JASON ATCHLEY : DATA : 5 TIPS FROM GARTNER FOR USING FILE ANALYTICS TO BECOME DATA-AWARE

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5 TIPS FROM GARTNER ABOUT USING FILE ANALYTICS TO BECOME DATA-AWARE

In 2014, Gartner highlighted DataGravity in its “Market Guide for File Analysis Software,” a report that explored how storage, legal and security professionals were using file analytics to manage unstructured data. The analysts noted how file analysis (FA) was a growing segment of a larger industry, with many valuable use cases, extending beyond data management to include governance, security, data migration and more. In the report, Gartner also cautioned users not to rely solely on FA technology to fully gather data insights, suggesting that IT administrators and architects use FA along with data retention and other best practices to ensure data governance initiatives could provide value.

Both of these ideas resonated heavily with us. FA is a crucial part of any data-aware strategy, but it’s not the only thing you need to protect your data and turn it into business value. The storage and data landscape has begun to shift since this report’s publication, but its insights continue to ring true. Below are five other tips from Gartner to help you apply FA as your company becomes data-aware.

1. Stop thinking of data insights as reports.

The content of your data can be a static repository or a dynamic business asset. If you’re not investing in ways to apply your data to bigger initiatives, however, you’re going to be stuck with the former.

2. Get support from C-level executives.

If your executives are backing data-driven strategies, you can use data-aware technology and FA results to inform your company’s holistic data governance strategy. Lacking this C-level buy-in, Gartner explains, will allow you to use these insights to alleviate point problems, but you may be limiting their capabilities.

3. Harness the power of data visualization.

“The data presentation provided by FA tools is critical and should be a key criteria, along with the level of metadata and content analysis, when selecting an FA tool,” writes Gartner. When you can visualize the risks in your data, you’re more empowered to stop them.

4. Match FA features to business goals.

Data insights are just facts unless you’re prepared to transform them into business value. Keep your end goals in mind to track progress and improve your results over time.

5. Collect insights as they’re created.

Gartner approaches DataGravity with a different context than the other vendors in this report, since it was the only vendor surveyed that offered users the ability to analyze, classify and protect data at the point of storage. The analysts mention how this unique approach increases support for e-discovery and corporate risk mitigation, as users can quickly identify and secure sensitive data. This value is one reason we expect to see more platforms becoming data-aware as FA technology grows and as users realize the full potential of their data.

Learn how data-aware storage goes above and beyond file analytics with our file services solution brief.

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Jason Atchley : Sales : 7 Sales Effectiveness Metrics For Better Sales

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THE 7 SALES EFFECTIVENESS METRICS TO TRACK FOR BETTER SALES

By Carolyn Jenkins

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June 5, 2015

Increasing sales is crucial to lead a successful company. Efficient sales operations can boost sales productivity. Tracking specific sales effectiveness metrics will reveal broken processes and performance improvement opportunities.  

A business can increase sales productivity by tracking these seven metrics:

"Between 50 and 69 percent of sales reps met their quota."

1. Pinpoint the quota attainment 
Quotas gauge the effectiveness of a sales rep. Tracking the average percentage of individuals who were able to reach 100 percent of their quota helps a business identify top performers. A Harvard Business Review study of sales leaders indicated 54 percent of participants reported between 50 and 69 percent of sales reps met their quota. A total of 26 percent of sales leaders reported 70 percent of their employees achieved the quota. 

2. Identify total revenue per individual sale
Entrepreneur noted businesses should also track revenue per sale. Tracking this data can determine which techniques practiced by top sales reps are capable of bringing in higher profit with each individual sale. 

The total revenue of an operation will rise when a business tracks and rewards this metric. Salespeople who regularly bring in higher revenue per sale can also share advice and help other employees improve their performance.

3. Track the quality of leads found 
Leads provide a business with the opportunity for growth. Recognizing quality leads and knowing where to focus resources is a crucial component to increasing the number of successful sales. 

