Designing Product Dashboards That Actually Help You
Most mornings, like any product manager, I kick off my day with coffee and a quick look at the product dashboards. I look for changes in the product or user journey, check health metrics, and see if the latest feature is driving the expected impact. But crafting meaningful dashboards can be challenging. To make sure we’re on track, I’ve set up a few key questions to answer with my team before getting started.
Are product dashboards really necessary?
You may feel the urge to set up extensive dashboards right away. However, if you are in the pre-MVP stage with just a few core metrics or you want to check some specific data periodically, pulling data with SQL queries may be more efficient. Automating data collection and representation prematurely can be a drain on resources. Remember that dashboards will require ongoing support from your devs and analysts to stay optimized and relevant.
What problem is your dashboard intended to solve?
Once you’re certain that a dashboard is needed, the next step is clarifying the specific problem it will address. Think of your dashboard as an internal product. So it should solve some problems. Are you looking to track how users pay for subscriptions in the app, or maybe to monitor onboarding efficiency across cohorts and channels? Clearly identifying the problem will guide the dashboard’s design and functionality. Avoid trying to address too many issues with one dashboard — it often leads to a cluttered design that you’ll only revisit occasionally to remember what the dashboard was meant to track.
What type of data you’re displaying and how are your metrics calculated?
You have answers for the previous questions, right? Then your next priority should be defining a clear methodology for each metric. This is crucial when multiple stakeholders, like marketing, finance, product, or executive teams, are using the same dashboards and data (it may be not a good practice but happens commonly). This approach reduces the risk of misunderstandings and keeps decisions grounded in shared metrics.
“For instance, marketing might include extra costs in CPA, finance may focus on revenue for business metrics, and product teams could prioritize gross profit. By establishing these baseline definitions across teams, you ensure alignment and avoid decision-making based on conflicting interpretations”
How should your product dashboard look?
Start by sketching your dashboard on paper before building it. Why? Because a simple sketch gives you a visual snapshot of how it will function in real life. Imagine that all the data and metrics on the paper version are real and live — how would you use them to make decisions? Visualizing your dashboard this way allows you to assess if it truly addresses your needs and how it fits into your decision-making process. Plus, this step can save you time by refining your approach before raising a ticket for the analytics team.