Even though it was just a few months ago that we published a post detailing the numerous improvements we’ve made to your favorite reporting platform, it’s already time to announce another major update.
This time around, the changes are significant and numerous enough for us to attach a number to the update, so welcome to Reportz 2.0! If you want to see our upgraded dashboard reporting tool in action, do not hesitate to sign up for a trial.
More options from the very start
We have always been upfront about how much we value your input and suggestions. However, regardless of how much we might like a particular idea, we have to prioritize and first take care of the most urgent issues. This results in the creation of a backlog of small improvements that we somehow never get around to making, despite recognizing their potential usefulness.
Aside from the more significant changes, this update also includes a range of these micro improvements that we didn’t get around to sooner, and that are aimed at making your experience smoother and more streamlined.
The first of these changes is noticeable as soon as you try to log into your account and is a great illustration of what we mean by minor but useful changes. Namely, while you could previously only do so by providing the email address and password you used to register for our reporting tool, now you also have the option to log in with your Facebook or Google account.
We’ll leave you to discover other minor performance, usability and visual improvements on your own, suffice it to say that if there was a way for us to help you save even more time with Reportz, we tried to address it in this update.
Changes to dashboards
While we do feel that even these minor improvements to Reportz create a noticeably better user experience, if they were all we did, we wouldn’t really be calling this version 2.0. Naturally, one of the areas we paid special attention to was dashboard management.
First of all, the entire dashboard creation process has been overhauled. You previously had to go through three steps in order to create a new dashboard. Even if you didn’t want to use a template or customize the appearance of your dashboard, you had to go through steps offering you those options.
Aside from this, if you wanted to use one of our template dashboards, you had to add API sources during the dashboard creation process (during step 2 to be exact), which is no longer the case. This also extends to the dashboards you already have, i.e. you can now add API sources directly from the dashboard, without having to leave it and go to the “Sources” page.
Dashboard creation process right now includes a total of one or two steps, depending on whether or not you want to use one of our templates, and since facilitating onboarding as much as possible was one of our main goals, it couldn’t be simpler.
When you click on “Create Dashboard” you need to name the dashboard and either choose to “Start from scratch”, which immediately takes you to an empty dashboard ready to be populated with widgets of your choosing, or to “Start from template”, which takes you to step 2, where you can choose a template you like and instantly create a dashboard based on that template without having to add data sources right away.
Depending on your choice, you’ll either get an empty dashboard, or one containing widgets that you’ll have to set data sources for. Either way, as soon as you are presented with your new dashboard, you’ll notice another (minor) improvement, namely, a simpler and more accessible way to add your and your client’s logo to the dashboard.
Dashboard Templates
If you have taken a careful look at the images above, you might have noticed another significant improvement, and if you have taken any kind of look at the title of this section, you probably know what we are talking about.
While we initially only offered three different report templates – SEO Template, SEO Lead Generation Template and SEO E-commerce Template, which we later expanded to seven, now you can take your pick from a total of 17 templates (two of them appear in two different categories, which is why you would get 19 if you added up all the numbers below):
- 3 General report templates – Site traffic, E-commerce, and E-commerce & SEO
- 3 SEO report templates – Basic SEO, E-commerce and SEO, Local SEO
- 8 PPC report templates – Google Ads Display, Google Ads Search, Google Ads Video, Google Ads Universal, Ultimate Google Ads, Facebook Ads General, LinkedIn Paid and LinkedIn Social & Paid
- 5 Social report templates – LinkedIn Social & Paid, Instagram, Facebook Social, LinkedIn Social, Agency Social
The jump from 7 to 17 might seem a bit extreme, which makes it a great illustration of how much we rely on your feedback. The first seven templates were identical or very similar to what we were using when reporting to our clients, and we could be sure that they actually made sense. While it was easy enough to speculate a number of other template types into existence, we refrained from doing so before we had a chance to hear what is it that you needed the most.
Naturally, we don’t intend to stop at 17, as long as we notice there’s interest on your side. Also, the ones currently available can still be modified based on your input, so try some of them out and let us know what you think through our Facebook community.
Changes to widget creation flow
Once we felt that dashboard creation and management was as optimized as currently possible, the only major area left to take care of was, of course, widgets. While your feedback suggested that you’d like us to simplify the dashboard creation process (which is exactly what we did), it seemed that you wouldn’t mind if we segmented the widget creation process even further.
You can see the old VS new widget creation flow on the image below, but just like with templates, it would probably be simplest for you to try it out yourself.
Aside from granulating the process, we have also made a point of adding as many predefined widget options as made sense, all with the intention of making it even easier for you to put together a perfect dashboard for your reporting needs.
This also includes giving you the option to reauthorize expired data sources directly while creating a new widget, editing an existing one, or even when specifying widget sources for the entire dashboard from the right sidebar menu. Since reauthorizing data sources previously required you leaving what you were doing, going to the “Sources” page and manually updating their status, this improvement is likely to save you quite a bit of time and prevent the annoying workflow interruptions.
We’re just getting started
While we’ve outlined the main changes to Reportz in this post, there are a lot more treats for you to discover as you navigate your way through our reporting utility. From bug fixes and other performance improvements to simple aesthetic improvements, we hope to keep pushing Reportz closer to perfection with every new update.
If you already have an account with us, head on over to our app and check out all the changes for yourself, and if not, we’d like to remind you of our constantly available free trial.
