What Makes A Good SAS Course?

Every Data Science aspirant, at one point or another, has asked themselves one impending question. What makes a good SAS course? OR Whether I should pursue a SAS course? All those novices in the field of Data Analytics, have time and again questioned themselves as to why would they want to do a course in SAS programming?

Like any other general course, any candidate who is willing to seek more knowledge and deep understanding of the world of Data Science is willing to take a course in SAS, mainly because this software is used by the largest section of the data analytics fraternity.

While every once in a while, every data aspirant is plagued with a doubt, “what if I take help of the internet to study?” While the biggest upside of doing this is the fact that you would get unlimited access to a lot of free material and you would be at the absolute leisure, of being able to decide the pace of your course.

But the downside here is that, there is a plethora of material out there, but no indication of which is the most relevant material, that you would require in specific for your need. This is exactly where, the guidance of an expert individual and the help of relevant study material to back it up, becomes very important.

This is probably the only reason why you must pursue a course in SAS. But what does really make a good SAS course?

The first and foremost thing that matters when it comes to any course is its curriculum. It also makes for one of the most frequent complaints, which a course curriculum always tends to bend a lot more on the theoretical side. A good SAS course must include relevant content as well as a strong connection between theory and practical, real life scenarios. Any good course has to be either run or designed by experts in that very field.

So when it comes to SAS, a good course would that, which is entirely run by experts in the data science industry, with a sterling experience. As these  courses are usually of very short duration, as a result of which it is imperative that these have a lot of quality material, supplemented herein.

Many SAS courses tend to just end after the theoretical part, with a little to almost no mentoring whatsoever. Many professionals who take up these courses are new to the field of data science and as a result, are not very familiar with the nuances that this field compromises of. This is where the role of mentors comes into importance.

These would be like the guiding stones for a professional. These people can prove instrumental in providing great guidance and career assistance to those candidates, who are looking to start off their career in data analytics.
While very few institutes are able to strike a balance between all of these factors, that make for a good SAS course.

Careers with a Diploma in Finance

The field of Finance is one of the fastest growing fields in India. Apart from being extremely challenging, as a career option it also is very rewarding. There are a lot of avenues in this field like investment banking, mergers and acquisitions, private equity, securities, stock market and many others. While there are a lot of graduate and post graduate courses through which people get into this field; an MBA in Finance is considered to be the go to course.
An MBA in Finance is rather longer in duration (around 2-3 years) and tends to run a bit tedious. To get admission into an MBA course, one is required to have about 5 to 7 years of professional experience as well. These and a few more reasons have led to the rise in people opting for either a Masters degree, or a Diploma course. These type of courses are usually short term and very intensive learning oriented. As their duration is shorter, they do not require any prior working experience, neither are they highly priced.
There are a lot of institutes that offer certification programs in investment banking, financial valuation and modeling; there are also diploma programs offered in Corporate Finance, Wealth Management , Retail Banking and so on. It is a common misconception that doing these courses won’t add any substance to a resume. Apart from being very adept at being at par with the industry standards, some of these courses also include mentoring sessions with experts of the Industry. Some of these courses also offer internships with leading firms after completion, thus offering the much needed hands on experience for the candidates.
FinanceThere are a lot of career options for someone holding a diploma degree. One can start from the position of an Analyst and work with banks, individuals, private firms and help them invest depending on the current situation of the market. One can become a Financial Analyst by getting licenses and certifications like Chartered Financial Analyst and can deal with the buying and selling of securities and bonds. Other career options include positions like the Financial Managers, Insurance Specialists, Brokers who deal in the stock market and Commercial Banking where one deals with management of financial services, the much coveted positions in Investment Banking and many more.
The salary aspects in careers after a Diploma in Finance are also very good-looking and with proper interest and experience, one can definitely further their career similar to that of a career of an MBA. When it comes to careers in Finance, the learning process is lifelong and just acquiring a degree doesn’t halt it. With each new post, deal or a responsibility, one gets to learn so much more at every level and aspect. Thus although one can go for higher courses with time, diploma courses and certification programs in finance do add value.
Imarticus Learning is a leading education institute, which offers both certification programs and diploma courses in Corporate Finance, Wealth Management, Retail Banking and more.

