Fireside Chat: Data Fueling Your Business
At the core of any business is data. Collecting it, reviewing it, interpreting it – no matter your industry, data is a critical component. That’s why we invited three expert panelists to our Fireside Chat focused on how collecting, using, and managing data is crucial to your business.
The live podcast recording was hosted at The Clubhouse in front of a live audience that included local entrepreneurs, the Advanced Technology Development Center (ATDC) companies, Technology Enterprise Park (TEP) employees, and more. Together, the discussion ranged from topics such as the best way to collect data, to whether or not businesses should be concentrating on data in the first place. Spoiler alert – the answer is yes, but it’s not that simple.
The discussion was moderated by Tech Square ATL (TSQATL) Social Club’s very own Jared Serfozo, who is hosting a Mind of Maker activation around podcasting later this month, and included an amazing panel of three local entrepreneurs with unique knowledge and experience collecting and using data to drive their business decisions:
Andrew Bate – CEO at Safely.com, where they are redefining how vacation rental properties are getting insured.
Michael Nguyen – CEO at DataTorch.io, which is providing the best tools to simplify every step of the machine learning (ML) lifecycle while streamlining data collection and organization.
Lawson Sumner – Chief Engineer at Ampere EV, which is aiming to bring innovation to the electric vehicle (EV) industry by providing conversions of existing gas-powered cars, as well as better safety and accessibility to charging.
You can listen to the full recording of the conversation on SoundCloud, with discussion questions including:
Do you think a majority of the businesses here in America should be collecting and storing more data?
Do you think there are businesses out there that probably don't need to spend the time taking a deeper dive into data?
What are some of the headaches you've experienced with collecting and storing data?
What are some of your favorite tools to store and organize your data?
What are your favorite hosting services?
“You have to have this mentality of being a data-driven decision maker and making data-driven decisions within your company. If that's not there, it doesn't matter how much more data you get.”
“I think there's a lot of data that companies are already collecting out of necessity. The question is, ‘Are they using that data effectively?’”
“In terms of collecting and storing more data, you have to ask yourself ‘Is it the right business decision to make?’”
Immediately following the Fireside Chat, all attendees stayed to network and discuss data further over complimentary pizza and drinks. We also polled everyone that evening around what their favorite online data storage was, with one being the clear contender:
Do you think collecting, using, and managing data is crucial to your business? Let us know in the comments below.