Business analysts are the ones that perform various tasks in order to help in achieving business objectives. They are responsible in helping in decision making, by giving valuable insight on the current processes. The major requirement in the field of business analysis is strong communication skills. The business analyst tools involved will require the use of various software platforms, research equipment and analytical strategies. By incorporating these tools, business analyst helps organizations become more competitive.
In this review, we shall be looking the top tools that a business analst would need to effectively work.
Creatio
Creatio is a low code platform with CRM and process automation functionalities. This low code platform will let IT as well as non-IT people build the apps according to their specific business needs. It supports on-premise as well as in cloud deployment. This BPM tool is best for medium to large businesses.
Features:
- Creatio offers the CRM solution for Marketing, Sales, and Service.
- Its self-service portal will let you collaborate with clients.
- It has out-of-the-box solutions that will extend platform functionality.
- Creatio CRM is the platform with a wide range of features such as 360? customer view, lead management, opportunity management, product management, document flow automation, case management, Contact Center, and Analytics.
- You can personalize the communication with the client through Service Creatio.
- It has features for product management like maintaining a product catalog hierarchy.
- It will let you group products based on custom or pre-defined product attributes like brand, category, etc.
Oracle NetSuite
Oracle NetSuite is one unified Business Management suite. It has solutions for small to large size businesses. It contains functionalities for ERP, CRM, e-commerce, etc. SuiteAnalytics provides the tool of Saved Search that will filter and match data for answering different business questions.
It provides standard and customizable reports for all transaction types. It will let you create a Workbook without coding and helps you with analyzing the data.
Features:
- Oracle NetSuite offers an easy to use, scalable, and agile business solution that provides several functionalities like ERP and CRM and hence suitable for small businesses.
- Medium-sized businesses can cut their IT costs in half, reduce financial close times 20% to 50%, and improves quote to cash cycle times by 50% by using Oracle NetSuite.
- Oracle NetSuite has functionalities to help global enterprises with their complex functional, industry, regulatory, and tax requirements.
=> Get Oracle NetSuite Free Product Tour Here
Xplenty
Xplenty is a cloud-based data integration platform that will bring all your data sources together. It offers no-code and low-code options that will make the platform to be usable by anyone.
Its intuitive graphic interface will help you to implement an ETL, ELT, or a replication solution. Xplenty offers solutions for marketing, sales, customer support, and developers.
Features:
- Xplenty’s marketing analytics solution will provide omnichannel marketing, data-driven insights, and features to enrich your marketing database.
- Its customer support analytics solution will help you with better business decisions and provide comprehensive insights.
- Xplenty’s sales analytics solution provides the features to understand your customers, data enrichment, centralized database, for keeping your CRM organized, etc.
Oribi
Oribi marketing analytics tool contains the capabilities of custom reports, automated event capturing, visitor Journey & email capturing, etc. It is suitable for all business sizes. Businesses will get benefited from the cutting-edge technology and top-notch optimization guidance of Oribi.
Features:
- Oribi provides actionable insights.
- It offers the features for event tracking and allows defining conversion goals without any code.
- You can easily create super funnels with just a few clicks and capture where the visitors are lost.
- You can easily spot the differences between visitor behavior by filtering the funnel by channels, devices, and countries.
- It offers the features for marketing channel analysis such as tracking & comparing multiple campaigns and evaluating the contribution of each channel to the goals.
- It offers many more capabilities such as visitor journeys, reports, marketing attribution, etc.
Wrike
Wrike is a cloud-based project management software. It is a SaaS product. With the help of Android and iOS apps, you will be able to update and provide tasks from anywhere.
Features:
- It will help you in setting the deadlines, scheduling, and other processes.
- It assists you in balancing resources.
- It will support you in keeping a track of the timelines and budget.
- It provides Calendar, communication window, and approval window.
HubSpot
HubSpot is an Inbound Marketing, Sales, and Service Software. Its Marketing Analytics Software will help you with measuring the performance of all your marketing campaigns in one place. It has a built-in analytics facility and provides reports and dashboards.
Features:
- You will be able to analyze the site’s performance with key metrics.
