Tech Tool: Spreadsheet Software
Software Videos: Spreadsheet Data Tables, Spreadsheet PivotTables and PivotCharts
Have you ever been asked for your ZIP code when you made a purchase at a store? From American Eagle to Williams Sonoma, stores ask customers for ZIP codes when a sale is made. Why?
ZIP codes can be used to identify pockets of customers in specific geographic regions that then can be targeted with coupon mailings and advertisements. When the sales transactions are recorded in the accounting system, also recording the customers’ ZIP codes can provide additional intelligence for making future sales.
As the new accounting intern, you just received your first information broadcast email containing the results of a business intelligence query. This BI query retrieved data from the company’s data warehouse about customer ZIP codes and amount of purchase, using information that had been stored in both the CUSTOMER table and the ORDER table. The query results were exported to a spreadsheet, and then using information broadcasting it was sent to your email inbox.
Complete the following steps to obtain a sense of how additional insights and business intelligence can be obtained through analysis.
Download and open the file for this exercise.
Format the data as a spreadsheet data table.
Create a PivotTable to analyze ZIP codes and purchases.
Create a chart that best depicts the location of customers making purchases. Does yourchart provide a means for gauging the dollar amount of the purchases? If not, can you thinkof a way to create a chart that would reveal this additional type of business intelligence?
Develop a digital dashboard that the company can use in the future for BI purposes.