WHY VIZ?
Data visualization–done right–can be a powerful tool to enhance communication of your important findings. Why? Because the human brain processes visuals much faster than raw numbers, helping audiences understand key messages at a glance. Data visualizations can make it easier to spot patterns, trends and outliers that may be otherwise missed in the raw data.
Applying effective design principles can transform complex information into clear, meaningful visuals. With the use of color, bolding, and placement, you can draw attention to where you want viewers to focus. Rather than relying on long tables or dense text which can overwhelm audiences, data visualizations highlight what matters most and makes data more digestible and persuasive.
At its core, good data viz connects data to a purpose...to make findings accessible, actionable, and impactful.
USING THE SITE & TEMPLATES
SEARCHING
You can search for viz templates and examples in several different ways. You can scroll through the images on the home page and click on a viz to open individual pages. But if you aren’t sure of what you want, you can use the drop-down menus at the top of the page to search by:
CHART TYPE – The menu first searches by chart type clusters (e.g., lines, bars, etc.). This will take you to a landing page where you can narrow your selection to individual charts/elements.
FUNCTION – This menu allows you to search by what function the viz should perform (e.g., make comparisons, show trends, illustrate parts of a whole, etc.).
COMPLEXITY – Lastly, you can search for visualizations based on the level of complexity involved with adapting the chart to your own purposes. The levels are: simple, moderate, complex. But don’t let the word complex scare you! Even the more advanced templates come with guidance to make them accessible and easy to adapt for all skill levels.
VISUALIZATION TEMPLATES
Each visualization’s page includes:
● an image of the viz
● a description of what it can do
● a downloadable Excel or PowerPoint file of the template or example
● a list of what is included in the downloadable file (some have more than one viz or example)
● search tags that can help you find the viz
● (and coming soon) a how-to video that demonstrates how to use the template (or example) to create your own visual
WORKING WITH EXCEL TEMPLATES
How to adjust axis boundaries: A step-by-step tip sheet for correcting axis ranges so your data is fully visible and easy to read.
Working with Text: A practical guide to headlines, labels, text boxes, and alignment in Excel.
DATA VIZ BASICS
Data visualization is all about intention. It starts with knowing what particular data story you want to convey. Then it’s about applying a set of specific design principles to focus the eye on what you want to emphasize and minimize the rest. It’s about telling your audience what you want them to get about the data. It’s about clear and direct communication.
When creating your data visualization, apply these five key principles:
❶ Know your data story. Identify what is important enough to tell in your data.
❷ Choose the right format. Be sure the viz format supports the function of the data story.
❸ Focus the eye. Use size, color and bolding to get viewers to zero in on the storyline.
❹ Keep it simple. Strip out all unnecessary data ink that detracts from your intentional design.
❺ State your point. Label your visualization with a headline that communicates the takeaway message of the visual.
FOR MORE ON DATA VISUALIZATION PRINCIPLES
OTHER RESOURCES
HOW-TO-GUIDANCE
VIZ MAKEOVERS
VIZ COLLECTIONS
Data Is Beautiful (Reddit)
COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE
TOOLS
Free data viz generator used by a lot of journalists
TinEye Using a photograph to choose colors, and finding photos based on your color palette
Free images (great for slides)
More free vectors (I usually download as SVG, open in Illustrator and then recolor as needed)
Adobe Fonts (keep in mind that you’ll need to download to your machine so that it’s available outside of Adobe products)
Reverse-search fonts (found something you like and you wish you had the font they used?)
KICKING YOUR EXCEL SKILLS UP A NOTCH:
Intro to DA using Excel – it’s project based and jumps right in with pivot tables and VLookup.
A multi-course module for IBM called Excel Basics for Data Analysis. This is even more basic than the previous one, but covers some of the tabs in Excel that can be really helpful without getting overly complicated, like conditional formatting and the sort/filter function.
Business Analytics with Excel: Elementary to Advanced, and is even more in depth. Covers What-if, regressions, basically different ways to answer questions using your data set.