Projects using business intelligence are not as straightforward as they might appear. Companies should think about how to start such projects by coordinating their corporate objectives with the project’s aims in a way that would enable them to make data-driven decisions later on. However, even after all these technical issues are resolved, businesses can have trouble comprehending their data. In the eyes of non-technical consumers, pure numbers could just be numbers, having no relation to other types of data. What about pictures of numbers? Could these charts and images make the data easier to understand? We have evidence to support our strong belief.
According to research in the field of neuroscience, the human brain is naturally wired to interpret and digest data presented in a visual format. And this is the main reason why business intelligence solutions combine data visualization tools. Companies should be thinking about more than just gathering the necessary business needs and specifying the precise KPIs to build a data model. Dashboard design is one more element to take into account. The problem with this is that it may put businesses in a position where they miss important outcomes and perhaps make data less comprehensible. By using data visualization technologies and design components that provide interactive dashboards, organizations can improve their understanding of the business.
Let’s first take a look at a well-designed dashboard before going through some general design guidelines for business intelligence systems that everyone should take into account. The following questions need to be answered in the affirmative:
Does it allow people to access complex data?
Organizations are able to reach audiences wherever they are because to omni-channel business strategies, which causes data storage to grow exponentially over time. The BI dashboard must convert complicated sheets and files into clear visual reports in order to utilise the data gathered from diverse sources.
Is everything user-friendly?
Concessions have no place when it comes to commercial prospects, which is why organizations need to grasp data, see the full picture, and connect it. Companies may easily accomplish it with the correct dashboard.
Does data visualization display accurate data?
Companies cannot make any mistakes in the business playground once again. This principle also holds true for dashboard layout. The dashboard should allow users to visualize and adequately depict portions of the data, which is the ideal case but is not utopian.
Can users get additional information?
To accomplish several specialized goals, a corporation can use a BI system. It follows that several departments will use it to streamline their processes. Users can create reports and access data in a more detailed view with the help of a well-designed dashboard, enabling them to respond to particular inquiries.
We can see that making an active dashboard necessitates paying close attention to several details. However, there are four fundamental ideas that businesses should take into account before beginning this difficult operation.
The Initial Solution
The most recent research indicates that it is getting difficult to maintain people’s attention in something for a longer period of time. Between 2000 and 2013, the average human attention span decreased from 12 to 8 seconds, and according to studies, it will soon be just approximately 5 seconds.
Companies should design dashboards that deliver essential information quickly. Enterprises should be aware that there is a visual layout issue if users seek for minutes in a panel but can’t find their answers. Although more thorough investigations can take longer, the most common metrics ought to be available right away.
This rule may seem irrelevant to The Funnel Companies, yet it is crucial to the creation of effective dashboards. We’ve heard of the ideas of showing information as a funnel or as an inverted pyramid in many different fields and industries. Both speak to the idea that documents ought to be broken down into three sections, each of which should contain a different kind of information: background information, context information, and in-depth information.
These ideas are used by BI experts to create visually appealing dashboards for users. In other words, the most important insights should always be displayed at the top of a BI dashboard, followed by information detailing the environment in which we may apply those insights, and finally, at the bottom, information that can be accessed by individuals.
Simplicity
Again, there are a lot of things we can learn from scientific research. The working memory of the human brain, according to experts, can only grasp seven elements at once (plus or minus two), turning dashboards with several graphics into a complete cluster.
Naturally, this is not what businesses want to achieve with their dashboards. The best solution is to incorporate five to nine different types of data visualization into a dashboard and provide customers with the choice to access more in-depth data in parts that are specifically tailored to their needs.
Tools for Data Visualization
Now that we are aware of how many visuals to include in a dashboard, how do we pick them? The sort of data visualization that can best fit the data will be determined by first knowing the type of data that will be transformed into visuals. Fortunately, businesses have a variety of options to select from. Here are just a few:
Graphs, including bar charts, bubble charts, histograms, area graphs, and more
Diagrams, include timelines, flow charts, tree diagrams, and illustrative diagrams.
Tables: timetable, heat map, calendar, and more.
Other examples include treemaps, word clouds, parallel sets, and donut charts.
Many businesses have the chance to visualize their data and make it understandable for varied users thanks to business intelligence dashboards. Businesses can ensure that pertinent information will be valuable for their future operations by using the aforementioned concepts. However, organizations need to have customized Business Intelligence systems in place in order to use the best practices we’ve looked at above. These technologies will enable businesses to develop interactive dashboards that will simplify complex data.
