Summary: Business intelligence tools can help organizations consolidate unstructured data from multiple sources and present it in an easy-to-read format. What types of tools are available for this purpose? Get more information in the article below!
Business intelligence & analytics are basically data management software solution implemented in organizations to get present as well as previous data, and analyze new, raw information using statistics. These are used to deliver detailed insights for making better decisions in future.
What is Business Intelligence and Business Analytics?
Business Intelligence – It deals with what has happened in the past and how it happened that has led to what the present situation is. Therefore, business intelligence can spot trends and patterns.
Business Analytics – It deals with the reasons of what has happened in the past and why. It analyses the factors that has caused it and why has it happened. This information is then used to predict what is going to happen in the future.
How Business Intelligence Tools Can Help?
Business Intelligence tools for big data analysis help in multiple ways. From reporting to analysis and building intuitive reports it can help you perform a lot of things. It can provide:
Accurate and fast reporting
Business insights
A complete analysis of past, present and future
Accurate decision making
Customer satisfaction
Improved data quality
Spotting trending market trends
Higher efficiency
Increase in revenue
15 Best Business Intelligence Tools List for Beginners & Small Business
The following are the top business intelligence tools that are suitable for startups and small businesses. They have all the necessary features that a BI tool needs to have. Let’s have a look at them:
SAP Business Intelligence
USP: Combines analysis and storytelling together
SAP Business is an integrated business Intelligence (BI) software which can be used at an enterprise level. It has the latest standards to provide one of the best BI software solution. It allows you to create high level database system which combines both transactions and analytics.
SAP Business Intelligence Basic Features
Highly flexible software
Transparent solution for businesses
Can be integrated with any system using SAP
Easy space and setup utilization
Supports cloud as well as on-premise deployment
Simple architecture for data warehouse
Integration with non-SAP as well as SAP applications
SAP Business Intelligence Primary Features
Creates role-based dashboards to share data insights with members
Supports the analysis of large-scale data
Easily customizes both 2D and 3D charts and graphs
Offers enterprise reporting system for managing business intelligence strategies
Highest Rated Features of SAP Business Intelligence
Multiple visualization tools to represent data
Supports cross-enterprise sharing of data insights
Offers SAP Analytics Cloud to use the tools on the cloud
Supports Ad hoc reporting to address random business questions and share the findings
Limitations of SAP Business Intelligence
Limited options available for data transformation
The processing of data queries is quite slow
Pricing of SAP Business Intelligence: SAP Business Intelligence pricing is available on request.
Yellowfin BI
USP: Combines analysis and storytelling together
This business intelligence (BI) platform is an integrated solution specially made for companies across industries. Now monitor and examine data easily with Yellowfin BI. It can be accessed from anywhere with the help of the World Wide Web or company intranet.
Basic Features of Yellowfin BI
The dashboard can be accessed by anywhere
Mobile BI features can be mapped easily
Smarter decision-making features
Data represented with interactive presentations and reports
Yellowfin BI Primary Features
Supports real-time collaboration to work on multiple data sets
Finds and reports the known changes in data with alerts
Extracts data from several sources via web APIs
Integrates the data findings in several workflows
Data insights can be reused in multiple dashboards
Yellowfin BI Highest Rated Features
Identifies and notifies about unknown changes in data sets via AI-driven signals.
Develops data-driven reports and presentations
Offers advanced Report Builder, Quick Charts, and Guided Natural Language Query to generate reports
Offers embedded BI to discover insights from data present in any app or website
Offers a free form dashboard to customize layout, grid style, charts, etc.
Manages the entire ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) process
Limitations of Yellowfin BI
Users do not find its visualization tools intuitive
The dashboard builder procedure is tiresome for users
Yellowfin BI Pricing: Available on request on its official website.
MicroStrategy
USB: Supports mobile BI
Microstartegy BI Tool is enterprise analytics software helps people to make better decisions and improves their way of doing business. You get advanced features as well as analytics.
Basic Features of MicroStrategy
Easy maintenance
Predictive analytics
Easy to use
Advanced analytics
Big data solutions
WYSIWYG real-time report design
Multi-functional dashboard
Primary Features of MicroStrategy
Supports object-based semantic graphs
Offers unlimited customization with advanced visuals, branding colors, open APIs, etc.
