A/B Testing

Decision Management’s “Epsom Salt” problem

July 7, 2011

Have you looked at a packet of Epsom Salt recently? Here’s a product that describes itself as

a soaking aid for minor sprains and bruises
a saline laxative for the short term relief of constipation
a plant nutrient for vigorous lawns, flowers, plants, vegetables and trees

Three very different uses – after all, how many laxatives would you put [...]

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First Look – Conductrics

January 27, 2011

I got a briefing from Conductrics recently. Conductrics is a start up delivering an agent-based decision optimization solution focused on next best action or next best message. Designed for a website, mobile application or even a POS it uses machine learning techniques to optimize the behavior of the site/application to meet some overarching objectives – [...]

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Decision Services need more than rules – #rulesfest

October 12, 2010

I just completed my presentation at RulesFest so here are the key points.
For the RulesFest audience I assumed that either they were already using business rules or at least that they plan to be, and that  they knew what a rule engine is and how it works. Before going on to my five points, let [...]

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Oracle Real Time Decisions in e-commerce #oow10

September 20, 2010

I am attending a few sessions at Oracle OpenWorld this week and the first one is an overview of Oracle Real-Time Decisions (RTD) in e-commerce. I have reviewed RTD 3.0 before. The context for using RTD is that consumers are harder to reach, satisfy and retain – their behavior evolves more quickly, there is more [...]

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First Look – IBM/SPSS Decision Management and Modeler

May 19, 2010

I received an update from IBM recently on IBM SPSS Decision Management 6 and IBM SPSS Modeler 14. IBM  sees organizations with many different data sources (inside and outside) that are moving from a traditional approach focused on reporting to one that involves “predict and act” – real-time, fact-driven decision making at the point of [...]

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Silverlink update

April 21, 2010

I did some work with Silverlink some time ago and was really impressed by their use of decision management to improve the communication of health plans and others in the healthcare space with members and patients. I got a chance to catch up with them recently to discuss progress and their use of adaptive control [...]

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Getting to Enterprise Application 2.0

August 26, 2009

On Monday I posted about Enterprise Application 2.0 and promised to return with some thoughts on how to get from Enterprise Application 1.0 to Enterprise Application 2.0. Let’s see:

Expose core elements as services
Identify and manage processes – hook up legacy and new services into new, more effective workflows
Find and automate decisions using business rules
Manage simple [...]

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Decision Services as agile, intelligent agents

December 19, 2008

Two articles I saw recently (Is SOA Enabling Intelligent Agents? and Three Keys to Enabling Agile Business Services) made me think about decision services in the context of agility and of so-called “intelligent agents”. Clearly SOA, web 2.0 and network-centric…

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Powering Next-Generation Predictive Applications with Oracle Data Mining (ODM)

December 2, 2008

Charlie Berger of Oracle presented on Powering Next-Generation Predictive Applications with Oracle Data Mining (ODM). Charlie joined Oracle from Thinking Machines about a decade ago and have been putting machine learning algorithms into the Oracle kernel. Data Mining, in database or otherwise, sifts through data to find hidden patterns, discover new insights and make predictions. [...]

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Evidence-based (decision-centric) CRM Processes

October 22, 2008

Graham Hill wrote a piece on Evidence-based CRM that focused on evidence-based CRM programs and it made me think about evidence-based CRM processes.
To me, evidence-based CRM means customer relationships, and thus customer treatments, that are based on evidence (data) and not judgment, hope, guesswork etc. It means

making offers that you have evidence this customer will [...]

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Impact Modeling and Maximizing Marketing Return

September 22, 2008

Nina Shikaloff discussed an analytics technique that I had not heard of – Impact Modeling. Impact Modeling is a decision modeling technique. Decisions on acquiring customers – what to offer for instance – managing customers and handling difficult customers are all important and it can be tricky to identify better ones. Impact modeling is about [...]

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Here’s how to get started with decision management

June 12, 2008

When I talk to folks about decision management they sometimes seem intimidated by the complexity of the problem and the sophistication of organizations that have invested heavily in the approach. Here, then, are some thoughts to help you get started.

Begin – even if the first version is not perfect or even close.
Automate the decision even [...]

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