A basic guide to interactive dashboards for small business

Business intelligence aims to summarise financial data in visual and easy-to-understand ways so decision-making is easy – and problems can be spotted early.

This makes them a worthwhile addition to your small business financial management toolkit.

Once the preserve of large businesses, its functionality has filtered down to even the smallest business – and A Basic Guide to Interactive Dashboards for Small Business explains how you can benefit.

Most of us have created simple graphs in spreadsheet applications using the automated tools. This is a way of visualising data. If one bar in a graph is taller than another then clearly that value is higher. We can see that at a glance, rather than wading through tables of figures.

Business intelligence is like that spreadsheet graph – but on performance-enhancing medication.

With just a few clicks, you can transform your profit and loss ledger into a series of attractive tables, charts and standout figures, known as a dashboard. Your dashboards might show overheads, expenses, net profit percentage or more.

Should you want to drill down into the expenses, as one example, you can click the graph to see a listing complete with variance year-on-year.

Business intelligence is about providing insight into data in the quickest and most intuitive way possible, and giving you the freedom to creatively explore it. This means you can be more reactive and responsive on a daily basis.

Our guide offers advice on

• The competitive advantage business intelligence dashboards and reports offer even the smallest business owner.
• How business intelligence can directly improve your business decision making – including examples drawn from real-world businesses.
• The dashboards of small business accounting software to show how you can quickly and easily implement the tools within your business.

Excerpt from A Basic Guide to Interactive Dashboards for Small Business

For more insights into what you can learn from A Basic Guide to Interactive Dashboards for Small Business, here’s an excerpt from the guide.

Introduction

To be alive today is to generate data on a minute-by-minute basis. Instant messages from family and friends on our smartphones, financial transactions when we purchase a coffee – data paints an incredibly accurate picture of us whether we like it or not.

Businesses are no different and the rise of sophisticated cloud-enabled accounting software means there’s a constant flow of financial data within your business. Again, the data paints a picture that’s accurate – but also invaluable.

The data can provide insights that empower the right decisions for growth. Problems can be spotted before they even arise. For example, you’re able to keep tighter control over creditors, leading to shorter waits for payments – and therefore improved cash flow.

You can see which customers are providing most business, both right now and projecting in the future, and therefore focus on them.

Taking control of your data also means admin tasks take less time, meaning you can focus on what drives you and your passion within the business. Turning your business data into invaluable insights sounds difficult – but it isn’t.

There’s a whole area of technology called business intelligence dedicated to the task. Business intelligence means you can view reports and dashboards showing your live financial data in useful and visually appealing ways, such as in graphs and pie charts, or by picking out the most important headline figures.

The intention is to tell you everything you need to know with little more than a glance – and that might be all it takes to spot a problem or an opportunity.