Databases!

This week I learned all about databases, and although they seem confusing to handle, they seem essential to understand when conducting a business for selling a new product. Databases manage vast amounts of information, perform quick queries, and make quick decisions about information. Databases are like the new and improved file cabinets for storing great amounts of informations, except they're so much quicker in retrieving information. The only problem with databases is the issue of data redundancy that could confuse your system.
For my earmuffs product, I would definitely use a database to store all of my customers' information, as well as any other business-related information that is important to my sales. I could have a database of my customers' orders, including billing information, sales, support and marketing.
In databases, you create tables to organize information, and each table can relate to other tables so that it's easier to retrieve information. For example, I could have a table with my customers' names and addresses and phone numbers which could connect to a table with their billing information and credit card numbers and orders of purchase. Each table needs a primary key, which is something unique within the table that allows it to relate to the other information in other tables that have to do with the same subject, or person. To relate the information between tables, you need a foreign key that connects a person's information, say, to more information in their "file" that could be found on another table.
I would definitely store all of my customers' information in a database so that if I ever needed to look up someone's address or billing info or phone number, it'd be easy to find, especially if someone has a problem with their product. This is a great way to keep track of all the assets in a business.