The fourth level is about screens people watch every day: a live panel instead of a static report. Nine lessons — from your first mini-panel and KPI cards to a manager’s panel read in ten seconds — plus design rules that separate a working screen from a wall of numbers.
Every lesson is a template with demo data: ten minutes to complete, one skill that stays. Open it in the Templates section of Analytics Agent and press “Use this template” to take the lesson on your own data.
What a Dashboard Is
Shows: the “what / why / what to do” trio on one screen — numbers, context, and one highlighted deviation; you assemble your first mini-panel from four tiles and an 18-month line.
You get: instead of watching the data yourself, you set up a screen that tells you when something broke.
KPI Cards: The Numbers That Matter
Shows: value + comparison base + state — the three parts of a good KPI card; state thresholds are edited in a file, not in code. The demo shows how one month breaks exactly two of the five cards.
You get: the key numbers of the business at one glance — with a clear answer to “is this good or bad?”.
Operational Panel: What Is Happening Now
Shows: three honest comparison bases — today, yesterday, and the same weekday a week ago; an incomplete “today” is never compared head-on. A Wednesday example shows how a naive base turns plus 24.2% into minus 53.0%.
You get: daily numbers stop jumping with the calendar — you see real shifts, not the rhythm of the week.
Analytical Panel: Why It Changed
Shows: the slice method: a drop is cut by channels, regions, people, until one piece collects the change; the shares of the drop add up to 100% — negatives included. The conclusion is not “revenue fell” but “the coupon partnership died on the first of September”.
You get: for the question “why did it fall” you have a method, not guesses.
A Panel for the Manager
Shows: six blocks, large type, ten seconds to read; every number has a comparison base (against plan, against the quarter), one computed deviation per screen, and depth one click away — not on the screen.
You get: the manager sees a verdict, not tables — and you get decisions instead of “what does this mean?” questions.
The Sales Funnel: Where People Leave
Shows: people are counted at every step — from visit to payment; step conversion names the thinnest step, for example “cart → checkout” on phones: 25% against 64% on desktops; every leak gets a price in people — over ten thousand recoverable.
You get: you know exactly where and how many customers your site loses — and what fixing it is worth.
Channels: Who Brings Better Customers
Shows: a channel is judged on two axes at once — price and quality: “cheap but one-time” against “expensive but loyal”; “cheap” customers are the most expensive in their first year, and if that channel died, the drop would be almost 90% in a month.
You get: the ad budget is spread by the honest cost of a customer, not by the “cheapest way in”.
Panel Design Rules
Shows: the same store drawn twice: “before” — a wall of eight identical numbers, two quantities on one axis, a truncated axis; “after” — three cards, one line, one bar chart, and a map of all 40 products; every violation is named and fixed, and the checklist lives in the file.
You get: you stop drawing panels that argue with themselves — and a colleague understands the screen in ten seconds.
Filters and Drill-Down
Shows: a filter slices, the drill goes down: region → category → product, every click narrows the path and keeps the context of the levels above; the whole panel filters together, a reset button is part of the design, and the totals reconcile to the cent at every level.
You get: “what is inside this region?” no longer needs a second page — one click.