Enables you to create and deploy apps on both cloud and on-premises
Provides role-based security filters to restrict the data access for protection
Highest Rated Features of MicroStrategy
Offers embedded analytics to integrate the analytics in various apps
Uses machine learning to identify data patterns and provides insights
Offers cloud-agile analytics for any type of data and reporting
Generates freeform SQL reports
Easily integrates with DevOps procedures and CI/CD pipelines.
MicroStrategy Limitations
Supports data import from visualizations having compound grids
Consolidating unstructured data in this software is challenging.
MicroStrategy Pricing: Available on request on its official website.
Zoho Analytics
USP: Best BI tool for Mac
Zoho Analytics self-service analytics and BI platform create interactive dashboards with data represented visually. AI-powered assistant is also available which lets users to ask questions, and in-return expect intelligent answers. It is one of the best BI tools for Mac.
Basic Features of Zoho Analytics
Visualization options like tables, charts and widgets
Hundreds of readymade connectors available for different apps, drives as well as databases
Analyze data from multiple source with unified analytics system
ML and AI powered assistants that understand queries in NL (Natural Language)
Portals for embedded analytics and BI.
Primary Features of Zoho Analytics
Helps manage roles and permissions to access the data
Supports real time collaboration to work on different data sets
Identifies and marks the data columns as PII (personally identifiable information for security)
Enables you to customize reporting dashboards with the brand logo
Generates private links for sharing files and documents
Zoho Analytics Highest Rated Features
Transforms and enriches data via data preparation and management
Offers augmented analysis to get data insights with AI, machine learning, etc.
Offers slideshows to represent data in the story form
Comes with APIs for data integration, modeling, custom styling, etc.
Offers visualization options like tables, charts and widgets
Limitations of Zoho Analytics
Users find it difficult to integrate this software for the white label use
Limited customization options available for visualization
Pricing of Zoho Analytics: Free plan available | Paid plan starts from INR 960 /month billed annually.
SAS
USP: Includes location intelligence
SAS Enterprise Miner is known for giving the right information at the right time. It can mine as well as alter data from different sources. You can retrieve that data and manage it while doing proper analysis on it.
Basic Features of SAS
Users and data sources can be connected with high quality data connections
Business data can be protected with security resolution and issue identification
Centralized governance and scalability is provided
Data can be visualized with interactive designs.
Real-time analysis can be done with self-service reporting.
Primary Features of SAS
Rewrites or updates data irrespective of its location
Controls and manages different data sources and keep them secured
Adds geographical content to data to identify location specific business opportunities.
Supports conversational AI and chatbots for data interaction
Processes data in a distributed, parallel SAS environment
SAS Highest Rated Features
Manages data from various resources
Deploys complicated projects’ analytics into workflows
Automatically develops data insights with data models and explanations
Summarizes KPIs through interactive dashboards
Develops and changes predictive data models via in-memory processing
Designs advanced data management workflows
Offers predictive analysis to find possible outcomes from data
SAS Limitations
Deployment of data models takes a lot of time
Offers limited options to export data
Pricing of SAS: Available on request on its official website
IBM Cognos Analytics
USB: Enables users without any technical knowledge to analyze data
IBM Cognos Analytics is an interactive BI tool that allows gaining data-driven insights in a controlled environment. It has the ability to create impressive dashboards and reports. This BI suite is a web-based tool and is developed by IBM.
Basic Features of IBM Cognos Analytics
Analyze data with the specialized toolsets receive detailed insights.
Create personalized dashboards and read or write information anytime anywhere.
Get cloud support as well as full governance over your data
Generate accurate reports online as well as offline
Perform cross-departmental analysis.
IBM Cognos Analytics Primary Features
Customizes and shares data reports
Supports time series forecasting to gain valuable insights
Offers web-based data modeling
Provides drag and drop functionality to insert data in graphs and charts
Highest Rated Features of IBM Cognos Analytics
Extracts data from CSV files, spreadsheets, SQL databases, Google BigQuery, etc.
Prepares data with AI and adds calculated fields, merges data, generates tables, etc.
Creates compelling dashboards and auto-generates data visualizations
Intent-based processing model available with predictive analysis
Offers AI assistant to identify data patterns
IBM Cognos Analytics Limitations
Does not provide details on any data error
Users find it difficult to change a report’s layout and font.
Pricing of IBM Cognos Analytics: No free plan available | Paid plan starts from INR 822.22 /month/user
ClicData
USB: One of the best BI tools for healthcare sector
ClicData BI tool is specifically designed to use by SMBs (small and medium-sized businesses). This tool like all other BI tools specializes in generating dashboards and reports. You can share data insights reports and various other metrics with individuals and groups. It is one of the best BI tools for healthcare.
