MB2-713 Certification (Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2016 Sales) – Sales Analysis (Charts)

This post is the next in my series covering revision topics for the MB2-713 certification. This time I will look at charts, Microsoft Dynamics CRM has several out of the box charts to help with sales analysis. It is also possible for general users to create personal charts. And beyond these developers can add additional system charts as required.

There are two types of charts. Personal and system.

Personal charts

• can be created by any user.
• Are initially only visible to the user who created them.
• Although personal charts can be shared with other users or teams.

System charts

• Visible to all users.
• Out of the box CRM contains several examples of system charts.
• Developers, with customizer or systems administrator roles, can create new system charts.

Charts

Multiple chart types exist in Microsoft Dynamics CRM, via the chart designer interface users can create the following types of chart;

• Bar – Shows data in horizontal columns.
• Column – Shows data in vertical columns.
• Pie – shows data as slices of a pie. Useful for show numerical proportions of data. (Such as % sales by sales territory)
• Funnel – Shows values as progressively decreasing proportions amounting to 100 percent in total. (Often used to represent a sales pipeline.)
• Area – used to show cumulative totals over time.
• Line – Shows individual points on the chart joined by a line, useful when looking for trends over time.

The chart below shows a typical example of a sales pipeline shown in a funnel chart.

Tip:
As shown below you can click on segment of a chart, that you have the ability to further filter on any field. Clicking the blue arrow will drill into the chart can represent the data in any one of the five chart types available in the filter. (Bar, Column, Funnel, Line and Pie.)

It is also possible to export the XML of the chart, edit it and re-import. This process allows other chart types to be created, including;

• Doughnut
• Candlestick
• Radar
• Bubble
• And many more

Tip:
In addition to changing the chart type in the XML other parameters such as colour, labels and drawing style can be customized.

Note:
The customization of charts using XML is beyond the scope of the MB2-713 exam. It will be important to know all of the chart types which can be created from the user interface but you are unlikely to get questions directly covering chart types only available via XML customization.

Charts can be single series or multi-series. A multi-series chart can represent data using two chart types, one laid over the other. For example, a column and line in a single chart. Below you can see a sample chart showing the number of opportunities created each month as a count, then their estimated revenue is shown as a line on the same chart.

Another variation of a multi-series chart is a stacked chart, these apply to column and bar charts. Stacked charts are useful when comparing data. Charts can be shown as standard stacked charts or 100% stacked charts. The difference being that the stacked chart shows the actual values whilst the 100% stacked chart represents the data in terms of a proportion. The chart below is an example of a 100% stacked chart. The chart tells me that 100% of the opportunities created in May have only a 10% probability. It doesn’t compare the number of opportunities in May with other months just their probability!

When plotting charts, it is possible to limit the data returned using options to show top “n” or bottom “n” rows. For example, the chart below shows my top 5 opportunities by estimated revenue.

Tip:
As charts are graphical your best way to learn about their capabilities is with some hands on experience.

I hope this post has given a flavour for the concepts connected with charts that you’ll need to understand for the MB2-713 certification. Next time I will continue this theme by looking at dashboards. J