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| How To Make Data Visualization More Effective |
For data to be really useful, it is important that they are easily understood. Data visualization has helped a lot of company owners to understand and make sense of information and numbers presented to them by their employees or consultants. By using the right software, employees and business owners themselves can detect and identify key trends, correlations, and patterns that they can use for the betterment of company processes and the company itself.
Data visualizations can come in the form of graphs and detailed infographics. For business owners to fully appreciate and make use of key data, it is important that these visualizations are created properly.
Since it is important to create effective data visualizations, you need to put some thought and effort into the whole process. Below are some helpful tips you can follow to ensure that you create data visualizations that are truly effective:
Select the right type of graphic or visualization to use.
To come up with effective visualizations, you have to pick the most appropriate graphic to display your data. Since the main objective of visualization is to express your data accurately and easily for readers to understand, utilizing the wrong method to express this information can confuse readers and there is a bigger chance that they will misinterpret your data.
To find out which graph or chart will be the most effective for your data, make sure you identify the purpose of your data and how you want the readers to interpret them. In general, bar graphs are used to compare data, line graphs to show statistics over time, pie charts to analyze portions of a whole, and infographics to express greater amounts of information.
Make sure you tell a story.
When creating data visualizations, you have to use facts and statistics to tell a story. These details can also be used to enhance and complement content instead of using them as filler. When coming up with a story, make sure you choose a compelling narrative and think about prospective reader or audience as well.
Correctly label your data.
To clearly describe your figures, statistics, and overall message, make sure you properly label your data visualizations. Provide as much information as you can so that the data is easy to understand. Use a title to explain what the readers will be interpreting, an axis on a chart or graph to show how the data is measured and headlines to help break up your data throughout the story and to make it more readable.
Lastly, keep it simple.
Oftentimes, people make the mistake of creating visualizations that are over-designed, over-complicated, and cluttered with too much data. Keep in mind that over-designed graphics can be an eye sore to readers and divert their attention to other things. As such, it pays to keep your visualizations as simple as possible.