Basic Features of ClicData
Import, sort, and connect data in one platform.
Track the complete health of your business with this BI tool.
Share insights and metrics with individuals and groups.
Create data warehouse which is cloud-based.
ClicData can create reports regarding the progress of your projects.
Get live notifications in your dashboard
Perform extensive manipulation your data.
ClicData Primary Features
Stores different types of data for analysis
Supports data versioning to create data history
Creates dashboards and find data anomalies with insights
Supports data fusion and merging from several sources
Highest Rated Features of ClicData
Integrates data from over 250+ sources
Converts data into structured form through data management
Offers the option to plug-in native data analyses tools
Offers templates to visualize data and generate reports
Provides an API to refresh data in real-time
Integrates machine learning algorithms into the data flows to segment data, perform regression analysis, classify data, etc.
Limitations of ClicData
Frequent error occurs while reloading data
Limited options available to secure data
ClicData Pricing: No free plan available | Paid plan starts from INR 6,165.41/month
Microsoft Power BI
USP: Best for integrating data from various sources
Microsoft Power BI is a business intelligence platform to extract, visualize, and analyze different data sets.
With this, you can consolidate data from several sources, visualize them via graphs and charts, and gain valuable insights via AI. It can also be used for customizing the reports with the brand logo and color.
Microsoft Power BI Basic Features
Offers embedded analytics
Creates paginated reports for sharing and collaboration
Extracts and transforms data from various sources
Creates data flow for direct query, linked and computed entities, etc.
Primary Features of Microsoft Power BI
Offers 100 TB of cloud storage
Support application lifecycle management
Offers metrics for content creation, publication, and consumption
Encrypts all the data at rest and in transit for security
Microsoft Power BI Limitations
It does not process big data sets properly
Highest Rated Features of Microsoft Power BI
Shares reports in popular MS Office apps
Refreshes data sheets every 48 hours
Supports AI visuals to process and analyze data sets
Supports Advanced AI for text analysis and image detection
Offers 500+ free connectors for data extraction
Microsoft Power BI Pricing: Desktop version is free | Paid plan starts from INR 823.96/user/month for SaaS product.
GROW
USP: Best BI tool for SQL server
GROW cloud-based BI software allows business users and data analysts to control and find relevant information from their data. It is hosted on the Grow cloud and constantly supported by the development team of Grow. It is one of the best BI tools for SQL server.
Basic Features of GROW
Over 115 data connectors are used for different systems.
Various data visualization elements to create customized dashboards
Create unlimited no. of user accounts.
Manage SQL with an easy-to-use UI.
Easy intra and inter team communication facilities.
Primary Features of GROW
Customizes different data sets
Connects to a data source to identify the data type you need to pull
Sets the timeline to refresh data in real-time
Supports different metrics to address problems related to data
Generates sharable links to view the data
GROW Highest Rated Features
Extracts data from social media to gain insights on engagement
Imports data from Google Sheets, OneDrive, etc., via integration
Offers PostgreSQL query for exploring advanced data structures, such as arrays, JSON, etc.
Automatically creates different data pipelines
Provides data explorer to visualize data in several formats
Limitations of GROW
Limited options available to customize dashboards
Offers very few options to export data and reports
Pricing of GROW: Available on request on its official website
Clear Analytics
USP: One of the best BI tools in Excel
Clear Analytics BI software is an excel-based application that can be used by everyone having just the basic knowledge of Excel.
It is one of the best BI tools in Excel. Get features like automating, creating and analyzing with Clear Analytics. You can easily extract information from large reliable data sources and create innovative reports.
Basic Features of Clear Analytics
Automate process so less human resource is required.
Create dashboards easily.
Easy graphical representation of data.
Get key performance indicators.
Indicating issues become easy.
Create strategic plans.
Get predictive analysis with this software.
Primary Features of Clear Analytics
Manages role-based permissions to access reports and queries
Shares the data directly to PowerPoint, OneDrive, etc.
Creates a query builder in Excel to explore data in different databases
Restricts access to sensitive data
Highest Rated Features of Clear Analytics
Aggregates data from multiple resources
Supports integration with Microsoft Power BI for visualizing and analyzing data
Integrates existing data into the Excel directly
Offers full audit trail for data sources
Centralizes all the spreadsheets at one place
Supports version control for data files
Clear Analytics Limitations
Limited capabilities for predictive analytics
You do not get OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) functionality with it.