Application Of Analytics In Business Functions

Almost everyone today is familiar with the one key process, which makes use of all the data, in the world today, in turning helping every sector achieve respective goals. Data Analytics, since its inception has gone on to become the most prerequisite process throughout various industries, like Finance, Sports, Health Care, E-commerce, Retail, Manufacturing and so on. While these industries consider the process of data analytics very essential, it is also essentially used in a number of Business Functions. Regardless of any kind of organization, data analytics as a process, has come to becomes really important, in terms of a number of business functions, especially Marketing and HR. Apart from these, the various other business functions, which employ the use of data analytics include sales, supply chain management, Manufacturing, Strategy and many more.

Marketing Marketing

The first rule of marketing, for any firm is striving hard to not only understand their target audience, but also to find and attract more people like them. Now as there are a huge number of customers and clients out there, it may make the task of knowing your audience, seem extremely daunting. This is where the importance of data analytics comes in. It is this process which helps the firm in figuring out the various nuances of every customer and thereby add more value to the company, by gathering data across all the present marketing channels and consolidating it into a common marketing view. Data Analytics helps in measuring, managing and analyzing the marketing performance, so as to increase the effectiveness and to double the rate of return of investments. The various questions that data analytics helps to answer in this field range from, performance of marketing initiatives to the allocation of marketing resources and the activities, that are conducted in comparison to that of the competition. The field of marketing involves the use of various tools of data analytics, in order to investigate the past performance and predict the future on the basis of it.

Human Resourse
Human Resources

For any firm, regardless of the field of specialization, Human Resources department makes for the most important part. This is mainly because of the fact, that this department is responsible for providing the perfect talent in order to perform the suitable functions, so as to generate profits for the company. Data Analytics in this field, collects all the related data and helps in the creation of a single representation of the entire workforce, looking to be placed in the said field. The various valuable insights that the data provides, can be then used for taking various business decisions, in order to help drive the business processes, thus improving not only the productivity but also the profitability of the company. The various key areas in HR, where data analytics is important are, talent acquisition and retention, building leadership, optimizing of compensation and benefits, attrition and so on.
This why, the market has seen a growing demand for those, who are proficient in using data analytics tools. Many candidates have also begun to show great interest, in this field and are looking to get certified in various data analytics tools like SAS Programming, R Programming, Hadoop and so on. Imarticus Learning is making it possible for the candidates to get into the career of their choice, by providing industry endorsed courses in various data analytics tools.

The Use of Data Analytics In The Retail Industry

Data Analytics today has found its application in various fields across the industry. Today, it is extensively used for strategic, operational and tactical decision-making processes, across various industry verticals. These range from Retail, E-commerce, Banking, Finance, Healthcare, Sports and Manufacturing among many others.
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In the modern, technology-driven world, users or customers in the retail scenario, are not only accustomed to the digital comfort, but they are also very savvy in terms of using it. Thus, when it comes to retail, a customer who now has a fast paced world and is extremely used to instant gratification, all of which are resultant features of technology; is not only impatient, busy but also looking to be the beneficiary of an excellent service.Data Analytics Banner

Just like there are many customers out there, there also exist numerous companies, which are rapidly striving to get online and combat the massive competition, from the others like them. In their bid to stay on top of the game, it is important for those companies to be able to fully understand, exactly what makes the customer tick, their likes, their dislikes, basically a full 360-degree view of their customer. What this understanding does is gives them absolute solid ground to excel at satisfying their customers and on the other hand, attracting the right kind of customers as well.
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Analytics plays the most crucial role in this process as, it is the very thing that drives those ‘understand what makes the customer tick’, policies of the retail companies. Through the various functions that it carries forward, it creates insights such as, how would a company be able to increase margins at the product level, it also provides insights in what the customer is like, or why the customer would want to buy a certain product, this in the industry jargon is called as, Market Basket Analysis. The analytics help the companies also identify those items, which a customer would be very likely of purchasing together, what promotions and offers would work the very best for which products and personalized offers for every individual customer. These insights are totally customer based, but there are also those that are fully company based insights, here, analytics is able to give the insights in terms of how much spending would a company have to do, store wise product mix, optimal pricing that would get them more buyers, efficient stock strategies and so on.
Those drones that have been zooming through the sky and delivering products that the customers haven’t even probably ordered yet, is exactly where the massive power of analytics lies today. The examples of EBay, Amazon and so many others, who have successfully reaped great benefits of data analytics, goes on to prove that retailers, large and small would definitely be able to harness the miraculous benefits of analysing not only structured, but also unstructured data. There are many data analytics tools today, which have made it possible for these things, which have so long just been theoretical musings.