- You will know about the quality and quantity of traffic.
- You can filter the analytics by country or specific URL structure.
- For each of your marketing channels, you will get detailed reports.
Business Process Diagramming, Wireframing, Flowcharts
Microsoft Visio
It is an application for making diagrams. It is a part of the MS Office for Standard and Professional editions.
Features:
- Helps in drawing advanced diagrams and templates.
- Diagrams can be connected to data sources.
- It can display the data graphically.
- Advanced shapes are provided for electrical diagrams, floor plans, site plans, and office layouts.
URL: Microsoft Visio
Bizagi
Bizagi provides Business Process Management tools. It has three products for on-premise use, i.e. Bizagi Modeler, Studio, and automation. In the cloud, it provides a platform as a service.
Features:
- Bizagi Modeler is used for drawing diagrams. It follows BPMN.
- It supports Word, PDF, Wiki, and Share Point.
- Provides agile automation platform.
URL: Bizagi
LucidCharts
It is a web-based solution for diagrams and charts. You can use it, by getting its subscriptions.
Features:
- With this tool, you can draw simple as well as complex diagrams and flow charts.
- You can create a connection between the live data and diagrams.
- Supports data import for automatic creation of build org charts.
URL: LucidCharts
Axure
Axure RP can create wireframe diagrams, software prototypes, and functional specifications. This tool is for web-based and desktop applications.
Features:
- Easy to use because of drag and drop facility. You can resize and format the diagram components as well.
- For wireframing, it provides many controls like image, text panel, hyperlinks, table, etc.
- It provides many forms of control like buttons, text areas, drop-down lists, and much more.
URL: Axure
Balsamiq
With the help of Balsamiq, you can create the wireframes for websites. Balsamiq also provides a GUI for mock-up.
Features:
- It provides an editor.
- Drag and drop facility.
- You can use Balsamiq as a desktop application and as a plug-in for Google Drive, Confluence, and JIRA.
URL: Balsamiq
MS PowerPoint
This particular software helps them prepare and deliver formal presentations. Every business analyst must be doing presentations. He also needs to communicate ideas, justify or provide project updates to stakeholders. With PowerPoint presentations, communication becomes more effortless.
MS Excel
Microsoft Excel is a spreadsheet-like tool. Excel has several built-in mathematical and financial functions that can perform data analysis. The work like reporting, creating dashboards, and creating tables can easily be performed using this tool.
MS Word
This particular software helps the business analysts to create documents by making the templates. Microsoft Word has so many templates and features that you can use for different purposes. It also offers various visual elements such as user-preferred fonts, themes, objects, shapes, smart arts, charts, and Visio diagrams.
MS Visio
Microsoft Visio is a leading tool for business modeling. It is the tool that business analysts use to capture and present stakeholder’s ideas effectively. It can also create case diagrams, project schedules, and project flowcharts to generate architecture diagrams and data models.
Rational RequisitePro
The Rational Requisite Pro is a must-have tool for every business analyst. It is one of the best tools for requirements management and working on requirement gathering and elicitation. It has a robust architecture that can easily manage documents that are dynamically linked to a project database.
Rational Requisite can be used for:
- Conducting impact analysis
- Managing an audit trail of changes
- Querying and sorting data using a dynamic database
- Tracing of requirements
Pencil
A pencil is free to use and an open-source tool. It is used for prototyping and creating easy mockups. It acts as a standalone tool that can be downloaded and used with a simple interface.
Pencil can be used for:
- Creating a prototype for the user
- Helping the customers understand the final product’s look and feel
- Implementing all the changes asked by the customers based on their needs to deliver the best outcome
- Modeling the decisions using a standardized approach
Google Docs
I am sure you might have heard of google docs. Google docs offer several features that makes using them very comfortable and easy. Some of its features are:
- It is a handy tool for sharing documents online
- It allows to create, view, and edit files online
- Users can download files in different formats such as .pdf, .txt, .docx, and many others
Conclusion
There are many tools for business analysis and requirements management tasks (and we use all of them). They supported us to make this list of free business analysis tools, which will surely help you.