What types of business dashboards should you consider?

The decision of what features their dashboards should include consumes a lot of time for firms thinking about implementing business intelligence dashboards. However, figuring out what kind of dashboard would suit your demands is an even better method to decide what functions to include.

Different BI Dashboards

Three major categories may be used to classify BI dashboards:

1. Strategic dashboards

They are often employed by the organization's top leaders. They provide a summary of the overall company performance. They provide information on key performance indicators (KPIs) that are crucial for gauging the success of the company. These dashboards provide executives a clear picture of the state of the business. They are more qualified to decide on the direction of the business and choose the most effective strategy for its development.

Let's examine this using five instances of strategic dashboards.

Strategic dashboard for management

One of the better examples of a strategic dashboard that might be exhibited during a board meeting is the management dashboard shown below. It offers a coherent data narrative rapidly without being crowded. The dashboard emphasizes revenue overall, revenue at the customer level, and client acquisition costs. Client acquisition costs, customer lifetime value, and sales objective are among the major KPIs that are included in the dashboard, which is time-bound.

#1 Ranking: Read how InetSoft was rated #1 for user adoption in G2's user survey-based index Read More

Strategic dashboard for CMOs

The marketing division has another example. Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) sometimes lack the time to monitor statistics like traffic or CTR for specific campaigns. But in order to get the finest marketing outcomes a company can have and, therefore, make a profit, they do need to take a deeper look at a more strategic level of marketing activities and even work in tandem with sales. This marketing dashboard presents these crucial strategic KPIs in a simple, clear, and useful manner.

Management dashboard for SaaS developers

Our next example is a management dashboard that concentrates on the executive level of a SaaS company. The three key components of every Software as a Service company—customers, revenue, and costs—are summarized here for management. You may gain a bird's eye perspective of pertinent metrics from past, present, and future performance by regularly monitoring these measures throughout time. This will help you improve procedures and make sure your organization is successful in the long run.

Strategic planning with a CFO dashboard

Chief financial officers are responsible for keeping a company's strategy on track, regularly monitoring financial performance, and responding when strategic goals and objectives are not being met. But not just that, non-direct elements like employee and customer happiness can have an impact on a company's profits. For instance, if staff members are not happy with their workplace, they may call in sick or quit the organization, which may result in financial difficulties. But let's focus on the specific kind of dashboards that CFOs want for their strategies.

KPI dashboard for sales

A potent sales BI tool is the subject of our next strategic dashboard template. The Sales KPI dashboard is focused on high-level sales KPIs that managers and c-level executives must carefully monitor to make sure objectives are being accomplished. The Sales KPI dashboard is focused on high-level sales KPIs that managers and c-level executives must carefully monitor to make sure objectives are being accomplished.

view gallery
View live interactive examples in InetSoft's dashboard and visualization gallery.

2. Dashboards for analytics

These highlight recurring patterns and trends in daily activity. These dashboards provide current data on certain activity. They are helpful for contrasting present-day data with earlier patterns. These dashboards are helpful for assessing certain operations, coming up with plans to increase efficiency, or figuring out what needs to change. These dashboards may be utilized by departments or even by people engaged in certain business activity.

The analytical dashboard may be located where the operational and strategic dashboards meet. They are made up of many modules that, when utilized properly, may improve a company's performance.

Dashboard for financial performance

Decision-makers may evaluate how effectively the company's money is being utilized by analyzing the financial dashboard that is performance-focused. They can also define a particular operational job to better frame future choices.

Dashboard for procurement costs

Another cost-focused dashboard, although this one was designed exclusively for the procurement division. As we all know, procurement serves as a function in most businesses that links them with their suppliers, contractors, freelancers, agencies, etc. Not only manufacturing-related sectors, but service-oriented ones as well, need it.

Patient-facing healthcare analytics dashboard

The healthcare sector is the focus of our next analytical dashboard template, which tracks all metrics relating to how happy patients are with your institution and the services it offers. This dashboard will assist you in evaluating your interaction with patients and making sure they are receiving all of the care they need by covering topics including personnel, treatment, waiting times, and safety.

KPI dashboard for retail analysis

Another example of an analytical dashboard comes from the retail sector. Given that the supply chain may have an immediate impact on customer satisfaction, it draws an analytical comparison between management and both. This thorough dashboard provides an overview of key elements of a retail firm, allowing analysts to spot patterns and provide management with the assistance they need for business operations.

why select InetSoft
“Flexible product with great training and support. The product has been very useful for quickly creating dashboards and data views. Support and training has always been available to us and quick to respond.
- George R, Information Technology Specialist at Sonepar USA

3. Dashboards for operations

These resemble analytical dashboards very substantially. On a daily basis, they provide information on the company's operations. These dashboards, however, don't elaborate on certain operations. They only provide a broad picture of the company's operational activity patterns. These dashboards, for instance, may be used to evaluate the effectiveness of several departments. They may also provide department bosses a summary of how well certain procedures are doing. They won't, however, disclose any specifics about actions. And now we'll concentrate on a dashboard example for operations that is also used for marketing.

Operational dashboards for marketing

One of our best operational dashboard examples is the dashboard for marketing performance shown above. It displays the results of three campaigns over a 12-week period. It gives the marketing team crucial operational data and key performance indicators on cost per acquisition, overall click volume, overall acquisition volume, and overall campaign spending volume.

Dashboards for manufacturing production

An operational dashboard may be an ideal tool for tracking production, as we have already discussed. Let's look at our manufacturing dashboard example to put this in context. This visual aid provides a thorough picture of all production-related factors, including volume, amount ordered, returned goods, and machine performance.

Logistics pick-and-pack operational dashboard

The logistics dashboard in our following example monitors every step of the order processing process. The act of finding an item from an order in the warehouse and placing it in a box or other sort of packing so it can be dispatched to the client is better known as pick and pack. By carefully monitoring these data, organizations may streamline crucial procedures, save expenses, and maintain a high level of service.

Dashboards for operational indicators in customer service

Customer service is the subject of one of our upcoming operational dashboard examples. The team is able to manage its operations much more effectively by having all the crucial KPIs for customer service on a single screen.

It's significant to remember that your company may modify your dashboard to meet your particular requirements. In reality, many firms have many dashboard types to accommodate the requirements of various organizational tasks. The most crucial characteristics your dashboard will need may be determined with the aid of the different sorts of dashboards you want to have.

Learn about the top 10 features of embedded business intelligence.