Advantages Of R Programming Language

R is a programming language, mainly dealing with the statistical computation of data and graphical representations. Many data science experts claim that R can be considered as a very different application, of its licensed contemporary tool, SAS. This data analytics tool was developed at Bell Laboratories, by John Chambers and his colleagues.
The various offerings of this tool include linear and non-linear modeling, classical statistical tests, time-series analysis, clustering, and graphical representation. It can be referred to as a more integrated suite of software facilities, for the purpose of data manipulation, calculation and data visualization. The R environment is more of a well-developed space for an R programming language, inclusive of user-defined recursive functions as well as input and output facilities. Since it is a relatively new data analytics tool in the IT-sphere, it is still considered to be very popular amongst a lot of data enthusiasts.

There are a number of advantages of this data analytics tool, which make it so very popular amongst Data Scientists. Firstly, the fact that it is by far the most comprehensive statistical analysis package available totally works in its favor. This tool strives to incorporate all of the standard statistical tests, models, and analyses as well as provides for an effective language so as to manage and manipulate data.
One of the biggest advantages of this tool is the fact that it is entirely open sourced. This means that it can be downloaded very easily and is free of cost. This is mainly the reason why there are also communities, which strive to develop the various aspects of this tool. Currently, there are about some 19 developers, including practicing professionals from the IT industry, who help in tweaking out this software. This is also the reason why most of the latest technological developments, are first to arrive on this software before they are seen anywhere else.

Why Learn R Programming

When it comes to a graphical representation, the related attributed to R are extremely exemplary. This is the reason why it is able to surpass most of the other statistical and graphical packages with great ease. The fact that it has no license restrictions, makes it literally the go-to software, for all of those who want to practice this in the earlier stages. It has over 4800 packages available, in its environment which belong to various repositories with specialization in various topics like econometrics, data mining, spatial analysis, and bioinformatics.
The best part about R programming is that it is more of a user-run software, which means that anyone is allowed to provide code enhancements and new packages. The quality of great packages on the R community environment is a testament to this very approach to developing certain software by sharing and encouraging inputs. This tool is also compatible across platforms and thereby it runs on many operating systems as well as hardware.
It can function with similar clarity for both the Linux as well as Microsoft Windows Operating Systems. In addition to this, the fact that R can also work well with other data analytics tools like SAS, SPSS and MySQL, have resulted in a number of takers for this data analytics tool. Imarticus Learning The Data Science Prodegree powered by KPMG is one such course which offers both SAS and R along with the opportunity to be a Data Scientist at KPMG.

The Advantages Of SAS Programming

The revolutionary transition of big data from, just an experimental mode, to accounting for record breaking revenues for e-giants like Google, Ebay, Snapchat and so on; had made big data the biggest key aspect of marketing today. This has gotten almost everyone into a flurry of activity, to try and master the various data analytics tools that allow the conversion of plain, logical data into value based insights for business expansion. The various data analytics tools include SAS Programming, R Programming, Big Data Hadoop, Python and so on. As almost everyone tries to grapple with the knowledge of using these data analytics tools, Imarticus Learning is becoming very sought after for their tailor made, industry relevant training programs. SAS Programming is one certification that is highly recommended by all the experts in the Data Science Industry, mainly due to the fact that its been out there, for quite a long time now.
The SAS, also known as the Statistical Analysis System is basically, a collection of software products, offered by the SAS Institute. These offerings primarily enable the user to perform a wide variety of tasks that cover almost every aspect of the business landscape. Working as a one-stop shop location for performing a host of activities, is what makes for the most prominent advantage of a SAS Programming. The SAS programming tool helps a professional, to perform a host of functions from, information system support, and customer care products to even human resources management. This makes studying for the SAS programming all the more worthwhile, mainly due to its wide scope of applications.
The amount of data generated every single day, is well beyond the efforts that are being made to analyse it. With almost every firm and company out there, regardless of what field they belong to, going out and trying to mine as much data as possible, the stakes of ensuring your data is transformed into asset-like decisions has almost become a norm today. In such an age of super competition and the rapid increase of the amount of data being generated, it becomes only logical to take the help of the most experienced technology. This is what makes having a SAS Programming extremely beneficial to one’s career. SAS has literally been ruling the roost for a long while now, where most of the companies have it as they default software. While having this certification under your belt will give you great rewards in the IT industry, it can also serve as a great pay-giver on the corporate side of the economy.
The IT Industry has already recognized the universal value of SAS and hence has begun to demand for skilled employees in this particular data analytics tool. As most of the companies have this as their default software, hiring a professional who is well versed with it, is extremely beneficial to them. Thus by extension, if you are an asset to the company, chances of your development are a lot more as well. These advantages of SAS are basically the reason why this data analytics tool has gained a lot of takers in the recent years.

