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The Orbis Blog

6 Reasons You Should Have a Data Integration Plan

Data integration combines both business and technical information from separate sources onto a unified platform, so it can be managed more effectively and made available to the right people. Ultimately, integration is critical for providing insight into business processes, and making it easier to manage and share the data. In this article we will be outlining some of the many advantages to integrating your data.

First and foremost, data integration helps to clean up your records and make data management simpler. By “streamlining” your current complex data interfaces, integration makes it easier for others to read and access the dataset. “Clean” data is valuable because this ensures that your records are accurate and complete, while decreasing your potential for careless errors.

Data integration is also useful when it comes to managing data across numerous formats and applications. Each unique data format is useful in its own way, with particular structures and attributes that make it necessary. Integrating data from these various formats can help your dataset to be specialized, and therefore more diverse. For instance, GIS data can be integrated to enhance a CAD drawing with layers of specialized geographic information. Data integration also allows for data to be displayed across multiple applications. Individual platforms present data in different and unique ways, so if all data were to be displayed in an identical format, it wouldn’t be as meaningful. That’s why you can integrate multiple software applications into one database, allowing formats to be easily converted and opened.

Combining separate datasets also serves to make the data more readily available. Centralizing data makes it easier for everyone at your company, from sales to marketing, to view, retrieve, share, and analyze the data presented. This is a key benefit, because providing data access to all databases used by your company will keep the employees more organized, efficient and in-sync. Respectively, integrated data promotes collaboration within, and outside of the company because employees will be more likely to share and incorporate data into projects and proposals.

As a result of easier access, the data can also be more easily updated. When all systems are connected, you can make changes once and the change will be consistent across all integrated platforms. This is a much simpler process than having someone manually enter the update across multiple systems, saving time and limiting room for error.

Lastly, gaining a better understanding of your data allows you to gain insight and to make better business decisions. By allowing people to view your data in multiple flexible formats, they are given an advantage to better understand the information being presented to them. Integration provides for a deeper comprehension of which parts of your business are interacting most frequently, which can lead to improved results and overall decision-making.

If you’re convinced that your company needs a data integration system, let us know. We’ll be glad to help!

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