Pricing of Clear Analytics: No free plan available | Paid plan starts from INR 2,384.28/month
Tableau
USP: Available free of cost
Tableau BI tool is used for data visualization and discovery. You can analyze and visualize data without any professional help.
Multiple data sources are supported like GA (google analytics), MS Excel, MS SQL and Oracle. Tableau offers standalone products like Tableau Desktop and Tableau Server that can be used as well.
Basic Features of Tableau
Tableau is a free to use BI tool.
Supports mobile BI strategy.
Data visualization and exploration possible with in-memory architecture.
Add and access data from different sources.
Can be integrated with Microsoft SharePoint
Get one click rapid reporting with Tableau
Tableau Public’s Primary Features
Generates portfolio of visualizations
Offers an author’s community to connect with other users
Enables you to create data visualizations offline
Generates customized maps, charts, graphs., for data visualization
Tableau Public’s Highest Rated Features
Supports data querying
Offers geospatial data visualization and analysis
Creates data reports in several formats including Excel and CSV
Enables you to share visualizations with anyone publicly
Offers a repository of creative data visualizations to explore the data on any topic
Limitations of Tableau Public
The work created cannot be stored in the local storage
You can only save 10 GB of data with this software
Pricing of Tableau Public: Free business intelligence tool
Oracle Business Intelligence
USP: Helps make mobile enabled business decisions
An enterprise-level BI, Oracle Business Intelligence is can give its users all the necessary BI capabilities. This includes mining data, creating dashboards, sending alerts, and many more capabilities. Oracle is excellent in analyzing large data volumes from various sources because of its robustness.
Basic Features of Oracle BI
It utilizes OBIEE for reporting, query analysis and much more.
Oracle uses Common Enterprise Model for business analytics (BA) and calculations.
Access information and maintain a collaborative workplace.
Accurate and in-depth insights.
Get agile data discovery with Oracle Endeca Discovery.
Balance IT collaboration with business.
Access non- traditional and traditional data analytics data.
Make accurate business decision
Oracle BI Primary Features
Offers 35 built-in connect to aggregate data from various sources
Automatically prepares data for analyses and identifies any anomalies
Provides open analytics solutions to unify analytics within the organization
Generates interactive dashboards to represent different data sets
Creates different reports with pre-configured templates
Highest Rated Features of Oracle BI
Create interactive data visualizations without any code
Explores and searches the data both verbally and visually
Supports machine learning to study data patterns and identify outcomes
Navigates through the data via custom map analytics
Builds data models to represent metrics and KPIs
Limitations of Oracle BI
Transporting data to the cloud is time consuming
Users find it difficult to consolidate data from multiple sources
Pricing of Oracle BI: Available on request on its official website.
BI Board
USP: Ideal for predictive analytics & performance management
BI Board intelligent tool combines features of corporate management and business intelligence. It is a toolkit which has business analytics (BA) and business intelligence (BI) in a single package.
Ad-hoc
querying and multi-dimensional analysis help to make strong business decisions
Basic Features of Board
Simulate, analyse and plan within a single platform.
Drill-down and drill-through functionalities are available.
Maintain planning and analytical applications.
Reporting can be done by accessing multiple data sources.
It is possible to put ad-hoc query
Multi-dimensional analysis is possible.
Primary Features of Board
Schedules and sends data reports in multiple formats
Restricts access to the data and reports via role-based permissions
Quicky uploads, merges, or models your data via data modeling features
Supports different file formats to import and export data insights
You can include Excel like formulas in reports for analyses
Board Highest Rated Features
Creates and deploy reports on any device via HTML 5 technology
Advanced charting options for data visualization
Offers a virtual repository to manage the findings
Supports predictive analysis to find future opportunities
Offers simulation to create and analyze scenarios for data
Supports real-time data modeling
Board Limitations
It does not produce high quality presentations
Configuring security profiles with it is time consuming
Pricing of Board: Price is available on request on its official website
SeekTable
USP: Best BI tool for MongoDB
Perform data analytics and operational reporting that too with live charts and tables only with SeekTable. Get a user-friendly report builder for building charts, tables and datagrids. It is one of the best BI tools for MongoDB.
Basic Features of SeekTable
Expand or collapse and drill-down data exploration capability
Calculate running totals and percentages.
Data restriction possible.
Customizable formula-based dimensions and metrics.
Primary Features of SeekTable
Consolidates data from different sources into a single report
Generates interactive dashboards through HTML layout, custom visuals, etc.
