In today’s high tech world, no matter how non-tech you are, your connection to “Metadata” is exactly same as it is for a techy dude. In simple words, metadata is all about an individual’s daily routine, interactions, points of view and associations.

Metadata is probably the most valuable item on the World Wide Web today and big enterprises spend millions of dollars every year to collect and analyze the metadata. According to a report, the global business intelligence market will worth USD 26.5 billion by 2021.

Understanding Metadata:

• Metadata is the key to make a website discover-able, i.e. it contains title, keywords, and description.
• Every email sent contains metadata, i.e. information about sender, recipient, IP, time when the email was sent etc.
• Every social media site uses metadata to identify how you consume the content and based on this metadata Twitter and Facebook show you the ads that are relevant to you.

I hope, with this quick explanation you’ve got the idea how metadata is so valuable and why big enterprises spend millions of dollars for this. Collecting and analyzing the data, and translating it into meaningful information, i.e. predicting user behavior is collectively called business intelligence (BI) which is the key success factor for any business today.

Earlier, business intelligence was often associated with big enterprises with big data sets, but big data doesn’t just just mean the size, but also the variety and velocity. With the rise of technology, we see metadata is more valuable than gold and diamonds for any startup or small business.  Any startup aiming for hyper growth or a small business looking for sustainable growth must invest in BI, and metadata management is the first step to have the big data.

Collecting, Managing & Analyzing the Metadata:

Well, metadata management is crucial, but doing it manually can be hectic, full of errors and way to expensive. Ideally, an early stage startup or even a smoothly running business should invest in a robust metadata management tool which is capable of doing following essential tasks efficiently.

• Discover metadata automatically across all the platforms being used by the business, i.e. databases, reporting tools etc.
• Store entire metadata in a centralized repository.
• Index and model data types in easiest possible way using smart algorithms, i.e. a layman should be able to understand the cross connections.
• Search and locate required data instantly.
• Create full data lineage instantly.

Benefits of Using a Metadata Management Tool for a Startup

As discussed in the beginning, metadata management is the key to analyze and understand your customers and take most profitable decisions. Here are some more reasons to convince you why it is worth investing in BI and specifically in a metadata management tool:

1. As a fact of the matter most of the startups are on a tighter budget and they don’t have much time and staff to analyze data. Using a metadata management tool, you ca have a quick and easy view of metrics all in one place with a data-driven approach.
2. With minimum viable investment you can put your startup on the growth track.
3. Automating metadata management will drastically increase the employees’ productivity, i.e. they have readily available data.
4. With machine managed data, there will be less chances of mistakes, subsequently improving the quality of metadata.

On a later stage when you have enough data; research and analysis can explore the areas that would not have bee possible otherwise. For instance:

5. You can uncover overlooked or hidden opportunities.
6. Identify trends and patterns.
7. Identify problems.
8. Predict success areas.
9. Use data for on time decision-making.
10. Pinpoint areas to cut costs and maximize revenues.

The Bottom Line:

We all know the common statistics about startups’ failure whereby 8 out of 10 startups fail right in their first year. Surprisingly, most of these failures are caused by behavioral reasons and not the financial ones. This is why it is crucial for a startup to leverage the analytics at an early stage. Startups that fail to incorporate an effective BI (Business Intelligence) system may not be able to correctly identify their market and take right decisions on right time.