Preparing for Excel Dashboard Demos

Introduction

Excel Dashboard Demos provide a great platform to showcase your work and skills. It is a unique opportunity to effectively communicate trends and dynamics within your organization. However, it is important to adequately prepare for Excel Dashboard Demo presentations. This guide is designed to provide an overview of how to do exactly that in order to make the most of this remarkable opportunity.

Purpose of Guide

This guide provides tips and essential steps needed to adequately prepare for Excel Dashboard Demo presentations. It is designed to ensure that presenters are well-prepared to display their work and demonstrate their knowledge of the dashboard.

Overview of How to Prepare for Excel Dashboard Demos

• Review the dashboard content
• Engage the audience
• Provide feedback
• Select the technology
• Review analytics tools
• Practice

Data Analysis

Preparing to demo an Excel dashboard involves collecting data on the desired outcomes and activities. The data collected needs to be organized and analyzed in order to enable the best presentation. This section outlines two steps in the data analysis process: establishing metrics and goals, and analyzing customer feedback.

Establish Metrics and Goals

Metrics and goals need to be established in order to create an effective Excel dashboard demo. This step contains two primary components. First, figuring out the desired outcomes and performance metrics for the project. For example, metrics may include things like the return on investment and customer satisfaction. Additionally, goals should be set in order to measure the success of the project. Goals need to have quantifiable and achievable results that can be tracked and measured against the metrics.

Analyze Customer Feedback

Analyzing customer feedback is an important component of any Excel dashboard demo. The customer feedback should be collected and organized into an easily digestible format. It should then be broken down into meaningful pieces of information that can be integrated into the presentation. Useful customer feedback may include comments on the usability of the project, the value of the project, and suggestions for improvement. The customer feedback should be used to demonstrate the impact of the Excel dashboard demo and show the success of the project.

• Establish metrics and goals
• Analyze customer feedback

Data Quality

When preparing for Excel Dashboard demonstrations, it is essential to ensure that the underlying data is of a high quality. As such, it is important to verify the accuracy and check that the data is up to date before embarking on any reporting or analysis using the data.

Verify Accuracy of Data

The first step in achieving data quality is confirming that the data is accurate. This could involve simply double checking the data yourself, or alternatively, can involve validation from other sources. For example, if there are customer orders within a data set, the customer service team might be able to confirm their accuracy for you.

Ensure Data is Up To Date

The second step for ensuring data quality is to ensure that data is up to date. Even if the data is accurate, a demo might not accurately reflect data from the current period.

One way of doing this is to keep track of when data was last updated and regularly re-collect any data that was not recently updated. This might be data such as financial results or customer order data. You can also set up automated collection systems if data needs to be updated on a regular basis.

Excel Skills

When learning how to prepare for dashboard demos in Excel, it is important to have certain skills in order to make your work sound. Doing the basics correctly and understanding the fundamentals of the software is incredibly important. Additionally, it is also important to know data visualization and charting.

Understand the basics of Excel

Learning the basics of Excel is key for any data analyst or professional looking to track and measure performance. Knowing how to use the fundamentals of Excel, such as basic mathematics, sorting, filtering, pivot tables, tables, and other tools can make any user sound. Knowing the basics will enable you to display the data accurately.

Have a firm grasp of data visualization and charting

In order to properly prepare for dashboard demos in Excel, it is important to have a firm grasp of data visualization and charting. Being able to create visuals that are easy to understand and communicate insights is key when preparing dashboard demos. Knowing how to transform data into visuals will enable you to make the most out of your demo.

• Understand the basics of Excel
• Have a firm grasp of data visualization and charting

Technology Tools

Giving a successful Dashboard Demo requires having the right technology in place. In addition, it is important to practice using the various software tools.

Have the Necessary Hardware

Before giving a successful Excel Dashboard Demo, it is important to make sure you have the necessary hardware. This would include a laptop with a minimum of 8 GB of RAM and an Intel i5 processor. A laptop stand and keyboard would also be necessary, as well as external monitors and a mouse.

Practice With the Available Software

In order to smoothly navigate through an Excel Dashboard Demo, it is important to practice with the various software tools. Aspects such as shortcut keys, Excel formulas and charts, ability to copy/paste, etc. should all be practiced beforehand. Additionally, it is strongly recommended to get familiar with the Excel dashboard and its navigation tools.

Familiarity with other software, such as Tableau, Power BI and Microsoft Dynamics, will also come in handy.

Demo Practice

In order to ensure success at a keynote presentation or demo, practice is essential. Demonstrators should perform test demos with friends or colleagues to practice the delivery and flow of the presentation. This helps to get a handle on the timing, flow and layout of the presentation. Practicing in front of an audience can help to calm nerves and adjust the run time of the presentation to ensure all aspects are completed in the necessary time.

Perform Test Demos

Performing several test demos is a great way to get a gauge on delivery, accuracy, and speed. Having an audience during the test demos can help the presenter identify confusing elements of the presentation and adjust the format to assure clarity. After the practice demos have been performed, the interest and attention of the audience can be noted in order to right adjustments to maintain interest and attract any wavering attention.

Use Feedback to Improve

Collecting feedback from those who view the test demos can give the presenters valuable insight into what works and what needs improvement. This can be done formally to those who participated in the practice demos, with written or verbal surveys. It can also be collected from those who are just observing the presentation in order to assess the overall delivery.

Participants should then use the feedback for modifications and improvements in the flow of the presentation as well as the quality and clarity of the message. Once all necessary adjustments have been made, the presenter can then be professionally prepared for their final delivery.

Conclusion

Delivering Excel Dashboard demos can be an effective way to present data, when done correctly. It showcases not just the technical prowess of the presenter, but also the expertise of the organization or company that used Excel to its full potential to create a highly functional and visually appealing dashboard.

In this guide, we have shared some of the best tips and techniques to plan and prepare for a successful Excel Dashboard demo. Specifically, we discussed how to:

• Select the right content and topics that showcase data insights.
• Choose the most appropriate charts, graphs and visuals to express the data insights.
• Create a timeline and checklist to ensure the delivery of the demo runs smoothly.
• Test the dashboard in advance of the demo to make sure everything works correctly.

We hope that these tips have been helpful to you in successfully delivering effective Excel Dashboard demos and inspiring data-driven decisions.