Supports customization of data sources
Automates reports sending via Zapier, Subscriptions, etc.
SeekTable Highest Rated Features
Builds interactive reports with filters and sorting
Exports data to PDF, Excels, plain HTML
Live reports can be generated
Offers white labelling for customizing reports with the company’s logo
Provides report parameters to customise database query filtering
Publishes the saved reports directly to the web
Limitations of SeekTable
You can upload CSV files only up to 500 MB.
Limited files exporting options available
SeekTable Pricing: Free plan available for its cloud plan | Pricing starts from INR 2,056.40/month/user for team sharing feature and INR 41,045.79/month for self-hosting
Pentaho
USB: Best BI tool for Ubuntu
Pentaho is a business analytics platform as well as data warehousing. This software can be used to discover, access and merge different types of data sets. It is one of the best BI tools for Ubuntu.
Features of Penatho
It is an enterprise platform used to accelerate the pipeline.
Efficient development with the community dashboard.
No coding needed for big data integration.
Embedded analytics
Data visualization with customizable dashboards
Can be used in mongo dB
Pentaho Primary Features
Generates interactive dashboards and data visualizations
Offers data mining to identify patterns in data sets
Offers Embedded OLAP Engine to perform multi-dimensional data analysis
Easily integrates data in different business applications
Pentaho Highest Rated Features
Supports codeless data pipeline development
Offers connectors library for data extraction
Offers the report designer tool to develop visualizations
Pentaho Pricing: Pentaho Community Edition is free to use | Pentaho Enterprise Edition pricing details are available on request on its official website.
Features & Capabilities of Business Intelligence Tools for Data Visualization
The features and capabilities of the best BI tools for data visualization are endless. Let’s have a look at a few of them.
Data Collection: The data is collected in the BI software with the help of a variety of internet monitoring social media tracking channels. Business Intelligence tools can perform this by using algorithms to sort out unstructured data and removing duplicate entries.
Data Analysis: After converting the raw and unstructured data into proper structured data sets, the BI tools can analyze the same. “What-if” analysis can also be done to predict the future impacts.
Reporting: Have a detailed view of the best as well as worst performing areas in your business. Get a view across multiple dimensions with the best BI tools for reporting.
Data Visualization: Visuals ranging from bars to pie charts are used to depict the information set present in hand. This helps because the mind processes visual data faster than plain text.
Integration: It has the ability to work in coordination with other software applications as well. BI software can work with existing infrastructure which includes 3rd party warehouses and SQL server configurations.
User Security: BI applications can also restrict particular users to access certain data sets. It allows you personalize different features to groups and individual users.
Free business intelligence tools can help businesses in transforming their unstructured data, consolidate it from multiple resources, and visualize it in different graphs and charts. Some of the reasons to use free BI tools include:
Assists in gaining insights on overall profit and loss through analysis.
Helps in accurately representing data and eliminating inaccuracies.
Data analysis helps in finding growth opportunities and creating strategies.
Helps in performing competitive analysis to find gaps in company’s existing strategies.
Makes it easier to export data within and outside the organization.
With it, you can manage the entire data ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) procedure
Conclusion
Consolidating and representing big data sets manually is a cumbersome procedure and may lead to inaccurate data entry, compliance issues, financial issues, and so on.
However, by using a reliable BI tool, you can accurately present and manage data in a single repository that will help in better data analysis and improved decision making.
FAQs
What is the impact of business intelligence?
Business intelligence has as very positive impact on the project’s performance in an organization. BI or business intelligence is used to convert large data into meaningful information. This information is then used in making better decision in a company.
What are the challenges with BI implementation?
There can be 3 types of challenges during BI implementation. It can be data-related, people-related and tech-related. Data-related challenges include poor governance and data quality.
People related challenges would include company’s administrative and internal issues. And tech-related challenges would include technical problems.
What are the best business intelligence tools for visual studio versions?
The best business intelligence tools for visual studio versions is Microsoft Visual Studio 2019. There are several Best BI tools free to be used for managing Video Studio versions. But using an advanced level software like these is better than using any BI tools open source.
Published On: December 23, 2019
Riya Basu
Riya Basu, a core member of the content team at Techjockey.com, has previously worked with several brands related to lifestyle, travel, education and f&b. However, technical content writing is currently her niche with more than 2 years of experience in writing about business software and hardware. She is a YouTuber who creates videos about fashion, food, technology and fitness. A photography enthusiast, she loves to write stories about people and places.