The Beginner’s Guide To Hadoop

The 21st Century is all set to go down in history, as the age of the data. Couple of decades in the past, experienced a great surge in activity in the virtual space. Although Internet was in existence for quite a while, but it is only now that it has realised its true potential. As internet came to be accessible to more people, this gave birth to a phenomenon that came to be known as ‘data’. AS technology advanced and people got access to more technological devices, data was generated with similar speed. This ‘data’ soon began to prove instrumental for various firms and companies, to add great value to their businesses. There emerged a whole new branch of studies known as ‘big data science’ and there existed various tools of data analytics, which helped professionals to give valuable insights in the growth the development of various firms. Today, the scenario is such that data is still being generated on a great scale, while there is an increasing dearth of people, who can derive value out of it. The lucrative aspect of careers here draws a lot of professionals towards Data Science. If you are a data science aspirant, then it is important for you to know all about the various tools of data analytics; especially about Hadoop.
Hadoop is an open source software, put together by Doug Cutting, Mike Cafarella and team in the year 2005, to combat various problems that search engines like Google were facing with analysing data. This is one tool, which can be downloaded free of cost, in its full form and is also a registered trademark of the Apache Software Foundation. In terms of its basic specifications, this software runs applications, by using the MapReduce algorithm and it is capable of not only developing, but also running applications on multiple computers at the same time. It can also perform full statistical analysis on great volumes of data with ease, which is one of the reasons why this data analytics tool is sought after by all.
Big data and HadoopThe Hadoop framework is written is the Java language and consists of four different modules namely, Hadoop Common, Hadoop Yarn, Hadoop Distributed File System and Hadoop MapReduce. The term Hadoop is no longer used, only in the reference of all of its base modules, but it is also used to refer to the collection of additional software packages, which can be used alongside the Hadoop software like, Python, Pig and so on. There are many advantages of this software like the fact, which is efficient enough to allow the user to write as well as test distributed systems, while utilizing the parallelism of the CPU cores. It does not rely on any hardware, rather its own library, which has been designed to detect and handle failures. Being java based is one of the great advantages of Hadoop, apart from being free and easy to download, it also is compatible on all platforms.
With the increasing popularity of this data analytics tools. Imarticus Learning, is a one of the top educational institute which is become popular due to their esteemed courses in SAS Programming, R Programming, Hadoop and so on.

Best Books To Read In Data Science And Machine Learning

Now the above title must be really very confusing and contradictory according to a lot of us. The major reason for this would be the fact that, data science in all its singularity, is a field which deals with the entire of virtual space. There are various data analytical tools such as SAS Programming, R Programming, Hadoop, Tableau, SQL, the list is endless; these tools are used to turn volumes of data into valuable insights, which help businesses and firms grow manifold. While many may argue that id the whole landscape of the field of data science is so virtual and online, then why would there be a need to have paper books written and refereed to? While attending various webinars, reading e-books, watching tutorials and so on makes absolute sense, similar is the case with books. First of all gaining information is the most important part, when it comes to researching any field, even more so with this new and upcoming field of data science. Books offer an individual to dedicate all their attention and focus to one source, devoid of any sort of distractions, including ads, pop ups and so on.
While it isn’t common knowledge, that there is a tonne of informative literature present on data science, which lets both beginners and seasoned professionals, get deeper understanding of the field of data science.
Here’s a list of books, which are highly recommended by Imarticus Learning, is a award winning education institute of Data Analytics In India. There recommendations are to both beginners as well as seasoned professionals in the field of Data Science.
Big Data A Revolution

Big Data A Revolution That Will Transform How We Live, Work And Think

This book is jointly authored by Viktor Mayer-Schonberger and Kenneth Cukier, both of who also happen to be two of the most popular experts in the field of data science. It consists of various intricacies of big data and the reality of the data driven world is explored herein.
Doing Data Science

Doing Data Science: Straight Talk From The Frontline

Authored by Cathy O’Neil and Rachel Schutt, this book is the go-to piece of reading for anyone who wants to know more about statistical inference, algorithms, spam filters, Naive Bayes, Data Visualization, Social Networks, Data Journalism, Financial Modeling, Logistic Regression, Data Engineering, MapReduce, Pregel, Hadoop and so on. This makes for a great read for those interested in finance as well as analytics industry.
Data Science For Business

