Understanding Google Data Studio Simplified

Data-driven decision-making has the capacity to bring powerful change. But to bring out that effective change, you need robust visualization tools and analytics software that can help you derive valuable insights from data. Because data in its raw form has noise and you can’t extract results without filtering the data. The business data shows billions or even trillions of stories, and it is your job to extract only meaningful stories from those piles. 

Without a systematic way to start and keep data clean, bad data will happen.

– Donato Diorio

That’s why business organizations need promising Data Analysis and Business Intelligence tools like Google Data Studio to keep the data clean and unique. In this article, you will get an understanding of Google Data Studio, its powerful features, and the procedure to create valuable reports. 

Table of Contents

• What is Google Data Studio?
• What are the Key Features of Google Data Studio?
• What are the Advantages of using Google Data Studio?
• What is the Need for Google Data Studio?
• Steps to use Google Data Studio
  • Step 1: Register for Google Data Studio
  • Step 2: Log in to your Google Account
  • Step 3: Select Suitable Options
  • Step 4: Select Tutorial Report
  • Step 5: Interact with Charts and Tables
  • Step 6: Filter your Data
  • Step 7: Interact with other Features
  • Step 8: Create Charts and Maps
  • Step 9: Create Personalized Report
  • Step 10: Add Data Sources
  • Step 11: Select your Data Source
  • Step 12: Change Table Styles
  • Step 13: Create Visualizations
  • Step 14: Choose Theme
• Conclusion

What is Google Data Studio?

Google Data Studio is Google’s Data Reporting and Visualization solution and is part of the Google Marketing Platform. Being a part of the Google Cloud Suite gives users the ability to easily integrate with other Google products and services such as Google Analytics, Google Sheets, Google Ads, etc, along with numerous third-party sources by either manually importing data or connecting to the data source using its API. It allows users to visualize data seamlessly and turn it into informative dashboards and reports and gain valuable insights from it. Along with that, it also houses functionality to allow real-time collaboration with multiple users irrespective of their physical location.

More information on Google Data Studio can be found here.

What are the Key Features of Google Data Studio?

The key features of Google Data Studio are as follows:

• Live Data Connectors: Google Data Studio supports seamless integration with over 200+ data sources eliminating the need to schedule periodic data refreshes for your reports.
• Full Customization Controls: Google Data Studio gives users the ability to add new pages, tables, charts, etc., and customize them as per business use case and data requirements.
• Dynamic Controls: One of the reasons why people love Google Data Studio is its dynamic control feature, which gives them the ability to perform slice and dice operations on the data without having to update the report setup itself. With Google Data Studio, users can also insert dynamic controls to enable viewers to filter through the content using dimensions and include and exclude content using filters as per requirements.
• Data Transformation: Raw data often needs to be transformed into a more complete and meaningful format before any useful analysis can be performed on it. Google Data Studio turns your data’s metrics and dimensions into powerful building blocks for graphs and charts.

What are the Advantages of using Google Data Studio?

Data is an essential asset of your organization as your business operates on it. Google knows how important your data is. By keeping the importance of data in mind, Google has created the Data Studio that has the following benefits:

• Combines all Features in One Place: Google Data Studio is compatible with multiple data sources, such as MySQL, Google Analytics, Google Ads, Google Campaign Manager 360, Google BigQuery, Google Sheets, Google Cloud SQL, PostgreSQL, YouTube, etc. It is embedded with pre-built connectors that permit users to import data from different sources. Besides, Google Data Studio allows users to perform authentication checks, give access rights, and design structures that can be valuable to perform calculations, transformations and visualizations. Google Data Studio, in short, combines all in one place for your business. 
• Embrace Transformation: Google Data Studio converts your data from raw to helpful information. You can draw metrics and dimensions required to transform data into easy-to-understand reports and dashboards. On Google Data Studio, you have an option to insert mathematical formulas, arithmetic functions, binary operators, comparison tables, and numerical fields from data sources, or you can also create custom fields to evaluate the performance of your data.  
• Tool For Beginners: If you’re a beginner, you don’t know how to write code, and you’ve no idea how to write SQL queries, then Google Data Studio is the perfect choice to go with. You can filter, unite, reconnoiter and transform your data without getting involved in programming lines. You can also access dynamic report templates to make and run your report in minutes. Design your report based on your requirements by adding the preferred logo, style, colors, and more. Google Data Studio has designed a dedicated space for rapid and ad-hoc querying, aiding beginners to visually explore the data with just one click.   
• Create Useful Visualization: Users can find numerous features like a drag and drop button, interactive shapes, eye-captivating bars, charts, graphs, and dynamic controls. Unlike other visualization tools, you can design customized and personalized reports that allow viewers to visualize data more efficiently. Use the company logo, add shapes, icons, and background images, fill the template gaps with colors, insert colored lines, headings, and text, adapt templates via different styles, and properties to make them productive. Once you’ve designed the template, you can also reuse the same template in the future.
• Share with Everyone: Once you’ve created reports, you can share them with your teammates, individuals, and customers. Sharing features helps your teams and colleagues view or edit as per their preferences. Similarly, you can also ask for opinions from others as they can add comments on the reports, enabling you to enhance it further. It means you can keep an eye on your team and collaborate with them instantly. While sharing reports, Google Data Studio also enables you to add a restricted access option so that only a few people can edit, view, or change your data and not everyone.

