When you need to explain a business challenge to your team, board, or stakeholders, data visualization and storytelling are the best tools for engaging your audience. But with a wealth of available graphs, charts, and infographics, you can easily get creative and lose sight of your goal: To highlight the key takeaway and motivate your audience to action.

To ensure that your message is clear, concise, and empathetic to your audience, start with the question you’re trying to answer, such as “Why are customers churning?” This will help you determine which data points to include and which to leave out to make the story more understandable.

The Art of Data Visualization: Transforming Numbers into Stories

Next, create a plot structure to organize your data story and guide the use of rhetorical devices to signal to the reader what the key takeaways are. For example, a simple chart like a connected scatterplot is good for showing variations in data across two variables, while a priestley timeline chart can show trends over time and is effective for highlighting dates and duration.

Finally, remember that the audience you’re targeting is just as important as the data itself. In fact, they may already have some background knowledge on the subject matter, and you should consider what their current understanding is and how you can build on it throughout your data visualizations and narrative.