EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Data warehousing is among fairly recent technology concepts holding great promise. Data warehouse supports better customer relationships, decision-making, and conversion of data into more usable forms, but such goals are achievable only where its application is appropriate and its execution skillfully managed.
In terms of Travel, a simplified definition of data warehouse is the organization and normalization of the mass of transaction data agencies generate in ways that facilitate practical, useful queries and enhanced reports. Main goal of a data warehouse is to provide merchandising and to make offers relevant and timely based on a customer's historical context, and then providing that knowledge through various touch points, such as an online travel agency or a call center. Data warehouse can be used in an operational setting to retrieve historical context about the particular person, including shopping trends and destinations of interest. This helps the online application craft a more pertinent and relevant offer to enhance the customer experience and help to close the sale.
One example that is pertinent to most people is finding the best travel deal. If a customer is shopping online for flights and hotels in Las Vegas, the data warehouse can provide knowledge of that shopping behavior even though the customer isn't buying anything yet. From a supplier perspective, the data warehouse searches for the best-priced flights based on different carriers. When we see someone shopping a particular market, we can build a campaign and bring that to his or her attention. You've already got interest—the customer wants to go to Vegas. If the customer sees an ad pertinent to that, it helps generate a better customer experience.
Thus Mega Agencies and TMC are working diligently to build technology platforms that can pull together global data in a unified fashion. Also on the drawing boards--and in the technology budgets--are designs to create globally standardized point-of-sale systems and self-service reservation tools, as well as worldwide intranet sites to provide communication and service links for agents around the globe.
Now the question which needs to be answered is “Which is the best vehicle to increase profits by building relationships with your customers and understanding their motivations?”
Is it Data Warehouse? Yes it can be a data warehouse. Data warehouse can be a boom for a Travel Agency which has thousands of employees and several offices throughout the country or globe providing all the travel related services to various customers. Travel Agency can have a scenario where they have legacy systems which are never been combined into a single database for new strategic marketing and campaigning.
But we surely need to check out that organizations don’t get bogged down building warehouses which they never use, and which loose support from top management because of the costs and delays associated with their construction, As building a data warehouse is a time consuming process and data warehouse projects are huge.
Being a Technology Partner to the TMC and Travel Agencies, it’s a basic requirement to understand what the TMC Top Management and the users is looking for. Then the data warehousing implementation can be taken with smaller steps and building a data warehouse over a period of time.
START SMALL & START FAST, approach really works well in Data Warehouse Implementation to ensure a successful data warehouse development effort.
Problem Definition
The definition and recording of the problem to be solved is one of the most often overlooked steps of any development effort. A problem needs to be solved, so the tendency is to jump right in a solve it. For small, negligible cost efforts this is fine. For Data Warehousing design, ignoring this step can lead to disaster. Write down and widely publish the answers to the following questions and all other questions that are appropriate for your specific effort. Remember to keep the questions targeted to DEFINING the problem NOT solving it.
Requirements Analysis
Performing a requirements analysis is critical to the success of any project. Without a clear goal in mind, success is dubious. There are a number of different philosophies about requirements analysis: top down, bottom up, inside out, etc. The method found to work the best is as follows:
- Clearly state the problem(s) you wish to solve.
- Identify all data sources and formats.
- Identify the users of the completed system.
- Formulate a specific budget - time, money, personnel.
- Ask identified users to specifically state what they expect the system to do.
- Ask management to specifically state their success criteria
- Separate their requirements from their "desirements." Only design to requirements. The enhancement phase is where you address the "desirements."
- Group and "bubble-up" requirements.
- Generate a prioritized requirements table listing the requirement, where it came from, the success criteria, and priority. Keep this table high-level. A table with a dozen requirements will be much easier to manage than one with hundreds.
- Produce a detailed development schedule including hardware, software, personnel, documentation, and reviews. Include outsourcing requirements and long lead-time items.
- Get a sign-off of the requirements, resource allocation, and schedule from top management before you go any further.
Information/Data Modeling
Information and Data modeling, along with the definition of the metadata, is the single most important activity in the design of a data warehouse.
Design & Prototyping
There are many design methodologies. The ones most successfully are
1. Rapid Prototyping (for small to medium projects)
2. Structured Development (for large or very complex projects)
Development & Documentation
Once the requirements analysis is well underway, the prototypes are working, and the focus groups are becoming happy, it's time to begin the development, Coordinating hardware and software purchases and upgrades, server and hardware installation, software and database development, documentation guides and manuals, reviews, and testing can become a full-time job.
Test & Review
Testing and Reviews take place throughout the development cycle, including prototyping, development, deployment, operations, and enhancements. It never ends. It's wise to place a single individual in charge of testing and reviews. This is not a popular job, but it is critical for developing a system that works and meets each of the requirements.
Deployment & Training
The development is complete, quality assurance is satisfied, the documentation is ready, and all the "off-the-shelf" products have arrived. Make sure that you have full management support and that they understand the nature and effect of the installation and deployment disruption. Scheduling training sessions concurrently with the installation can be an effective use of time. Don't skimp on the training. Make sure you have training in the budget from the beginning and don't dip into it. The best way to ensure success is to effectively train the users so that they will actually use the system and possibly sing its praises. Also remember that training is ongoing. New employees or employees being moved or promoted will need to be trained. Each time enhancements are added; new training sessions must be scheduled.
Operation
Data warehouses usually contain two or more servers. Tasks such as backups, bug fixes, software updates, hardware maintenance and upgrades, media services, account maintenance, security patches, and other similar tasks must be performed regularly. Operation and maintenance of such services requires an operations staff.
Conclusion
Some people tend to view the data warehouse as, "We're going to go out and try to own the world." The truth is, we can't own the world. The world is too big, and we need to describe it for us. An industry like travel has so many participants with everybody obviously trying to compete for the same market share. Today, the agency channel has a lot of connections to the back end for reporting, so data warehouse helps them deliver products that give agencies the view into the business and the way they are driving. Building Data Warehouse for the TMC and Agencies provide a way to compete favorably within the market by using the historical data that's contained within the data warehouse, to help in making better marketing strategies, campaigning and customer experiences.
At the end I would like to leave readers with few questions which will help them define and refine there requirements more clearly and help achieve the real benefits of Data Warehouse Implementation.
Do I Need a Data Warehouse?
What specific Problems will it solve?
What are my available resources (time, money, and personnel)?
What criteria will I use to measure success?
Should I outsource all, some, or none of the development and operation ?
Am I upgrading an existing system, converting from a legacy system, or developing from scratch?
Ashish Kumar Gupta
Business Analyst – Pre Sales | TBSG
InterGlobe Technologies Limited