Reports consist of widgets. Just like reports, widgets can be customised through filters, group by and rank order to include or exclude datasets. You can also track more than one metric in a widget - you can measure multiple metrics, compare them and even use rank order to make sure that only the top 5 or bottom 5 results are taken into consideration. 


Freshworks products come with preconfigured widgets (which you can search for) but you can also build your own chart widgets to track the key performance indicators that matter to your business. You can add as many widgets as you'd want in a single report. You can create up to 10 pages of widgets in a report - use it wisely. 


If you'd like to create a text widget, read this. 


Creating a chart widget


You can either create a widget from scratch, modify a widget created by your team (or you) previously - present in the 'Existing' gallery - or modify a template created by the Freshworks team. Drag your preferred type of widget onto the report canvas to get started.


You can modify a widget by click on the pencil icon that appears once you hover over the widget to choose 'Edit'. Alternatively, you can click on the visualisation to directly go to the configuration page. To get up to speed on the terms we use - metrics, filters etc. -, please check out the terms glossary



Metrics


You can select any metric from the metrics dropdown (example: tickets, public note count, no of group reassigns till date, etc) and choose the aggregate function aka generate it in the required mode (example: total, percentage, average, maximum, minimum, sum, etc). 


Depending on the metric, you get your choice of aggregate functions - for instance, you cannot get the percentage function for time spent in calendar hours. 


You can apply filters to metrics and then save them under a new name - this is most useful when you need to compare specific custom metrics across time periods. 


Say, you want to compare a total tickets resolved this month against the previous month. You'd choose 'Total tickets' as one metric, reduce the dataset to this month by using resolution date is in this month as the filter, and rename the metric to 'Total tickets resolved this month'.



Once you do, you need to add a second metric to the widget - 'Total tickets' and add a filter as 'Previous time period of <the first metric> aka total tickets resolved this month'. This way, you'll be able to compare the metric easily, against the same time intervals. Please note that these metrics are not saved permanently to your account - you cannot search for them by name (or find them).


Previous time period works only when there is more than one metric with a time period attached to it. 

Some metrics have a mandatory time period filter that has to be specified before the dataset can be drawn up. For instance, unresolved tickets is a metric that requires a time period. 


If it's a time-based metric, you can specify using date range dimension what timeframe should be taken into consideration when applying a global filter - at the widget or report level. For instance, if you're trying to create a support dashboard for the month, you should specify that the date range dimension for date-based metrics is created date so that the report-level filter of 'created date is this month' can be correctly applied to the dataset.


Filters



You can add multiple filters and choose to have all or any of your filters applied. You can make use of the advanced filters to leverage the AND/OR operators for yielding refined results. 


You can drill down further into the dataset by using group by on a particular field or section of a dataset. For instance, if you've just created a widget to show you total tickets grouped by priority, you can drill down further by grouping low priority tickets by status. 


Group by


You can use the group by option to select the dimension across which you want to study your metric. This can be a ticket field (default and custom), ticket property, SLA property and more. 


This field can even be a date, sorted by hour of the day, day of the week, day of the month, month of the year, quarter of the year, month and week. When you specify a date grouping, make sure to specify a date range dimension for the metric. A date range dimension specifies what timeframe should be taken into consideration when applying a global filter - at the widget or report level. For instance, if you're trying to create a support dashboard for the month, you should specify that the date range dimension for date-based metrics is created date so that the report-level filter of 'created date is this month' can be correctly applied to the dataset.


You can add up to 2 levels under 'group by'. You can also add rank order, but only if there's a single group by and metric. Using rank order, you can specify if you'd like the data to be restricted to just the top 5 or bottom 5 results. For e.g., if you're sorting total tickets by status, you can specify that you'd like to see only the top 5 statuses with the most number of tickets, using rank order.


For some properties, you can also specify buckets. For e.g., in Freshdesk, you can specify a range (or bucket) for ticket ID. 


You can also drilldown further into a chart's data. Right click on a chart section to drill down up to 3 levels of data. This is possible if you've applied only 1 group by. 


Visualisations




Freshworks Analytics automatically picks the best visualisation for your data set but if you'd like to change it, use the dropdown to choose your preferred type. 


Here's a breakdown of the options you have, depending on the filters and group by options that you pick.


Saving changes


Once you apply your changes to a widget, you can either save it or use save as to add it to a report. Widgets can be added to other custom-built reports only and not to curated reports.


When you modify the filters for a widget or a report, you need to hit 'Apply' for the changes to be reflected in the widget. If the widget exists in more than one report, you also have the option of having your changes be reflected in just the widget you're working on currently or all instances of the widget. 


Exporting data


You can export the graph data, and tabular data of each widget in CSV format. The graph data gives you the data points extracted by applying your filters. The tabular data option gives you the raw data associated with the metric(s) that you chose. You can view the raw data by clicking on 'View underlying data'. You can choose which columns you'd like to view in the table using the gear button on the upper right corner.


Widgets can be scheduled to be sent to your inbox, at the time interval of your choice (daily, weekly, and monthly) in PDF or CSV form. 





Take me to the Freshdesk, Freshservice, Freshsales, Freshcaller, Freshrelease and Freshteam support portals.