Interactive dashboards are the insightful, flexible, high-performing partners you need.
If your performance marketing reports are still delivered via PowerPoint, it’s time to move on. Don’t stay stuck in a bad relationship. You deserve one that challenges, inspires and excites you and fulfills your every need. You have an inquisitive, analytical mind with complicated needs that PowerPoint just can’t keep up with. PowerPoint fails you in so many ways that when you step back and evaluate them, you’ll be nodding in agreement and saying, “Dear PowerPoint, it’s not me – it’s you.”
PowerPoint wastes your precious time and money.
You want more for less. Less time, effort and money, that is. PowerPoint reporting is an unnecessarily manual process that takes too long to compile reports. The hours spent fetching information, copying and pasting charts and graphs, formatting and reformatting fonts or shapes, and writing and re-writing narratives gets old quick. Couldn’t that time have been better spent interpreting and analyzing data and planning?
PowerPoint shuts you down and keeps you in the dark.
You want to know it all. You’re smart and want to keep it that way. With PowerPoint reporting, you get a slimmed down, over-simplified version of a much larger story. It’s simple math: the more time making decks, the less time evaluating the data. Executive summaries lack detail or thorough explanation. Critical information can fall through gaps, making it hard to answer the questions that arise when data is condensed into a few short slides. Valuable details get relegated to an appendix or left out entirely. Wouldn’t you want to ask and answer questions instantaneously?
PowerPoint is possessive and holds you back.
You want to be in control. But PowerPoint reports are static and rely on the author to explain or validate key points. Interactive dashboards put control over your data back into your hands. You can harness the interactivity that dashboards provide, using filters or parameters that let you dive into the data. Why marry yourself to overly simple PowerPoint reports when you could have a relationship that is dynamic and engaging and that feeds your thirst for data with more flexibility, access and detailed information?
PowerPoint is never on time and can’t keep up.
You want answers and you want them now, but PowerPoint slows you down and makes it harder to gain insight. By the time the report finally arrives, often days, weeks, or even months later, you’re looking at old news. This means you’re reacting to what happened “then” rather than responding to the here and now. You’re missing critical information about the current state of your program(s), including trends, forecasts and projections. Why hitch yourself to an outdated process when you could be scanning through information that is current or near-real time and thinking or planning ahead?
PowerPoint just doesn’t “get” you or live up to your expectations.
Your needs are unique and you want customized information for everyone on your team, but PowerPoint treats you all alike. For example, you might need an executive summary with high-level KPIs while others on the team need granular views for monitoring and managing campaigns day-to-day. With PowerPoint, you have to compromise. But interactive dashboards can meet everyone’s needs through a single source. You can house different views together or have multiple separate dashboards stemming from the same data connections. All without having to create and re-create a million micro-PowerPoint reports. And, unlike with PowerPoint, when data sources are updated with that single refresh, so are all the views. Interactive dashboards let you modify results within existing views or quickly create new visualizations. Why deprive yourself of this autonomy and personalization?
Good news: you don’t need PowerPoint – you have options.
Better is out there and waiting for you. You no longer have to compromise. When you trade up to interactive reporting dashboards, you’ll be instantly gratified.
You’ll know it’s right when your reports are fueled by live connections to data that deliver accurate, clean information in near-real time. You can craft the narrative and follow along with your data stories right within your dashboards. When you want newer, fresher information, your ask is quickly and easily met with a simple refresh of data sources. It’s a relationship that never grows stale. Plus, views can be structured to anticipate your questions and be responsive to your evolving needs. Sometimes you might be in the mood to add color to a view or to apply a filter and drill down into the gritty campaign details.
You’ll benefit further from having engaging conversations with and about your data. The immediacy and interactivity of dashboards free you to use your time more wisely. You might even get more analytical minds with differing perspectives huddling around your results. Sparks will fly during these thoughtful conversations. You’ll gain insights and act more nimbly. You’ll feel liberated when you regain control of your time and access to information. Knowing your strategic mind and competitive spirit, you’ll finally be satisfied with reports that not only keep up with you, but that challenge you to think ahead.
Bad news: sometimes breakups are hard.
Breaking up with PowerPoint can be hard to do, especially when your friends and family think everything is “fine.” But don’t hesitate to introduce interactive dashboards to them. They’ll fall in love, too.
Of course, there might be some initial awkwardness, but once they see the features and functionality of dashboard, they’ll wonder what they ever saw in PowerPoint. Soon, they’ll be praising you for demanding better performance marketing reporting.
When you finally end the toxic reporting relationship you’ve been in, it will be liberating to move on and rally your organization around a more interactive, efficient, nimble and strategic future. You’ll forget all about your ex and bask in your newfound empowerment. After all, a healthy relationship should make you better, not hold you back.
Other good news: Adcom is there to help.
If you or someone you know are stuck in a slow-to-insights, backwards-looking, read-and-archived PowerPoint performance marketing reporting relationship, lets talk! Adcom is a communications and digital marketing firm that helps clients maximize the investment in their marketing program. Lets connect for a free assessment to identify your greatest opportunity to drive performance and value for your company.