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What Is Data
Reporting and How
to Create Data
Reports for Your
Business
REPORTING
MAR 15, 2024 | 17 minutes read

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According to Gartner’s prediction,

90% of organizations will consider
information the most valuable asset
a business may have.

And where does this information

come from?

Here’s a magic word – data.

Even though many companies report

making important decisions based
on their gut feeling, 85% of them
would like to improve the ways they
use data insights to make business
decisions.

It’s because they know data is

critical for growth, especially when
modern software allows you to
monitor data in real-time and create
effective reports for better and
faster decision-making. To support
this, over half of the companies
surveyed for recent Databox’s state
of business reporting study
confirmed that regular monitoring
and reporting brought them
significant and tangible benefits.

Want to learn more about data

reporting? This article will walk you
through what data reports are, how
they can benefit your company, and
show you how to use the right tools
to create effective, well-organized,
and actionable reports.

Let’s dive right in.

● What is Data Reporting?

● Why Is Data Reporting Important

for Any Business?

● What is the Difference Between

Data Reporting and Data
Analysis?

● How to Write a Data Report

● Data Report Examples and

Templates

● How to Improve Your Data

Reporting: 12 Best Practices

What is Data
Reporting?
If you’re looking for an exact data
reporting definition, it comes down
to the following:

Data reporting refers to the process

of collecting unprocessed data from
different sources that you later
organize into meaningful and
digestible pieces of information to
gain valuable insights into your
business performance.

After the collected data has been

pulled from several sources or tools,
organized, and visualized in an easy-
to-follow manner, you can perform
data analysis to assess the current
state in your organization and create
an actionable plan or give
recommendations about future
activities based on this data. That
said, reporting on data is practically
the step that leads to data analysis.

You can create a data report in

different formats, but nowadays,
reports created via data visualization
tools are the most common ones.
You will often find all kinds of
illustrations in such reports: tables,
pie charts, graphs, timelines, and
more. Data reports can vary in
nature, ranging from static to
interactive dashboards, and they
may possess varying levels of detail.
Additionally, data can be categorized
and organized in various ways,
including by category, significance,
objectives, or department.

Financial data reports are one of the

most common types, but, in reality,
every department within a company
can benefit from reporting software:
marketing, sales, HR, and others.

Why Is Data Reporting

Important for Any
Business?
The eternal question for any
business is this: which strategies are
profitable and which ones need
adjusting?

Having a consistent data reporting

process in place helps you answer
this question accurately and quickly.
Without data reports, data analysis
can’t happen, and without data
analysis, you can’t plan your further
steps towards your business
objectives.

Based on the data you collect over a

specific period of time, you can draw
conclusions about your business
performance and make future
decisions about allocating time and
money into activities that bring you
revenue or help you reach other
business goals. Data also helps you
identify any problematic areas of
your business that need your
attention or strategies that need
improvement because they’re not
generating satisfactory results.

Having accurate data at your

disposal in real-time helps you
discover patterns and notice red
flags so you can prevent potential
problems before they occur. It also
enables you to identify correlations
between two or more trends and find
their causes, so you can replicate
your most successful tactics any
time.

Without frequent reporting on data,

you may end up with one of two
scenarios:

● You make wrong business

decisions because you don’t have
accurate data to rely and act on.

● You believe your figures are

better than they really are
because some of the data hasn’t
been reported – this is called
underreporting and can give you a
wrong overall picture of your
business.

By understanding the importance of

data reporting and analysis, you can
easily avoid these situations.

What is the Difference

Between Data
Reporting and Data
Analysis?
Now that we’ve mentioned data
analysis, the next logical step after
you’ve crafted a data report, it’s
worth mentioning that some people
use these terms interchangeably.

However, they are not the same. Here

are the main differences between
data reporting and data analysis:

Data Reporting
● This process comes first as a
preparation for analysis

● It’s used to track performance

● Data needs to be pulled from

multiple sources and it’s
unprocessed

● Enables you to ask the right

questions about your business

● Use of the “push approach” – the

data is pushed to you so you can
analyze it

Data Analysis
● This process relies on data
reporting and comes after it

● It’s used to create actionable

plans based on the conclusions

● Data is organized and available

to you in dashboards, reports, etc.

● Enables you to answer the

questions asked while reporting

● Use of the “pull approach” where

a person pulls out specific data to
explore it

How to Write a Data

Report
If you’re getting ready to write a data
report, you may be looking for the
best practices and writing tips to
explore before you get started.
Here’s what you need to do to write
a great data report.

Step 1: Define what type of data

report you need to write. There are
several types of data reports, such
as informational, analytical,
investigative, recommendation, KPI,
and more. All these data reports
focus on providing facts or analysis,
help to identify risks, come up with
recommendations for further steps,
monitor business KPIs, etc.
Determine your report goal first, and
then you’ll know exactly what
sections you need to include.

PRO TIP: How Well

Are Your
Marketing KPIs
Performing?
Like most marketers and
marketing managers, you want
to know how well your efforts
are translating into results each
month. How much traffic and
new contact conversions do you
get? How many new contacts do
you get from organic sessions?
How are your email campaigns
performing? How well are your
landing pages converting? You
might have to scramble to put all
of this together in a single report,
but now you can have it all at
your fingertips in a single
Databox dashboard.

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Dashboard includes data from
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Obviously, the higher the
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Sessions. How well is your
campaign driving new
contacts and customers?

3. Marketing Performance
KPIs. Tracking the number of
MQLs, SQLs, New Contacts
and similar will help you
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the success of your email
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Keep an eye on your most
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Step 2: Determine who you’re

writing the report for. Is it upper or
middle management, or potential
clients or investors? Different
audiences may require using a
different tone, terminology, and can
affect the choice of data you’re going
to include.

Step 3: Create an outline. Before you

start compiling the report, plan its
structure. It’ll be easier to stay on
track, choose the right KPIs, and
ensure you’ve presented everything
relevant while excluding the
information that doesn’t contribute
to the report.

Step 4: Include data visualizations.

To make your data report more
readable and beautiful, make sure
you use data charts, tables, graphs,
and other data visualization tools to
make the data easy to interpret for
the reader.

Step 5: Write a summary. Every

great report has a summary that
briefly explains the purpose of the
document and its key findings.
Sometimes, depending on the report
type, you may even include a few
action steps in this section.

Data Report Examples

and Templates
Good teachers teach by showing
rather than telling, right? Well, that’s
why we also wanted to share a few
great examples of data reports and
templates you can use for building
your own data report.

1. Marketing Data Report Example

2. SEO Data Report Example

3. Sales Data Report Example

4. Customer Support Data Report

Example

5. Ecommerce Data Report

Example

6. Project Management Data

Report Example

7. Financial KPI Data Report

Example

Marketing Data Report

Example
One of the best things about this
marketing dashboard is that it’s
intuitive and easy to follow. It allows
you to track your website traffic,
engagement, and conversions, and
monitor user activity on your
website. If metrics like page CTA
clicks, bounce rate, pageviews per
session matter to you, you will love
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