How to Effectively Visualize Your data with Microsoft Power BI

Data Science is rapidly changing the world of business as we know it. In this post, we will be talking about Microsoft Power BI and how you can visualize critical pieces of information within your Data using it. When you combine Big Data with Data visualization, you get a number of business insights. These insights have the power to change the face of any company, and exponentially increase revenues when adequately channelized.

In this post, we will cover everything about visualizing data with power BI starting from the basics.

The first step

With the free version and the Pro subscription model of Power BI, every business owner can now effectively use business Data to project future options. The first step of the process is to get your subscription and set up the software on your computer.

Of the two most popular versions of Power BI: Desktop and the other being Pro, desktop is better if your primary need is for developing reports as there are more options etc. but should you want to share these reports throughout Office 365 you’re going to need the Pro version. You can also integrate Power BI with Microsoft office tools for ease of use.

Sourcing your Data

You will have to source your Data before analyzing and preparing reports for it. Power BI can easily be integrated with most of Data sources including:

• Microsoft Excel
• Google Analytics
• Google Search Console
• SQL Database
• Live streaming Data
• Direct Webpages
• And many others

Sorting the Data sets

Next in line is sorting the Data sets. You can get Data from practically any source, and it is crucial to sort in a particular structure in order to analyze it effectively. Power BI is loaded with a lot of algorithms based on machine learning and is capable of analyzing trends in data sets and sorting them into sets. Some of the primary changes that should be done are –

• Devising numerical Data in specific rows
• Deleting non-relevant Data sets
• Creating automated Data sets and groups to analyze changes within the system

Starting out with basic Visualizations

Power Bi is full of powerful visualization options, and the scope to get insights is endless. In order to start analyzing your data, you can choose any of the options starting from the basics to the advanced visualization options including:

• Pie Charts
• Bar Graphs
• Maps
• All the way up to advanced visualization options including
• Waterfalls
• Funnels
• Gauges
• And many more

You can start quickly by dragging the right-side pane into the report canvas and begin making interactive reports of your Data.

Custom visuals, visual “gallery” and Developer tools

You can practically use any number of ways to customize your reports and Data. These features are beneficial for companies as every company has its unique and categorizing requirements in specific niches is complicated. According to our personal views, these three features give a lot of power in the hands of users –

• You can prepare your custom visuals and use them to prepare reports. These visuals can be custom coded and include any design or algorithm that you can think of.

• You can access the visuals gallery given by Microsoft. The visual gallery website, visuals.powerbi.com, is full of engaging and creative visuals, all of which can be uploaded to Power BI with a single click.

• Developer tools enable coders to code their algorithms and specific designs that will resonate with their Industry.

Building reports

With advanced algorithms backing Power BI, all you have to do is click on reports and create custom reports. For example, you can get geographical Data of sales of a company onto your Canvas. Clicking on map visualization, you will get your Data visualized in the form of maps and get a lot of options to simplify it further and get insights for business.

Sharing the Data

Power BI provides a lot of options for you to share the reports that you have generated. A lot of stakeholders are responsible for business decisions in a company. The reports generated by Power BI can be integrated within Office 365 and shared and viewed in all platforms including –

• Mobile
• Desktop
• Gateway
• And a few others

Creating Dashboards

After you have prepared the reports, you can bring all the reports on a single canvas and then create a dashboard that will help you process all the reports on a separate window. In this Dashboard, you can easily view, edit, compare, or process the reports in any form to get business insights and make changes.

Stay tuned for more such interesting and informative posts about Data Analysis and Science!

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Errin O’Connor

Founder at EPC Group

Errin O’Connor founded EPC Group over 23 years ago and is EPC Group’s Founder and Chief Technology Architect. Errin is the author of 4 Microsoft Press book and delivers world-class IT services leveraging his ability to provide scalable enterprise-level solutions.

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• How to Effectively Visualize Your data with Microsoft Power BI - July 8, 2020