Data Science For Business

This book is an essential read, as it explores the various real-time business problems that will arise in the worlds and how one can effectively make use of data analytics to tackle the same. This book is written by Foster Provost and is definitely a must read for data science enthusiasts.
Machine Learning For Hackers

Machine Learning For Hackers

Written by Drew Conway and John Myles White, this book is extremely ideal for programmers from any background of data science, which includes business, government, academics and so on.
The Signal And the Noise

The Signal And the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail-But Some Don’t

This is a book that makes for a must read for anyone who is interested in the intricacies of predictive analytics and why it works the way it does. Authored by Nate Silver, who is also known as the best political forecaster of his time, this book goes on to highlight the major mistakes, in the process of predictive analysis.

Executive Workshop on Business Analysis

Business analysis provides a solid foundation for almost every type of change in an organization. Business analysts investigate the work of the business to locate both the problems to be corrected and recommend solutions to improve business processes. Business analysis is not a single competency, but rather a combination of modelling, systemic thinking, innovating, communicating, process analysis, persuasion and several other analytical skills.
Business Analysts are increasingly required to extend themselves beyond their traditional role of developing and maintaining IT systems. They need the capability to understand the business strategy, use proven techniques to analyse the business area, and identify changes to business processes needed to meet internal and external challenges.
Imarticus Learning is conducting an exclusive 2 day power workshop on Business Analysis on 7th and 8th December in Mumbai. This exclusive, 2-day workshop on Business Analysis is designed for the budding Business Analyst and offers an overview of key Business Analysis frameworks, tools and techniques along with industry best practices through a practical case study-based learning methodology. The program is endorsed by IIBA ensuring that the course material, teaching methodology and faculty have met the highest standards globally.
Learning Methodology
Our 2-day workshop offers comprehensive coverage of key Business Analysis topics such as Enterprise Management, Requirements Elicitation, Solution Design, Strategy Analysis and Stakeholder Management. You will gain exposure to various IIBA (International Institute of Business Analysis, Canada) recommended tools and techniques for effective and practical learning outcomes, along with faculty-driven industry best practices.
Being an IIBA endorsed training provider, Imarticus has successfully trained over 2000 candidates on Business Analysis. Come join us and experience the difference!


Written by Zenobia Sethna

Basics About Topic Modelling As A Data Analytics Technique

The Data Science industry has brought about various new avenues into the world of business and internet of things. Here, data analytics as a field, basically deals with extracting ‘information’ from all the obtained data. With rapid digitalization and increasing of the boundaries of the virtual world, the generation and availability of data is on an all-time high. While some of this data might be pre-processed and structured, most of it is just not structured at all. This causes a lot of difficulties when it comes to the part, where relevant and important information is required. That’s where the tools and technologies of the data analytics industry come into play. These are powerful methods, developed by technology and can be used for sifting through the volumes of data and sniffing out, exactly what a professional is looking for. One of the subsets of these technology is the field of text mining, which basically deals with the technique known as Topic Modelling.
This process mainly deals with, identifying topics present in a text object and deriving hidden patterns automatically, thus aiding in the betterment of decision making. This process differs from other run of the mill text mining approaches, which basically deal with regular search techniques or keywords searching techniques based on any random dictionary. A specific bunch of words that is supposed to be found and observed by a professional, is known as “topics”, which usually are present in large clusters of texts. Topic modelling is the unsupervised approach to performing the above mentioned action, with only the machine and no manual help.
Data Science CourseTopics in other words are, “a pattern of co-occuring terms in a corpus, which keeps repeating itself”. For instance

while building a topic model for healthcare, it should be devised in such a way that it results in words like, health, doctor, patient, hospital and other related words. These topic models are very useful when it comes to processes such as, document clustering, organizing large blocks of textual data, feature selection and retrieval of information from unstructured text and so on. What makes this technique so very important is that it can be used in almost any field from print media to marketing and still be relevant and product centric. For example, there are top gun newspaper publishing houses like, The New York Times, who have a team working on perfecting topic models so as to boost their article recommendations for users. There are a lot of advanced HR teams dabbling in this sector by trying to use it to match perfect candidates, with perfect job profiles
These text models are also used in various other applications such as organization of large datasets of emails, customer reviews and user social media profiles. These are some of the reasons why professionals specializing in this technique are gradually becoming sought after. As the demand of companies rises, the amount of people opting to get trained in these techniques also goes up. Imarticus Learning has various industry intensive course offerings for various data analytics tools like Python, which uses this topic modeling technique most extensively.