We use data visualization in our everyday lives all the time without realizing it. The menu board at McDonald’s featuring food photos… That’s visual data. Temperature gauge… That’s also a visual representation of complex data.
Today on the North American Association of Sales Engineers blog, we’ll dive into the basics of data visualization.
Data Visualization And Business
If you’ve never used data visualization in your business before, you should. There are many reasons why it makes sense. These include:
- Visual data makes it easier to understand and decipher complex information
- Having access to a snapshot of data helps you improve your decision-making skills so that you can grow faster
- It’s easier to share insight with your customers, employees, and shareholders
How Is Data Visualization Useful In Marketing?
From a marketing perspective, data visualization is valuable because it helps grab attention. This is crucial as the attention spans of adults continue to get shorter and shorter, and you only have about eight seconds before your customers are ready to look at something else. When you can compress information from videos, articles, and studies, you can showcase the most important data, which may then prompt your potential customer to dive deeper into a specific vein of data. Supermetrics notes that you can also use data visualization to help identify trends and to reinforce an opinion.
Common Data Visualization Tools
Fortunately, there are many data visualization tools that even beginners can use. These include:
- Banners. An online banner is used in marketing to capture attention. You don’t have to be a graphic designer to create a visually pleasing banner, and you can easily find a free banner maker online. Look for a platform that you can customize and download. Your template selection should be based on the type of data that you use, where you plan to advertise, and its size.
- Database visualization. While banners are relatively basic, database visualization (utilizing tools like Tableau) tends to be complex. Tableau is used by around 57,000 companies throughout the US, including Amazon. It utilizes big data, machine learning, and AI to provide an immersive data experience.
- Pie charts. Pie charts, like banners, scale information down quickly so that it is easily readable by people on all levels. You can use Microsoft Excel to create a simple pie chart, which you can then use to show things like comparisons, population, and time spent on certain tasks.
- Graphs. Graphs are just as common as pie charts, and, in fact, a pie chart is a type of graph. However, there are many other types of graphs, including histograms, line graphs, and scatterplots.
- Venn diagram. A Venn diagram is a way to visualize data that shows where it overlaps. Typically composed of two or three circles, Venn diagrams make it easy to show how different parts of your business are related.
- Kanban boards. Kanban boards are a type of visual workflow system that shows where your projects are, who’s working on them, and when you can expect them to be completed. This is one of the most popular digital project management tools, and it’s mostly utilized in the IT world. Kanban boards are also now popular for remote teams as they allow for online collaboration and project management from anywhere.
Data visualization does not have to be complicated. However, it can be used to showcase complex ideas to everyone in and out of your organization. By utilizing common data visualization tools, from banners to kanban boards, you can create more effective marketing plans, tighter project management, and a more efficient work environment. If you’ve yet to adopt data visualization in your organization, it’s never too late to start, and you’ll be glad you did.
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