Why dashboards combine multiple views in Tableau - Business Case Study

Scenario Mode

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

📋 Request: Your manager wants a dashboard that shows sales performance from different angles to help make quick decisions.

📊 Data: You have monthly sales data by region, product category, and sales channel.

🎯 Deliverable: Create a dashboard that combines multiple views to show overall sales trends, regional sales breakdown, and top product categories.

Sample Data

Month	Region	Product Category	Sales Channel	Sales Amount
Jan	North	Electronics	Online	12000
Jan	South	Clothing	Retail	8000
Feb	North	Electronics	Retail	15000
Feb	East	Clothing	Online	7000
Mar	West	Home Goods	Retail	9000
Mar	South	Electronics	Online	11000
Apr	East	Home Goods	Retail	13000
Apr	North	Clothing	Online	6000
May	West	Electronics	Retail	14000
May	South	Home Goods	Online	7500

1

Step 1: Create a line chart showing total sales amount by month to see overall sales trends.

Rows: SUM(Sales Amount), Columns: Month

Expected Result

Line chart showing sales increasing and decreasing over months.

2

Step 2: Create a bar chart showing total sales amount by region to compare regional performance.

Rows: Region, Columns: SUM(Sales Amount)

Expected Result

Bar chart with sales amounts for North, South, East, and West regions.

3

Step 3: Create a pie chart showing sales distribution by product category to identify top categories.

Slices: Product Category, Size: SUM(Sales Amount)

Expected Result

Pie chart showing percentage sales for Electronics, Clothing, and Home Goods.

4

Step 4: Combine the three charts into one dashboard to provide multiple views in one place.

Add line chart, bar chart, and pie chart to dashboard layout with clear titles and legends.

Expected Result

Dashboard showing overall sales trend, regional sales, and product category sales side by side.

5

Step 5: Add interactivity by linking charts so selecting a region filters the other views.

Use dashboard actions to filter line and pie charts when a region is selected in bar chart.

Expected Result

Selecting a region updates the sales trend and product category charts to show data for that region only.

Final Result

Dashboard
+----------------------+---------------------+
| Sales Trend (Line)   | Regional Sales (Bar) |
|                      |                     |
|   /\                 |  |  |  |             |
|  /  \                |  |  |  |             |
| /    \               |  |  |  |             |
+----------------------+---------------------+
| Product Category (Pie)                      |
|   (Electronics, Clothing, Home Goods)      |
+--------------------------------------------+

✓Sales trend shows fluctuations over months with peaks in February and May.

✓North and West regions have higher sales compared to East and South.

✓Electronics is the top product category contributing most to sales.

Bonus Challenge

Add a filter to the dashboard to select sales channel (Online or Retail) and see all views update accordingly.

Show Hint

Use a dashboard filter action connected to all charts to filter data by Sales Channel.