Retaining customer loyalty is just as important as converting leads into clients. Pinpoint when spending falls or plateaus. A business should examine and address this pattern to make sure growth continues. 

4. Determine the lead to sale rate 
Tracking the leads that turn into sales is another important metric to track, according to Forbes. This can indicate overall effectiveness of a sales rep. Knowing which sales techniques are essential to bringing more clients on board will encourage the growth of total sales productivity. 

When tracking conversion rates, a business should note the individuals who consistently succeed in converting leads to clients. These individuals can assist fellow employees achieve successful lead to client conversion and lead to company-wide success. 

Businesses should examine why the conversion rate varies among staff. Consider the different times of the year or the week or day conversion is most successful and develop a sales strategy based on findings.  

"Spending money to turn leads into customers may be effective, it should also not cut into total revenue."

5. Find custom acquisition cost 
According to Forbes, identifying how much it costs to attract a customer is another valuable metric a business can use. This can help an operation determine how efficient a sales rep is and how effective the team is as a whole. 

A good indicator that a business needs to engineer a new strategy is if the money spent to acquire customers continues to rise. In addition, businesses need to reevaluate their sales and marketing strategy if the money's use does not have a positive impact on sales productivity. Spending money to turn leads into customers may be impactful, but it should never cut into total revenue. 

6. Monitor total sales of each product or service 
Entrepreneur emphasized the importance of noting which products or services are selling successfully. A business can then focus energy on promoting what consumers want to buy and re-evaluating the sales method or marketing channel of an unsuccessful product.  

If one product or service does not sell well among customers, a business can harness the power of social media to research consumer preferences for products and services offered. Gaining insight directly from those who have the purchasing power will help an operation determine how to move forward with a more effective sales strategy. 

7. Know prior activity before a successful sale 
Businesses should identify the events that took place before a sale. This data can be used to track any patterns that occur when consumers make purchases. Tracking this metric allows an operation to figure out the root of a successful or failed sale attempt. Entrepreneur noted a sales decrease potentially may happen due to a lower number of sales per call. A change to the phone script used to speak with customers may help. 

Improving a sales strategy starts by identifying both successful and unsuccessful patterns among a team. Knowing which metrics to track can boost a company's productivity. 

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JASON ATCHLEY : DATA STORAGE : MAKING MAGIC HAPPEN WITH DATA-AWARE STORAGE IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR

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MAKING MAGIC HAPPEN WITH DATA-AWARE STORAGE IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR

IT pros should be allowed to add “magician” to their resumes. (Outside of the “personal interests” section, we mean. To each his own.)

On a daily basis, we hear how our customers are bringing IT magic to their organizations by streamlining tired processes and proposing innovative new ways to avoid risks and encourage team productivity. All the more impressive is the materials these pros usually have at their disposal. Major enterprises tend to have access to expansive teams and the latest tools to help power their latest projects. Midmarket companies and public sector organizations, however, need to distribute resources wisely and make educated decisions that enhance value, protect the agency’s most confidential data and keep budget top of mind.

Data-aware storage helps IT pros command a magic power – the ability to unlock the value of their data and incite change in their organizations. Now that Promark Technology has added DataGravity to its General Services Administration (GSA) Schedule, public sector organizations can harness this power and experience the benefits it makes possible. Promark has a two-tier distribution agreement that connects value-added resellers and system integrators with government agencies and public sector organizations in need of storage innovation. Federal, state, local and education (SLED) agencies leverage this relationship to help cut their spending by billions of dollars.

Whether you’re a full-fledged data magician or an IT pro with a few tricks up your sleeve, DataGravity can help you conjure up business value. And now, Promark will help public sector organizations pull off the following feats:

• Meet tight compliance policies, through the ability to see which files violate regulations and which users are accessing them;
• Track when users read, write, delete and update files and use data visualizations to provide a clear picture of any inherent risks;
• Shine a light on dark data to avoid racking up storage costs while exposing the organization to long-forgotten security risks; and
• Identify the files and encourage the collaborations that help teams streamline tasks and increase productivity.

