Once you have successfully collected a wide range of data and combined all your datasets from a range of assets, you will now want to use your findings to propel your business and shout about the things you’ve achieved. This final stage of a data strategy is incredibly important, and it is important to choose the best methods to visualise your data to appeal to your target audience.
There are a wide variety of reporting techniques you may apply, whether the reports are for internal use only, to help with organisational development, or externally for stakeholders, audience members or potential new clients. There are many data visualisation software tools available online that can help you turn your datasets into clear graphs that are appealing to the right group of people.
Seeing large datasets sat in spreadsheets can be incredibly overwhelming and it takes time to understand the data in this way. This is why data visualisation tools are popular to be able to visualise the information being told. It can be a quick way to tell your data story, and for internal and external clients to understand your business concepts. Understanding data in this clear format is not only beneficial to help people understand the positive outcomes of your data collection, but equally as important understand any problems that need urgent attention.
Depending on the size and capacity of your organisation, you may have dedicated employees with specific skills suited to understand the complexities of complex data visualisation systems. If this is not the case then websites such as www.outliertechnology.com can provide you with all the support you need to get the best results.
There are a wide range of tools available, depending on your skill level. For example, it may be that your data has been collected through only one data source and sits comfortably in a simple Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. If this is the case then there are tools built into Microsoft Excel that allow you to create graphs, tables, maps, pivot charts and sparklines. So long as the data is in the correct format before you start, these can be very user-friendly ways of creating simple visualisations of your findings. These basic graphs may be fine for internal reporting, however you may want to consider visualisation software that can produce more interesting visuals to show off your findings to external clients or stakeholders.
For more advanced users, or if you are collecting data from multiple sources, you may want to explore more options that can be found online. For example there are sites such as Microsoft PowerBI and Tableau that have free to use basic versions. These sites aggregate data from multiple sources, updates the user platform and creates graphs for you using real-time data. There are also options to share your dashboards for collaboration with other team members, which can be useful for larger or remote-working organisations.
For extremely tech-savvy organisations there is a whole world of data visualisation tools using vector-based or Javascript that you will be able to use, such as Tangle and Processing. These will need more than just a basic understanding of the software to use however, so understand this and prepare appropriately before you start.
The most important thing to remember with all of these packages available are that the final visualisations meet the high standard of your organisation, and can clearly communicate the messages you want to celebrate to team members, stakeholders and clients.
