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Using KPI dashboards is the best way to keep track of your company’s performance.
It gives you a clear picture (quite literally) of where your business stands and what you need to tweak to make things run smoothly.
In this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about KPI dashboards – different types of dashboards, their importance, how to build one, common mistakes, and best practices, and include examples that you can use right away.
A KPI Dashboard is a visual tool that displays your key performance indicators in real-time to help you track and analyze performance across different departments.
From sales performances and customer satisfaction to financial health and marketing efficiency, a KPI dashboard consolidates these metrics into a single, easy-to-read interface.
KPIs give you measurable targets that show you whether your business is going in the right direction, or if it’s time to adjust your strategies.
And KPI dashboards provide a visual overview of these key indicators in real-time, making it easy for teams to see how they’re doing, track progress, and make better decisions. With it, you can see how the smaller goals feed into the bigger ones.
To make better use of your KPIs, it’s important to understand their relationship with dashboards.
Let’s check it out below.
You can use different dashboards to focus on specific areas like sales, marketing, and finance, each featuring its own set of relevant KPIs.
For example, with a KPI dashboard for finance, you track metrics like cash flow, profit margins, and revenue.
With a KPI dashboard for sales, you track conversion rates, lead generation, and sales growth. Marketing dashboards focus on website traffic, customer acquisition cost, and ROI on campaigns.
A dashboard is where all your tracked KPIs come together to give you a comprehensive view of your business performance.
With all these key metrics in one place, dashboards transform raw data into actionable insights.
Dashboards allow you to visualize your KPIs in different forms – primarily graphs, charts, and tables.
Many dashboards also support meters and similar interactive elements that show you how close you are to hitting your targets.
These visual elements make it easy to process complex data at a glance. And when your dashboard KPIs are presented in a visually engaging way, it’s easier for you to monitor and analyze performance.
Combining KPIs with dashboards offers these key advantages:
Building a dashboard from scratch can be a tedious process, especially if you haven’t done it before.
Luckily, there’s an easier way to do it – with ready-to-use templates and examples in Databox.
Below, we’ll cover some of our most popular KPI dashboard examples that our clients use:
Sales KPI Dashboards are designed to give you a comprehensive view of your sales team’s performance, sales funnel efficiency, sales event success, and much more.
From sales managers to account executives, a sales dashboard can be useful for just about anyone on your team.
You can use it to easily track the performance of your sales reps, whether team members are hitting goals, how many new deals you have in the pipeline, how many new leads you’re contacting each month, and more.
For example, here’s a HubSpot Sales Activity Dashboard from our library.
With this dashboard, you can keep a close eye on every stage of your sales process and see where potential leaks are.
You get a holistic snapshot that shows the detailed activities of each individual sales rep on your team.
Marketing KPI Dashboards provide a unified view of your marketing performance, allowing you to analyze and optimize every aspect of your campaigns.
Whether it’s PPC, SEO, email marketing, content marketing, or any other channel – you can find a suitable marketing dashboard in our library.
Instead of scrapping different tools to get your data in order, you can quickly compile all key KPIs in one place.
For example, if you run ads on both Facebook and Google, but struggle to keep up with real-time data, here’s a Facebook Ads and Google Ads Paid Marketing Overview Dashboard you can use for free.
With this at-glance view of your performance, you can track things like:
And this is just scratching the surface.
Finance KPI Dashboards help you monitor and manage your company’s financial health by displaying all the relevant information in one place.
You can get insights into the most important metrics, including cash flow, bank accounts, invoices, and expenses, from all the most popular tools like Stripe, Xero, and QuickBooks.
One popular example is the Xero Overview Dashboard.
This Xero dashboard helps you track everything from monthly income and expenses to cash transactions that happened in a particular period.
Instead of navigating Xero’s hard-to-read reports in the user interface, you now have an easier way to bring it all together.
Are you struggling to keep up with your most important SaaS metrics like MRR, churn rate, CLV, and similar ones?
It sounds like you might need a SaaS KPI Dashboard to simplify things.
One particularly popular example from our library is the Stripe MRR and Subscription Overview Dashboard.
Here are just some of the things you can track with this template:
And more!
Ecommerce KPI Dashboards compile a set of KPIs that you can use to identify trends and anomalies, and get actionable insights regarding your online store.
With this dashboard, store owners and managers have an easier way to stay up-to-date on all the important metrics – from transactions and conversions to generated revenue and average order value.
One study found that, by adopting a retail analytics dashboard, more than 1,000 ecommerce websites have seen a 13–20% increase in average weekly revenues post-adoption.
For example, you can download our free Shopify Store Overview Dashboard to track these KPIs from a single interface.
This dashboard gives you an overview of:
More insights are available once you download the dashboard and connect your most relevant metrics.
Looking for an actionable step-by-step guide you can follow to build your first KPI dashboard?
Let’s check it out:
Here’s how to make a KPI dashboard in Excel:
And here’s a video instruction on how to build a KPI dashboard in Excel:
Now you might be wondering – isn’t there an easier way to build a dashboard?
Of course there is – with Databox.
Here’s how to make a KPI dashboard in Databox in just a few simple steps:
First, you’ll need to create a free Databox account – the process takes just a few minutes.
Then, you can log into your new account and go to the ‘Databoards’ section, where you’ll click on ‘New Databoard’.
There are two options here – ‘Use Wizard’ and ‘Start Blank’.
If you go with the Wizard, you’ll be taken to a page where you can simply connect your data source and the metrics will show up on the Databoard.
