From data to insight: 5 rules for clear dashboards
Introduction
Companies, teams, and individuals collect large amounts of data every day. However, the real value of this information lies in its understanding, interpretation, and use of it. This is the point where the dashboards come into play. In Salesforce, dashboards serve as a tool that visually tells you a story based on your data, a tool that transforms your data into meaningful insights. If the dashboards are designed correctly, they help in decision-making, make understanding data easier, improve performance tracking, and bring clarity to your processes.
But some dashboards can confuse you, load you with unnecessary information, and take up extra time for analysis. And to prevent this from happening, in this article we will look at 5 principles that will help you avoid mistakes when preparing dashboards, and make your dashboards immediately understandable and impactful.
1. Define a Clear Purpose for Every Dashboard
The very first thing you should do before you even start creating and filling a dashboard is to ask yourself the question: "What is the purpose of creating this dashboard?"
Is it needed to track sales performance? Does the support team need a dashboard to track the resolution of support cases? To manage marketing KPIs?
By answering this question, as a result, you will be able to clearly tell who will be the user of this dashboard, from the whole variety of components provided by Salesforce which of them will really be needed to be displayed on the dashboard and will solve the users issues, and which will be unnecessary information and will only distract the attention of users of this dashboard. Without a clearly defined goal, the dashboard risks becoming cluttered with unnecessary information, instead of helping in decision-making.
The key steps:
1) Identify your target audience (for example, sales representatives, sales executives, support team and so on)
2) Identify the most important 3-5 questions that your dashboard should answer.
3) Decide which component of the dashboard is the most suitable for each of these issues.
Tips:
- Ask a potential user of the dashboard what information it is important for them to see there, what they need for their daily work.
- Use folders for the dashboards, and coordinate and adhere to a single naming style for the dashboards so that its meaning is easily understood from the name.
2. Use Visual Hierarchy to Guide Attention
Remember what the layout of a newspaper or a well-designed website looks like, you always immediately understand what it's about, and quickly retrieve all the information. In the same way, dashboards should naturally draw the user's gaze first to the most important information. This is where the use of visual hierarchy becomes important.
Tips:
- Place the most important metrics at the top of the dashboard, or on the top-left.
- Use large components for the most important information, and smaller components for secondary, auxiliary information.
- Stick to using the same color solutions for the same data types. For example, use a light gray color for forecasts, and a blue color for actuals.
- Group components with similar data in sections with headers and spaces.
3. Choose the Right Visuals for the Right Data
One of the common mistakes when preparing a dashboard is choosing the inappropriate chart type for your data. Let's figure out which charts should be used for which types of data so that it looks clear and correct.
- Bar/Column Charts: are great for comparing different categories, such as sales by different regions or which products received the most support requests.
- Line Charts: are suitable for comparing trends over time, for example, how many leads were created each week or month.
- Donut/Pie Charts: is ideal for demonstrating the relationship of parts to the whole. For example, the age categories of the total number of employees, employees aged 30-40 years make up 34% of employees or 1030 people, employees aged 40-50 years make up 40% of employees or 1212 people.
- Tables: is the best option if you need to provide a detailed view.
- Gauge Charts: is suitable for showing progress towards a goal.
4. Limit Clutter and Focus on What Matters
As mentioned earlier, clutter is the enemy of clarity. If the dashboards are overloaded with components, charts, filters, and texts, they become difficult to read and extract valuable information. And as a result, a lot of information just starts to be ignored. To prevent this, our goal is not to try to fit everything that is possible on one dashboard, but to display what is crucial.
Tips:
- Add no more than 5-8 components per dashboard.
- Avoid unnecessary decorative elements.
- Use short, clear and understandable labels and titles.
- Add gaps to improve the readability of information.
5. Make It Actionable
The dashboard is not just a report, it is a tool to help in making decisions. A well-designed board highlights not only "what", but also "what's next".
To make the board encouraging, highlight anomalies or trends using conditional formatting, use color coding, for example, red - if the indicator is below the norm and green - if it is within the norm; add filters for interaction and exploration; add links and buttons for users so that they can, if necessary, delve into the details or take action.
For example, instead of just prioritizing open cases, add the ability for users to delve into high-priority cases and assign them directly from the board.
Pay attention to the following most common mistakes when creating dashboards and do not repeat them:
- too many components,
- incorrect choice of chart type,
- lack of consultation/consistency with the end user when preparing the dashboard,
- static filters.
Focus on relevance, clarity and flexibility.
Conclusion
A well-designed dashboard doesn't just display data, it conveys the most important information, helps with making important decisions and saves you time. By applying these five rules listed above, you will be able to transform even the most difficult-to-perceive information into something immediately easy to understand. Remember that the best board is not the one that contains the most information, but the one that gives the information meaning. Use these principles when creating dashboards for yourself, for your team, to create boards that will really have an impact.
