The need for a dashboard comes from the realisation that a small amount of information must be extracted from the abundance of data and variables available. Up until this point everyone is agreed. It’s later when things start to get complicated.
Increasingly in the minds of professionals, the dashboard is a method for obtaining an overview of their online activity. However, this is not what a dashboard is. A dashboard is the result of a thought process on a company’s digital strategy, allowing professionals to check that the results are in line with the strategy that has been put in place. If this is not the case then the dashboard is more likely to be a report, an assessment, an overview, a summary of a company’s online activity, but in any case it is not a dashboard. If, despite all this, you decide to rely on this type of reporting only, this is what you are risking.
Strategic blindness
Companies make strategic errors, some are aware of the errors they make, others aren’t or realise too late that they have made a mistake and the road to recovery is impossible.
The aim of a dashboard is to tell you if the digital strategy which has been decided upon is functioning or not, and to this end the dashboard is designed after and only after KPIs have been defined. Each goal corresponds to a variable. The presence of KPIs in your dashboard will link your dashboard to your strategy.
A report is unable to tell you if you are on the wrong path and may even result in error by displaying variables which do not evaluate the real performance of your digital devices.
What do the Top 10 keywords on search engines tell you? What do the top 5 page entries tell you? What information about your strategy can be drawn from this? Even though these analyses are interesting, I admit, they have, however, no reason for being in a dashboard.
The real dashboard incites questions and reassessment, and avoids catastrophes.
What makes a dashboard a dashboard is its close link with the company’s strategy.
The “everything is important” syndrome leads to indecision
The “everything is important” syndrome is a concept which is widespread throughout companies, sapping the energy and lowering the morale of the different teams as they are not able to do everything. Teams are required to give all they’ve got on the different projects they are working on at the same time, and in particular those with short deadlines. However, the time, competences and resources required are limited and as a result choices must be made.
What can we do whenever we don’t know what is important and what isn’t?
The dashboard establishes a hierarchy between the different variables and brings the strategy to life. It is not enough to just define the digital strategy. It needs to be shared, consulted and understood. If the dashboard does not organise the KPIs into a hierarchy, all of the variables will become important, creating confusion and leading to indecision.
If there is a large increase in the value of your site’s average shopping basket yet a rapid decrease in the conversion rate, what conclusions can be made? Does the evolution of one compensate for the evolution of the other? What should be done in this case? Do we continue to create customer loyalty and increase the value of the site’s average shopping basket or do we work on new customer acquisition by optimising the conversion rate? Which of the actions should be prioritised?
The real dashboard helps to set priorities, make choices and decide between two alternatives.
What makes a dashboard a dashboard is the hierarchy that exists between the different variables.
The excess of secondary tasks and the feeling of helplessness
The operational teams work on tasks by allocating more or less time and attention depending on the task at hand. There is the risk of losing the link that exists between the operational priorities and the company strategy in place, and as a result, the teams will work on tasks which have little impact on the company’s strategic results.
The dashboard displays the interrelations between the KPIs. If I want to make a specific operational KPI progress, I also contribute to making a specific strategic KPI progress.
If your site’s SEO traffic is rising, then the team responsible for SEO has achieved its goal. But what does this change? What impact does it have on the company’s financial performance? Why should we continue to focus efforts on SEO?
The dashboard will help your colleagues focus better on their efforts on a daily basis and better understand the strategic implications of their own marketing actions.
If the variables are presented with no link between them this will not allow a first level analysis should one of the variables underperform. If the figures are poor, the feeling of helplessness starts to take over people’s minds.
If the number of conversions for your site declines, do you know what to do? Which analyses would you carry out first? Do you know which operational teams you could call upon, and do you know in which direction to guide them?
The dashboard presents the different interactions between the KPIs. By displaying the KPIs which impact the strategic KPI close to the latter, decision-makers will be able to quickly identify poor performing KPIs and steer actions in the right direction.
What makes a dashboard a dashboard are the different interactions displayed between the variables.
This is our vision of what a dashboard should be.
Do you share our vision? If so, we can help you implement it. Please feel free to contact AT Insight for further information on the services that we provide on defining KPIs and designing dashboards for your Digital Strategy.
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