Scatter plots in Tableau - Real Business Scenario

Scenario Mode

👤 Your Role: You are a sales analyst at a retail company.

📋 Request: Your manager wants to understand the relationship between advertising spend and sales revenue across different stores to identify if higher advertising leads to higher sales.

📊 Data: You have monthly data for 10 stores including Store ID, Advertising Spend (in $), and Sales Revenue (in $).

🎯 Deliverable: Create a scatter plot in Tableau showing Advertising Spend on the X-axis and Sales Revenue on the Y-axis, with each point representing a store. Add store labels and a trend line to show the correlation.

Sample Data

Store ID	Advertising Spend ($)	Sales Revenue ($)
Store 1	5000	45000
Store 2	7000	62000
Store 3	3000	28000
Store 4	8000	70000
Store 5	2000	22000
Store 6	6000	58000
Store 7	4000	39000
Store 8	10000	90000
Store 9	3500	33000
Store 10	4500	42000

1

Step 1: Open Tableau and connect to the data source containing the store data.

Connect to the Excel or CSV file with columns: Store ID, Advertising Spend, Sales Revenue.

Expected Result

Data is loaded and visible in Tableau's Data pane.

2

Step 2: Create a new worksheet for the scatter plot.

Click on 'New Worksheet' icon at the bottom.

Expected Result

A blank worksheet is ready for visualization.

3

Step 3: Drag 'Advertising Spend' to Columns shelf and 'Sales Revenue' to Rows shelf.

Columns: Advertising Spend; Rows: Sales Revenue.

Expected Result

Scatter plot axes are set with Advertising Spend on X-axis and Sales Revenue on Y-axis.

4

Step 4: Drag 'Store ID' to Detail on the Marks card to show each store as a separate point.

Marks card > Detail: Store ID.

Expected Result

Each point on the scatter plot represents a different store.

5

Step 5: Add store labels to each point for easy identification.

Marks card > Label: drag Store ID and enable 'Show mark labels'.

Expected Result

Store IDs appear next to each point on the scatter plot.

6

Step 6: Add a trend line to visualize the correlation between advertising spend and sales revenue.

From the Analytics pane, drag 'Trend Line' onto the scatter plot and select 'Linear'.

Expected Result

A linear trend line appears showing the relationship between advertising spend and sales revenue.

7

Step 7: Format the scatter plot for clarity and accessibility.

Ensure axis titles are clear, increase font size for labels, and check color contrast for points and labels.

Expected Result

Scatter plot is easy to read with clear labels and good color contrast.

Final Result

Scatter Plot: Advertising Spend vs Sales Revenue

Y-axis (Sales Revenue $)
|
|        * Store 8 (10000, 90000)
|       * Store 4 (8000, 70000)
|      * Store 2 (7000, 62000)
|     * Store 6 (6000, 58000)
|    * Store 1 (5000, 45000)
|   * Store 10 (4500, 42000)
|  * Store 7 (4000, 39000)
| * Store 9 (3500, 33000)
|* Store 3 (3000, 28000)
|* Store 5 (2000, 22000)
+------------------------------------> X-axis (Advertising Spend $)

✓There is a clear positive relationship between advertising spend and sales revenue.

✓Stores that spend more on advertising tend to have higher sales revenue.

✓Store 8 has the highest advertising spend and sales revenue.

✓Store 5 has the lowest advertising spend and sales revenue.

Bonus Challenge

Add a filter to the scatter plot to allow the manager to view data for specific months or quarters if the data had a time dimension.

Show Hint

Use Tableau's filter shelf to add a date field and enable the filter control on the dashboard.