Streamline Business with Excel Analytics Training
Last Updated on November 23, 2022
Microsoft Excel has been the go-to spreadsheet program for decades. Almost every business professional has used Excel at some point to organize data, compute totals, and create graphs.
Excel Analytics provides capabilities that allow users to go way beyond typical Excel functionality. A great way to learn how to leverage the extensive power of Excel Analytics is to participate in our Excel Analytics training. Excel Analytics gives users of every technical skill level the power to import, manipulate, and analyze data and then present their results in the most meaningful way to their intended audience.
Some of the top functions that can help you streamline business with Excel Analytics are described below.
1. Easily Import and Query Data with Power Query
Power Query gives users the ability to connect to data sources without the need of a database administrator or programmer, which saves time and makes business employees more efficient and powerful. Data from multiple data sources (e.g. Excel, text files, relational databases) can be combined and analyzed to present the findings in a relevant and meaningful summary. The data can plug right into Excel or Power Pivot for further analysis or Power View and Power Map for visualization of the results. Saved data queries can even be shared with other users so that work isn’t replicated or redundant.
2. Perform Deep Data Analysis with Power Pivot
Like Power Query, Power Pivot allows data to be imported from virtually unlimited data sources. Power Pivot can also process large quantities of data very quickly from multiple data sources into the same worksheet.
Power Pivot also provides a new formula language called Data Analysis Expressions (DAX). DAX extends Excel’s data manipulation capabilities to sophisticated calculation and analysis. While its capabilities are highly sophisticated, the formulas can be created in the Excel format with which many are already familiar. This makes it easier for users to become proficient if they are already familiar with creating formulas in Excel. Microsoft SharePoint can also be used to host saved queries, providing collaboration capabilities for multiple users.
3. Display Your Results with Power View
Power View is another add-in in the Excel Analytics suite of tools that lets you explore and visualize the results produced with Power Query and Power Pivot. Power View provides the capability to construct data models quickly and easily directly from Excel worksheets or using Power Pivot. Then users can produce various types of visualizations such as bar, bubble, and pie charts.
Power View also provides advanced filtering and sorting capabilities so that groups of important data can be highlighted for greater focus on details. These features combined with Power View’s capability of hosting results on multiple platforms give the user tons of options on how to best display the results of their analysis in a way that is most meaningful for their intended audience.
4. Provide Geographical Data Relevance with Power Map
Power Map provides the ability to display data results on geographical displays. For example, millions of rows of data can be plotted onto a 3D map in Bing from Excel tables or data models created in Excel. It can also generate multiple types of maps including bubble, column, heat, and region maps. Power Map gives the intended audience the ability to move around the map and view the results displayed in a localized format, which can yield information about specific geographical locations. Another very powerful feature of Power Map is that you can record data over a specific time period for a designated region and play back the changes in the data over time.
5. Publish Your Results with Power BI
Power BI gives businesses the ability to create informative, customizable dashboards that can be utilized to display their most critical data all on one screen. Power BI is a cloud-based technology that consists of the Power BI Desktop, which can be used for dashboard creation and maintenance, and Power BI Mobile Apps that can be used to access critical data from anywhere. Power BI provides a design and view interface that gives decision makers on-the-fly, real-time access to the tools that they need to make informed decisions.
Excel Analytics is a suite of add-ins for to Microsoft Excel that makes an already tried and true business tool infinitely more powerful. Training on Excel Analytics will give business users the power and ability to unlock the possibilities of their data.
