. 

Although text analytics offers many benefits, it is far from perfect. And for managers who are searching for a quick, easy way to analyze customer data, text analytics alone may prove to be insufficient. 

Text analytics rarely, if ever, possesses data analysis capabilities. This means managers who want to use the service to obtain actionable customer insights may be forced to mine customer data sets on their own. 

In most cases, data mining is time- and cost-intensive. Managers who lack data mining experience will need to allocate significant time and resources to learn how to perform it effectively. Or, managers may need to learn as they go and risk missing out on actionable insights along the way. 

Data mining requires managers to look at a large collection of customer data and try to make sense of it. Typically, managers will search for patterns or trends within a data set in the hopes of generating meaningful insights. If managers are successful, they can gain unparalleled insights into consumer sentiment, customer loyalty and assorted customer behaviors. On the other hand, managers who make mistakes risk wasting time and resources on ineffective data analysis. 

How Can Visualization Help Managers?

Data visualization simplifies data analysis, and for good reason. It ensures business managers can avoid the headaches commonly associated with data mining, and instead, use charts, graphs and other illustrations to highlight customer behaviors and trends. 

Text analytics does not provide data visualization capabilities. But a data analysis service is available that works in combination with text analytics and provides data visualization capabilities that managers can use at any time – Self-Service Text Analytics.

Unlike a traditional data analysis service, Self-Service Text Analytics empowers managers with advanced visualization capabilities. At the same time, Self-Service Text Analytics is easy to use, ensuring managers won't have to deal with a long, complicated process to transform customer data into relevant insights. 

To use Self-Service Text Analytics, a manager only needs to register for the service – something that requires just a few seconds to complete. Then, a manager can upload an Excel spreadsheet that contains user-generated content. After the upload is finished, a manager will receive an interactive PDF (iPDF) report via email within about 15 minutes.  

Each interactive PDF (iPDF) report contains dozens or hundreds of visualizations based on customer data. It enables managers to explore a wealth of customer insights so they can understand why customers may select one brand over another, how customers feel about a company's products and services and much more. 

Together, text analytics and Self-Service Text Analytics provide visualizations that drive data analysis. The services ensure managers can get the most out of customer data and make informed business decisions consistently. 

Summary

Business managers may leverage text analytics, but this service frequently fails to deliver the desired results. Text analytics helps managers obtain customer data, yet managers often need extra help to fully analyze this information. Today, Self-Service Text Analytics provides managers with data visualization capabilities so they can optimize the value of customer data. When used in combination with text analytics, Self-Service Text Analytics allows managers to visualize customer data and gain the insights they need to improve a company's products, services and customer interactions.