What is the Need for Google Data Studio?

You can leverage Google Data Studio to perform the following functions:

• Smart Marketing: Google Data Studio has built-in intelligent features and automated surfaces that enable enterprises to make intelligent marketing decisions.
• Deliver Quicker: Google Data Studio offers you ready-to-go templates through which you can analyze insights rapidly.  
• Control over Data: With Google Data Studio, you can have more control over your data, financial assets, and business investments. You can determine which parts of your business are working perfectly, which need improvements, and which parts are causing business loss.
• Delving into Deeper: Insight properties and features of Google Data Studio helps you to determine your preferences, choices, and styles. You can start from scratch to uncover your customer’s likes and dislikes or make significant changes to an existing business model.  
• Unite and Share Insights: You can use Google Data Studio to combine all the insights in one place and then share meaningful results with your teams. With Google Data Studio, you can work collectively, improve outcomes and make the information accessible to everyone. 

Businesses of all sizes can use Google Data Studio to get powerful insights, and solutions and bring your vision to life. 

Steps to use Google Data Studio

To use Google Data Studio, you don’t need any prior programming expertise and query knowledge because it has an easy-to-understand interface. The ultimate guide comprising lessons, courses, and tutorials is also available on the Google Analytics Academy page. 

You can create dashboards on Google Data Studio by implementing the following steps:

• Step 1: Register for Google Data Studio
• Step 2: Log in to your Google Account
• Step 3: Select Suitable Options
• Step 4: Select Tutorial Report
• Step 5: Interact with Charts and Tables
• Step 6: Filter your Data
• Step 7: Interact with other Features
• Step 8: Create Charts and Maps
• Step 9: Create Personalized Report
• Step 10: Add Data Sources
• Step 11: Select your Data Source
• Step 12: Change Table Styles
• Step 13: Create Visualizations
• Step 14: Choose Theme

Step 1: Register for Google Data Studio

Open the Data Studio official page, and click on the Use It For Free button.   

Step 2: Log in to your Google Account

Choose your Google account, and connect with it.

Step 3: Select Suitable Options

After connecting your email and password, the homepage of Google Data Studio will appear as shown below. Now you can use either built-in templates or create your own report. You can also find three tabs:

• Reports
• Data sources
• Explorer

Step 4: Select Tutorial Report

Click on the Tutorial Report option to open the beginner’s guide.

Step 5: Interact with Charts and Tables

To analyze how charts and tables work in Google Data Studio, click over the graph of a session. A pop-up screen will appear indicating session properties and date. Similarly, sort the values by clicking on the Source icon to change the order of items.

Step 6: Filter your Data

Google Data Studio allows you to analyze data by setting dates. For instance, click over the 3-dots vertical icon, select the start date 1^st June 2021 and the end date 10^th June 2021. Hit the Apply button and see the results. 

Step 7: Interact with other Features

Check the remaining features and guides by clicking on the left side of the Google Data Studio screen page. 

Step 8: Create Charts and Maps

Google Data Studio is compatible with dynamic Charts and Maps, including Google Maps, Bar Chart, Pie Chart, Scatter Chart, Bullet Chart, Area Chart, etc.

Since you have understood the basic steps, you can now create your own report template now. 

Step 9: Create Personalized Report

To create a personalized report, click on the Blank Report icon and enter the basic information.

Step 10: Add Data Sources

A simple report template will appear. To import data, click Add Data in the Menu Bar.

Step 11: Select your Data Source

Select a data source based on your unique business and data requirements. Once the necessary data has been imported, you will be able to see the following screen:

Step 12: Change Table Styles

Click on the table, and the panel will appear on the right side of the screen. Select your preferred style, colors, and fonts to make it more visually appealing.

Step 13: Create Visualizations

You can now create visualizations as per your requirements. For example, if you want to create a Pie Chart, click on the Add a Chart icon and select the Pie Chart. Select the preferred position and place it over the screen. Google Data Studio will automatically create the visualization. Change the style, color, and fonts to make it more enchanting. 

Step 14: Choose Theme

Click over the Theme and Layout option and choose the template based on your requirements. Add headings, text and complete the final look of your report to make it easier to understand.

Conclusion

Business requires data to make accurate decisions. But data consists of raw materials and irrelevant information too. Business visualization tools like Google Data Studio provides an easy path to filter, clean, explore, and transform your data. In this article, you got an understanding of the importance, benefits, and steps to creating visualizations on Google Data Studio.

Choosing a Business Intelligence and Data Analysis tool for your business can be a tough decision primarily because almost all departments in a business such as Product, Finance, Marketing, etc. now make use of multiple platforms to run their day-to-day operations and there is no single tool that can integrate with all these sources easily. Hence, businesses can consider using automated Data Integration platforms like Hevo.

Hevo helps you directly transfer data from a source of your choice to a Data Warehouse, Business Intelligence tools such as Google Data Studio, etc., or desired destination in a fully automated and secure manner without having to write the code. It will make your life easier and make data migration hassle-free. It is User-Friendly, Reliable, and Secure.

Details on Hevo’s pricing can be found here. Give Hevo a try by signing up for the 14-day free trial today.