Asking questions
Maps
Putting your numbers on a map, what your data needs to contain for it to work, and what a map answers that a chart cannot.
Some questions are about where. Which region is underperforming, where the late deliveries cluster, which cities have customers but no branch. A bar chart of the same numbers makes you translate names into places in your head. A map does it for you.
Getting a map
- 1Press Widgets beside the composer and choose Map.
- 2Ask a question with a place in it: sales per city, customers per governorate, deliveries by branch.
- 3The map is drawn with a pin for each place, and clicking a pin shows its name and value.
On the map
- Drag to pan and use the zoom controls, or scroll, to move around.
- Click any pin for the place name and the number behind it.
- Save keeps it on the Saved Maps page, from where it can be pinned to your dashboard.
- Open a saved map full screen from the Saved Maps page. It is worth doing, because a map in a chat column is small, and full screen is only offered once the map is saved.
Questions worth asking on a map
Where are our top customers, so we can plan a route rather than a spreadsheet of addresses. Which areas have deliveries running late this month. Where did we lose customers this year compared with last. Which branches sit closest together, which is often the first sign that two of them are competing for the same street.
A saved map stays current
Like charts and tables, a saved map remembers its question. Refreshing it re-runs the query, so a map of this month's late deliveries is about this month every time you open it.