Data Visualization : What It Is and Why It Matters

Data visualization is the process of translating data into a visual context, and it is one of the aspects of descriptive analysis. It is the process of visualizing our data using histograms, bar charts, pie charts, and box plots. It displays the information in a graphical or pictorial format. This method allows the user to comprehend the data and gain meaningful insights. The primary purpose of this procedure is to make it easier to spot patterns, trends, and outliers in the data.

One of the most critical processes is data visualization, which specifies that after the data has been collected, it should be processed, modeled, and then presented to conclude the data.

A Sankey Diagram is one of the most useful tools for visualizing data. It shows how information flows from one set of facts to the next. While there are a plethora of data visualization tools available, some are inaccurate and difficult to use. Sankey diagrams are a type of data visualization that is simple to use and allows you to quickly get insights into data.

 

What Is the Importance of Data Visualization?

 

By distributing data in the most effective way possible, visualization may assist you in any business or activity. In the business intelligence process data visualization is an essential phase because it takes raw data, refine it, and delivers it to conclude. Data scientists in advanced analytics are developing machine learning techniques to help organize crucial data into representations that are easier to grasp and interpret.

In data visualization, visual data is utilized for communicating information in a universal, quick, and effective way. This technique can assist businesses in determining which areas require development, what factors influence consumer satisfaction and dissatisfaction, and what to do about specific issues (where they should go and who they should be sold to). Stakeholders, business owners, and decision-makers can better anticipate sales volumes and future growth using graphical data.

Material flow, energy, supply chain management, marketing, and advertising are just a few of the applications for Sankey diagrams. We’ll learn how to visualize the customer journey using a Sankey chart in marketing and advertising.

Sankey diagrams are the quickest and most straightforward approach to gain insights into your customers’ journey since they enable you to examine data through segmentation. You can learn about the top-performing keywords and the sources of traffic.

Consider the following scenario: you wish to view a PPC statistic in three dimensions: match type, device type, and impressions. Take the left-hand match type, the right-hand device type, and the middle-hand impression share.

Reading the Sankey Diagram

A match will occur between a search query and the keywords in this Sankey diagram. If they match, your ad will receive an impression, followed by a device action. As a result, you can see that this graphic can be read both ways.

The impression share in Google Ads is expressed as a percentage. If the ratio of impressions is 70%, the ad campaign is missing out on 30% of the opportunity. This implies you’ll need to figure out how to take advantage of the 30% opportunities.

The total percentage of match types may be more significant than 100%. As a result, the % isn’t added to this graph. Why? Each of the percentages is based on a different set of numbers. Similarly, the device kinds’ percentages are unrelated.

Don’t Put Too Much Information on a Sankey Chart

In Google Ads or other PPC Ad campaigns, a Sankey diagram is a helpful tool for visualizing the consumer path. It is, nevertheless, suitable for limiting data analysis to a few brief sessions. Filling the chart with too much information will make it difficult to read or interpret.

As a result, it’s best to concentrate on only one Ad at a time. You’ll be in a far better position to figure out which keywords are bringing in the most traffic and where it’s coming from.

 

What Are the Benefits of Data Visualization?

 

Data visualization speeds up an organization’s decision-making procedure by providing lively visual representations of raw data. Businesses can now spot trends more rapidly since they may evaluate data in graphical or pictorial formats. Here are a few more specific instances of how data visualization may benefit a business:

• Relationship Correlations: Identifying the correlations without data visualization between the relationships of different variables is difficult and time consuming. If we can make sense of those independent variables, we can make better business judgments.
• The trend over time: While this may appear to be an apparent data visualization application, it is also helpful. Without the necessary knowledge from the past and today, making predictions is impossible. Trends over time show us where we’ve come from and where we might be headed in the future.
• Frequency is a concept: It is closely associated with long-term patterns. By examining how frequently and when potential new customers buy, we can better determine how they react to various marketing and client acquisition strategies.
• Examining the Market: Data visualization identifies which consumers to target and which to avoid using data from numerous marketplaces. We can better understand the possibilities of those markets by displaying the data on different charts and graphs.
• Analyzing value and risk measurements: It needs skill because we must assess complex spreadsheets and figures without data visualization. After the data has been visualized, we may pinpoint places that may or may not require action.
• Reacting to the Market: Instead of analyzing long spreadsheets the ability to obtain information quickly and easily, with data displayed clearly on an operational dashboard, allows firms to act and respond swiftly to findings, lowering the chance of errors.

 

Conclusion

 
The Sankey diagram is a handy data visualization that aids in the visualization and understanding of data. It is beneficial in the sales, material management, supply chain, and marketing industries. It’s great for illustrating a customer’s journey and demonstrating how different factors affect a PPC metric. The most admirable aspect is that a Sankey chart is simple to make. So, go to work on creating a Sankey diagram and evaluating data.