TFF #008 - 3 PowerBI AI Tricks to Max Your Data Insight

Hello,

Welcome to another edition of the Tech for Finance newsletter where we’re looking at how you can use 3 AI tricks to max your data insight using PowerBI

Chances are, you might already be using PowerBI if you're using Microsoft 365. It's available to anyone to try for free and the Pro version is only £7.50 a month.

PowerBI will allow you to easily use AI, without any technical knowledge, to start to drive further insight from your data.

The below tricks use a combination of free and pro capabilities, and if you're a first-time user of PowerBI you can try the pro version free for 60 days.

With this 'How-to' You should be able to put these into action within 10 minutes. All you need is a spreadsheet with a reasonable amount of data on it.

The three tricks are:

1. Quick Insights

2. Dashboard Auto-Create

3. Q & A

Quick insights will use AI to trawl through your data and present you with visuals and trends automatically.

The Dashboard 'Auto-create' will look at your data structure, and automatically create a dashboard for you to start working on without having to build it from scratch.

The Q & A will allow you to question your data using natural language.

1. Quick Insights

This guide explains how to use the 'Quick insights' feature within PowerBI, using data from a spreadsheet.

1. Once you've logged into PowerBI, click on the get data button on the bottom left.

2. Select 'Get' under 'Files'

3. Choose a local file, and select your spreadsheet [Note - Make sure the data in your spreadsheet is formatted into tables]

4. You should then automatically be dropped into your workplace

5. Click on the lookup and choose 'Get Quick Insights'

6. Wait until your insights are ready, then click view insights

7. Start spotting trends

a) Sales Call Data Example

b) Financial Data Example

2. Dashboard Auto-Create

This guide explains how to auto-create a dashboard, once you've connected your data from a spreadsheet or other data source.

1. Click on your Dataset

2. Under visualise data, click 'Auto-create'

3. Enjoy your Dashboard

a) Sales Call Data Example

b) Financial Data Example

3. Q & A

This guide explains how to ask PowerBI questions in natural language, once you've connected your data and created a report.

1. Select your Dashboard and then click Q & A at the top.

2. You'll then get a set of suggested questions which you're free to click.

3. Or, you can ask it your own questions.

So there you are, some extremely quick ways to start leveraging AI within PowerBI to start driving data insight.

The above examples were done with very poorly formatted data, literally just exported in the raw format from a CRM system and a Financial system.

With tidier data and better naming conventions, you'll be swimming in insight in no time.

Enjoy!

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When you’re ready, there are 2 ways I can help you:

1/ E-mail me at adam@techforfinance.com if you’re a finance pro and you feel like your current tech-stack is holding you back, and I'll provide some 1-2-1 advice

2/ Subscribe to the Tech for Finance Podcast here, and the YouTube channel here.

Know someone else that'll like this? It'd mean a lot to me if you could forward on 🙂

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