Contact DataGravity to find out how data-aware storage can make magic happen at your company. 

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Jason Atchley : Data Security : 3 Signs it is Time to Update your Security Policies

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3 Signs it’s Time to Update your Security Policies

In her mid-60s, Diana Nyad swam 110 miles from Havana, Cuba to Key West, Florida. The firsttime she tried to complete the task, she was 28 and the year was 1978. At this year’s RSA Conference in San Francisco, I got the chance to hear Nyad’s firsthand account of these experiences, as well as her take on the mental stamina they demanded. What does data security have to do with long-distance swimming? Both require an intense amount of perseverance. However, as Nyad reminded our audience of IT and security professionals, when you have an important goal in mind, there’s no reason you should let anything stand in your way.

If you have a nagging feeling that your security plans are in need of an update, you’re not alone, and it’s not too late to get started. Consider the below three warning signs.

1. If a threat breaches your perimeter, all bets are off.

Most companies have no idea what kind of data they’re storing, or where it’s living within their IT environment. This means that security solutions that only focus on your perimeter can expose your most critical information unless they’re paired with data-aware tools that can secure and protect information at its core.

2. You’re waiting for change, not proactively making it happen.

Incremental and iterative changes aren’t enough to help your company pull ahead of the constantly shifting threat landscape. The answer to your security issues may not work for your industry peers, or you may need to build out a comprehensive strategy that takes multiple tools into account. So, what’s the best way to approach this action? Be courageous. Pilot new products and ideas, and resist slow or overly cautious implementations. Don’t just make changes in your go-to security issue responses; think bigger and start updating your team’s strategy behind its approach to chronic security challenges.

3. You’re not thinking in terms of the big picture.

As you get educated about the tools and technologies available in today’s security market, it’s important to get granular, think outside the box and give your entire environment a chance to contribute. Security strategies need data-driven insights to become intelligent, so you need full visibility into your network in order to inform your initiatives. The big picture is telling us that the security status quo isn’t working. To remedy this, bring your storage, networks, servers, applications and firewalls on board and see what they have to offer.

The major sessions at RSA had a lot of overlap in terms of their messages and overall takeaways. Today’s security issues are pervasive, and companies need to start making radical changes. Don’t get hung up on industry changes or cautious actions. The threats will still be out there, and they’re growing – in the long run, any movement toward your security goals will be more beneficial than treading water.

Start enhancing security for your company by evaluating the use cases where data-aware storage can help.

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Jason Atchley : Data Security : As Data Breaches Go On, Hackers See Big Profits

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As Data Breaches Go On, Hackers See Big Profits

Rebekah Mintzer, Corporate Counsel

June 10, 2015    | 0 Comments

Read more: http://www.corpcounsel.com/id=1202728825336/As-Data-Breaches-Go-On-Hackers-See-Big-Profits#ixzz3cgZLFor0

If you were told that a new venture for your business would reap nearly 1,500 percent returns, would you pull the trigger? Cybercriminals certainly do. According to a new report from Trustwave Holdings Inc., this is the ROI that an enterprising hacker can get on certain types of breaches involving ransomware, which essentially involves taking data hostage by encrypting it until the rightful owner pays up.

The potential profits from breaches are not the only unnerving statistics revealed in the “2015 Trustwave Global Security Report,” in which the security company analyzes data collected from 574 breach investigations across 15 countries last year.

For starters, it appears that some companies are failing to figure out that they’ve been breached. “Anytime you discover a breach yourself, you’re going to get a jump on things,” Charles Henderson, vice president of managed security testing at Trustwave, told CorpCounsel.com. Clearly, some companies are falling behind. In 81 percent of the investigations studied, the victim organization didn’t detect the incursion internally.

This has real consequences. According to the data, self-detected breaches only lasted a median of 14.5 days from intrusion to containment. Those that were externally detected lasted a median of 154 days. Henderson added that those companies with their own detection capabilities (or with their own managed security services to detect breaches for them) create their own hacker deterrence.

