Example – identifying frequently purchased groceries with association rules
As noted in this chapter's introduction, market basket analysis is used behind the scenes for the recommendation systems used in many brick-and-mortar and online retailers. The learned association rules indicate the combinations of items that are often purchased together. Knowledge of these patterns provides insight into new ways a grocery chain might optimize the inventory, advertise promotions, or organize the physical layout of the store. For instance, if shoppers frequently purchase coffee or orange juice with a breakfast pastry, it may be possible to increase profit by relocating pastries closer to coffee and juice.
In this tutorial, we will perform a market basket analysis of transactional data from a grocery store. However, the techniques could be applied to many different types of problems, from movie recommendations, to dating sites, to finding dangerous interactions among medications. In doing...
