When you hear the words business software and Reporting Images of binders packed with charts, spreadsheets and footnotes might come to the mind. Or perhaps conference rooms are crowded with executives slogging through slide presentations. This is changing, thanks to the collaboration of several digital tools. Cognitive and machine learning tools will do much of the job of collecting data, making reports and disseminating the information – freeing human workers to perform more interesting tasks.

The winners of the new era are those who redefine what it means to run an enterprise optimizing resource allocation to maximize productivity and profits that is truly product-driven. They will utilize their products to drive acquisition, retention and growth of their customers. They’ll also integrate PLG into their product design process, development and delivery.

At Metso for instance the centralized reporting system on Quickbase allowed them to pull in all of their critical information such as ERP, inventory data etc. Monitoring the progress of a high-priority order and tracking the progression of orders. They saved more than $1 million per year using the system. With the right business analytics platform, you can simplify your processes, increase efficiency and make better business decisions with current and accurate information. It is crucial to ensure that the reporting and business analytics platform isn’t an expense for users, but instead an effective tool. PLG is all about this.