“I think the reason that most companies don’t self-detect is that the companies that are in the position to self-detect in the first place don’t tend to get breached, because they remain in a much better position from a security perspective,” Henderson said.

The report also looked at where breaches are occurring, and concluded that the U.S is still a big target with half the compromises happening within U.S. borders. However, this is a 9 percent decrease from last year. Other countries, such as Australia and the U.K., with 24 percent and 14 percent of attacks, respectively, are taking more of the heat.

Looking at the industries being breached, the most compromised, according to Trustwave, is retail, with 43 percent of investigations in 2014, up from 35 percent in 2013. Henderson said that retailers place a lot of time and energy into their core business and the bottom line. “So security becomes an afterthought,” he said. “But I think more and more you’re seeing retailers paying more attention to security.” Behind retail was the food and beverage industry, followed by hospitality, two other sectors that might not yet be accustomed to focusing on customer data protection.

The report also delved into a perennial problem for companies: trying to encourage the use of better passwords among employees to mitigate breach risk. By looking at thousands of passwords found in penetration testing over the past year, Trustwave found that “Password1” still reigns as the most used password, followed by “Welcome1,” likely because simple passwords are set by network administrators and then never get changed by employees.

If they weren’t using variations on words like “password,” employees often used variations on names and places. Some 8.4 percent of passwords used names from the top 2,000 baby names, and 4.9 percent used U.S. city names. These credentials may be easier for hackers to figure out.

Password length was a big issue as well. Most passwords did not exceed eight characters, the number often required by policy. The report pointed out that the estimated time it takes to crack an eight-character password is a single day, while a password that is slightly longer, at 10 characters, is much safer, taking an estimated 591 days.

Read more: http://www.corpcounsel.com/id=1202728825336/As-Data-Breaches-Go-On-Hackers-See-Big-Profits#ixzz3cgZW5C2O

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Jason Atchley : Data Analytics : How to Calculate Data-Aware Business Value

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Getting out of the weeds: How to calculate data-aware business value

When you’re a value-added reseller (VAR), you start recognizing trends that are unique to certain industries. For example, storage platforms have been conceptually the same for a long time. Different vendors will spice up their offerings with language and add-on features, so one product may provide the “cheap and deep” storage you need while another delivers “lightning-fast” services, or one may have a particularly strong deduplication play while another excels in the quality of its snapshots. However, when you boil it down, storage vendors and users are usually measuring the efficacy of platforms through their cost per terabyte (TB) or input/output operations per second (IOPS) rate.

Once an organization knows it can meet its capacity, IOPS and efficiency needs, determining the big-picture benefits of different storage platforms can feel like splitting hairs. Data-aware technology changes this game by extending the conversation beyond storage. As we work with our customers, we dive into the storage weeds, but the details take up less than half of our discussions. The rest of the time, we’re talking about how storage and IT administrators can make a serious impact on holistic business value.

If you’re trying to start this process at your company or with one of your clients, your first step should be getting out of the weeds. The reason you need storage in the first place is your data, and you deserve to know what’s in it. Consider the cost of the below processes on your IT system. Each of these can create a productivity roadblock if you’re not using data-aware storage. How much would you save if these initiatives had no impact on storage, network or server resources and were instantly available with real time data?

• Search and discovery: Many end users create the same content over and over again, causing any data of value to get lost in the shuffle. As a result, IT pros can’t always find the information they need, when they need it.
• Securing sensitive data: It’s simple – if you don’t know what’s in your data, you’re not going to be able to protect it.
• User and file auditing: Network security measures often can’t help secure information from internal threats once your network is breached. Using data-aware storage to track when files are read, written and deleted – and visualizing this information to get a clear view of its impact – will stop you from getting caught off guard.
• Near-instant recovery: Poring through backups can be a painstaking process. If users accidentally delete or misplace a file, data-aware storage can help you find it using attributes such as keywords, authors or file types, and click to restore it immediately.

Connect with DataGravity to start your own data-aware conversation.

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