If you click on ‘Start Blank’, you’ll be taken to a ‘Designer’ page where you can build a KPI dashboard from scratch.
The next step is to choose the metrics you want to add.
Databox’s metric library includes 3,000+ pre-built Datablocks and each one is a mixture of metrics and visualization formats, based on the most popular and commonly-used use cases.
To get started, click on ‘Metric Library’ in the left corner of the menu.
In the drop-down list that appears, you can choose which data source you want to connect – this can be anything from Google Analytics to accounting software like QuickBooks.
You can also use the search bar if you’re looking for specific metrics to add.
Once you find a suitable Datablock, you can use the drag-and-drop functionality to add it to your Databoard.
With the ‘Datablock Editor’, you can customize your Datablock further and add new elements.
Each metric you add will show up in the ‘My Metrics’ section, and you can use it to organize your dashboard more clearly.
Click on ‘Visualization Types’ on the left side of the Designer menu and pick which visualization you want to add and customize.
Use the drag-and-drop functionality to get it onto the Databoard, and you’ll see a blank Datablock appear automatically.
When building a KPI dashboard, there are also certain pitfalls you’ll want to watch out for:
While it might seem like a good idea to show all the information at once, it can actually make things confusing and overwhelming for users. When the dashboard is too cluttered, it’s hard to focus on what’s really important.
Keep it simple by choosing only the most relevant KPIs so everything stays clear and remember that sometimes less is more. Ideally, you should be aiming for 5-8 KPIs per dashboard.
KPIs and dashboards are designed to serve the needs of their users, so ignoring their input can cause a variety of issues. Regularly asking for and using user feedback makes sure the dashboard stays useful.
Ideally, you’ll want to get feedback on the type of KPIs you’re tracking, visualization formats, and general ease of use.
KPIs need to be connected to your main objectives to make sure you’re heading in the right direction. If they’re not aligned, you can end up wasting time and resources on things that don’t matter.
Without context, KPIs are just numbers. They don’t tell the full story of what’s happening in the business. And without knowing the backstory, users base their decisions on incomplete information.
Contextual data, such as historical trends, industry benchmarks, and specific targets, help interpret KPIs accurately.
Not all metrics are equally important, and prioritizing non-critical KPIs can divert attention from the key indicators that truly drive performance.
For instance, focusing on vanity metrics like social media likes, instead of revenue-related KPIs, can mislead the team about the actual business health.
Being motivated is one thing, but setting targets that are too ambitious is another.
When your KPIs are unrealistic, it can demotivate your team and lead to burnout. It’s important to set targets that are challenging but still doable. This way, your team stays motivated and can actually achieve the goals.
If you’re not acting on the information you get from KPI insights, then what’s the point of tracking them in the first place?
Make it a habit to review your KPI data regularly and turn those insights into real actions. This way, you can keep improving your strategies, solve problems early, and make the most of opportunities to get better.
There’s no one-size-fits-all approach to building a KPI dashboard – but there are certain best practices that you should keep in mind.
Here are some useful tips on how to make the most out of KPIs:
Clear goals give everyone a sense of direction and help ensure everyone knows what the KPIs are aiming to achieve.
When you know exactly what your objectives are, it’s easier to pick the right KPIs that match your business priorities. This not only helps in tracking performance better but also keeps everyone on the same page and more involved.
When looking at a dashboard, users don’t want to be overwhelmed by unnecessary details. They want to process what they’re seeing quickly and easily. Tich is why a clean design is the way to go.
Focus on important, relevant metrics and use intuitive visuals that display your KPIs in the clearest way possible.
Accurate and reliable data forms the backbone of meaningful KPI analysis.
To achieve this, businesses should implement robust data collection methods, regular data audits, and validation processes.
Consistent data quality means you can trust the insights you get from your KPIs, reducing the chance of bad decisions based on wrong information.
You need to make sure the data remains current and relevant for decision-making. With regular updates, you can track real-time performance, address issues that arise, and spot new trends.
Connect the dashboard with the tools your team already uses. This way, you get quick access to key metrics without having to switch platforms.
The integration also helps with easy data sharing, teamwork, and real-time updates, so your team can keep an eye on KPIs and make decisions based on up-to-date info.
This is important because everyone involved needs to interpret the data accurately and use it to make proper decisions. Your team and clients need to fully understand the meaning of each KPI.
Training them also creates a shared understanding of your goals, and promotes better communication and collaboration.
You want your dashboard to be focused on the most important data. So make sure you refine it over time – eliminate outdated metrics, choose new KPIs, and adjust visualizations.
Do you want to have a clear, real-time view of your business’s performance at your fingertips? Well, this is the power of KPI dashboards.
From getting actionable insights you need to make better decisions to using real-time data to optimize performance, it’s hard to run any modern organization without a KPI dashboard nowadays.
And while getting started is never easy, Databox makes the process much smoother (even if you’ve never built a single dashboard in your life).
With 100+ free dashboard examples and templates, you can have one ready for your next stakeholder meeting in just a few minutes.
No need to spend hours compiling data from several spreadsheets, and then spending even more time connecting it.
A dashboard should typically have 5-8 KPIs for maximum clarity and focus. With this approach, you avoid information overload but still provide essential insights.
The most important KPIs to track depend on your specific goals and area of focus – such as sales, marketing, finance, or customer service.
For example, key KPIs for marketing could include conversion rate, customer acquisition cost (CAC), return on investment (ROI), lead generation, and customer lifetime value (CLV).
KPIs should be updated regularly, ideally in real-time or at least on a weekly basis. This is to ensure that the data reflects current performance and that you can make timely decisions.
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