Visual communication of data is the art of extracting useful, effective, and efficient information by graphically representing raw data. It is not only limited to the graphical representation only. Any form of data visualization like graphs, charts, colorful patterns, pie, bar, maps, treemapping, histograms, line bars, columns, and X – Y scattering of data can be referred to as visualization of data in a useful way for communication of meaningful information. Simply, there are so many categories of visual communications including motion graphics, infographics, and other interactive forms of content.
Regardless of the fact, which data visualization technique is being used, there are some common attributes of all the visualization techniques communicating the same purposes. The following elements are essentials of all the forms of data visualization which include interactivity, meaning, usefulness, illustration, and most importantly effective visualization of data in any form which gives meaning to the raw data. In today’s digital era, a staggering amount of available data can be easily found when it comes to the collection of data. But such a big amount of data may not come out to be useful especially for an average business having nothing to do with it. There is a need of paying extra heed to such a big volume of data to extract insightful information out of it which can be beneficial for your business. Otherwise, the wrong manipulation of data may also cause big losses instead of generating revenues. That is why it is highly necessary to manage data effectively otherwise, there is no way to get insights out of it. It is useful only if we manage it effectively.
Now, there comes a question, which visual communication form can be most appropriate for better management of data? Although it’s an important question, it solely depends upon the goals of your company. It is important to take into account the goals of your campaign which you want to achieve at the end. Furthermore, it also depends on the type of audience which you are targeting. Taking into view, both your personal or business goals and your targeted audience, you can be in a better position to decide the way which more appropriately and effectively visualizes your communicating data. Different websites, social media posts, TV shows, official presentations, study books, conferences, weather forecasting, and so much more use the art of visual communication of data for a better understanding of the audience. That is why it is highly important to consider new ways of data visualization.
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Digital Marketing Dashboards
Effective visual communication of data by developing digital marketing dashboards has become a great way to provide in-depth analysis of any business organization. A dashboard is simply a visual display consisting of a single screen displaying single or multiple key insights for the achievement of any business objective. Such dashboards are very user-friendly and easy to interact with. Key parameters showing business performance can be easily managed to display on the dashboard to keep a quick look at overall business activities. Along with the display of the data, dashboards are also helping decision-makers to take actionable measures based on the intuitive display of insightful facts and figures in a highly effective and efficient manner. While digital marketing dashboards are very effective in their consolidation of data for comprehensive analysis of business analytics. These digital marketing dashboards are explicitly designed for monitoring key indicators of performance having an impact on overall business activities. Capturing insightful indicators drives measurable actions to keep the business running smoothly.
Types of Digital Dashboards
Three types of digital dashboards are mentioned below:
Analytical Dashboards are subjected to monitor the health of an organization. This type of dashboards is also helpful to extract useful information related to business improvements and opportunities for expansion.
Strategic Dashboards help understand different trends and comparison of data concerning multiple variables having a key impact on business strategies. For example, comparing data against different values of the time. In this case, it has been used as a secondary variable to compare data on the time axis. It also supports different types of interactions with data.
Operational Dashboard monitors real-time activities of business organizations. In case of any deviation from normal business operations, it generates alerts. It also includes in its operations, key performance insights. This is how the operational dashboard visually communicates.
Driving elements for a Perfect Digital Dashboard
These are some orderly arranged driving elements for designing a perfect digital dashboard.
Defining the objective for designing of digital dashboard
Choosing the right metrics most appropriate with a defined objective
Analyzing the data
Visualization of the raw data
Comprehensive testing, evaluation, and fine-tuning of the system.
Furthermore, to deliver context, the dashboard should have leverage targets, competitive intelligence, and benchmarks also. It is also very necessary to take into consideration your target audience while designing the dashboard. It is important to consider their interaction with the dashboard that how they will interact with it and how it will respond in return. While displaying Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) on the dashboard, must cover end-to-end procurement, outcomes, and behaviors. Many of the designers make the fundamental mistake of cluttering the dashboard with a bunch of metrics. There is no need to do so. Select the most important metrics which you want to get displayed on the dashboard. It is also a good practice to display recommendations with numbers and figures on the dashboard. It will enhance the overall business impact.
Guidelines for Designing Digital Dashboards with effective Visual Communication of Data
These are some important suggestions to make an effective dashboard with efficient visual communication capabilities:
The designed dashboard should be an actionable screen. Otherwise, it will just be a report without any insightful actions to perform on it.
All the content implied for the development of the dashboard should be relevant to the business goals and must be aligned up with our previously defined business objectives.
It should be fully relevant to the users and targeted audience who ought to interact with the dashboard. So that it would be easy to use and easy to understand for anyone in the organization who comes into interacting with it.
It should also be automated in a way to update all the data at regular intervals without any interference from any outside node. Most effective dashboards do not require any external input from the user to update displaying data. Moreover, most recent data must also be updated regularly to accompany relevant actionable insights.
It should increase the visibility of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) of the business.
It must also be simple enough for easy understanding and interpreting its alignment with the organization’s strategical goals.
It must also be a driving component of the decision-making process and should be capable enough to extract insights from the performance parameters and give suggestions to take actionable measures, hence removing the overall noise component.
Key Outcomes from the Dashboard
This is how we can develop and design a digital dashboard for effective visual communication of data. Some of the expected outcomes of such a system are mentioned below:
Increased Visibility into the business
Higher Scope of Optimization
Hence, increased profit from business activities