The Tasting Panel magazine

April 2016

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98  /  the tasting panel  /  april 2016 the thinking we brought to our company," says Dennis, adding that this approach has proven successful across a broad spectrum of industry, including the beverage alcohol industry through InsightAction's dedicated beverage division. Matt Bannister, VP of User Experience and Project Management, possesses a unique insight on how people tend to think when navigating big data. "My experiences have helped shape my approach to work. I've lived and worked on four different continents as an artist, educator and technologist. Through these experiences, I have developed a deep understanding for people's needs, desires and expectations and work to apply this to a User Centric Design approach." In fact, Dennis says working with Louisville-based wines and spirits corpora- tion Brown-Forman is a perfect example of how InsightAction can revolutionize a company's approach to sales, marketing and other logistics without disrupting day-to-day operations. Despite myriad and separate sources of data (suppliers' shipments to distributors, distributors' shipments to individual accounts, control states, national accounts, etc.), and despite disparate hardware and software pro- grams already in use, InsightAction can seamlessly align its software development capabilities to maximize an organizations existing information technology. "Our solution can sit on top of existing platforms or even replace underper- forming platforms—but the success is targeting it to the end-user's needs," says Dennis. "Our focus [with Brown-Forman] was developing the platform that every person—sales, marketing, finance, senior management—can use at their fingertips, and we also knew this would have relevance to the beverage alcohol industry as a whole." Stephanie Kubacki, InsightAction's North American Director of Strategic Partnerships, adds, "After working for beverage alcohol supplier companies for over 15 years, I know all too well the challenges with big data and the complexity in beverage alcohol. It does not have to be so difficult. One of the outstanding benefits is that this technology unites all functions and departments because everyone is looking at the same information." In March, Campbell Brown, who managed Brown-Forman's brands in Canada and the Midwest and who was named President of Old Forester Bourbon last year, told The Tasting Panel, "With the program from InsightAction, we can identify the nature of our sales store by store, street by street, city by city. We can see, in real time, where our brands are shelved, where they are selling and which rival brands are selling next to them." Such results prove especially gratifying to Dennis, who previously spent 20 years in consumer packaged goods, including tenures in sales and marketing with companies like Coca-Cola and Bacardi. One of his great frustrations was looking through endless reports for the insights needed to guide his decision-making. "In the end, we had a static selling presentation to take to our clients. The problem at the time and today is that the market dynamics are ever-changing. I've always carried that with me," he says. With solutions from InsightAction, Dennis says the dynamic between frontline sales with on- and off-premise accounts changes dramatically, becoming much more interactive with Big Data rather than passive or reactionary: "That sales rep now becomes an advisor; the information is real-time. They're no longer selling to accounts; they're collaborating with accounts. If objections are raised, the infor- mation is there for discussion. If a new idea is proposed, the information can be accessed right there, as the conversation is happening. It's a real time conversation with real time information that provides real answers." Dennis goes on to say, "One of the best parts about this sophisticated engage- ment is that our products are so intuitive that the users are fully leveraging their potential the moment it's in their hands." "WITHOUT FAIL, EVERY COM- PANY WE HAVE EVER MET WITH HAS MORE DATA THAN THEY KNOW WHAT DO WITH. WE HELP THEM LEVERAGE THAT DATA AND PROVIDE INSIGHT THAT EVERYONE CAN USE TO IMPROVE PERFORMANCE."

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