Getting started with Zendesk Explore: Hands-on tutorial

<body>
<p id="docs-hc-snippet" style="display: none;">In this article, you’ll use what you've learned in thegetting started guideto create and share a simple Zendesk Explore dashboard that reflects a common business scenario.</p>
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<p class="p" dir="ltr">In this article, you’ll use what you've learned in the <a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408831710618-Getting-started-with-Zendesk-Explore" target="_blank">getting started guide</a> to create and share a
simple Zendesk Explore dashboard that reflects a common business scenario. </p>
<p class="p">This dashboard shows the following information:</p>
<div class="p">
<ol class="ol">
<li class="li">For each agent in your organization, show the number of tickets assigned to
them.</li>
<li class="li">Give the ability to filter the tickets by status. For example, for a selected
agent, show only their tickets in a solved state.</li>
</ol>
</div>
<div class="note tip">
<span class="tiptitle">Tip:</span> These steps are an introduction to the basic workflow of creating and sharing a
dashboard. However, we encourage you to experiment. If you want to choose different
metrics and attributes, change the chart type, or wonder what an option does, try
it!<p class="p">If you need more help with anything you find, take a look at the <a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408846357018-Zendesk-Explore-resources" target="_blank">Zendesk Explore resources</a>
article.</p>
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<p class="p">This article contains the following sections:</p>
<ul class="ul" id="topic_drj_4pd_t2b__ul_ycf_prh_x2b">
<li class="li"><a class="xref" href="#topic_acg_3qd_t2b">Before you start</a></li>
<li class="li"><a class="xref" href="#topic_uqw_jvd_t2b">Step 1: Create a report</a></li>
<li class="li"><a class="xref" href="#topic_qtr_nvd_t2b">Step 2: Create a dashboard</a></li>
<li class="li"><a class="xref" href="#topic_ztf_pvd_t2b">Step 3: Share your dashboard</a></li>
<li class="li"><a class="xref" href="#topic_jnj_rvd_t2b">Next steps</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title2" class="topic nested1" id="topic_acg_3qd_t2b">
<h2 class="title topictitle2" id="ariaid-title2">Before you start</h2>
<div class="body">
<p class="p">Before you can complete this walkthrough, ensure that:</p>
<div class="p">
<ul class="ul" id="topic_acg_3qd_t2b__ul_s5n_jqd_t2b">
<li class="li">Zendesk Support contains ticket and agent data. While Explore integrates
with all Zendesk channels, for this example, you'll use the <strong class="ph b">Support:
Tickets</strong> dataset. If you are just starting with Zendesk, the reports
you generate might not show much data for the first few days.</li>
<li class="li">Your user account is set up to use Explore. Additionally, ensure you have
the <strong class="ph b">Admin</strong> or <strong class="ph b">Editor</strong> user role. For more information, see <a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408836002970-Adding-users-to-Explore" target="_blank">Adding users to Explore</a>.</li>
</ul>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title3" class="topic nested1" id="topic_uqw_jvd_t2b">
<h2 class="title topictitle2" id="ariaid-title3">Step 1: Create a report</h2>
<div class="body">
<p class="p" dir="ltr">In this step, you'll create a report that asks questions about your
business data in Zendesk Support. You'll start by connecting to a
<em class="ph i">dataset</em>.</p>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title4" class="topic nested2" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b">
<h3 class="title topictitle3" id="ariaid-title4">Get started</h3>
<div class="body">
<ol class="ol" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b__ol_byc_syd_t2b">
<li class="li">Click the Zendesk products menu in the top bar, then select
<strong class="ph b">Analytics</strong>.</li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">Click the <strong class="ph b">Reports</strong> icon (<img alt="reports button" class="image" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b__image_ikb_n23_x2b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore_query_icon.png" width="16">) in the sidebar.</li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">On the <strong class="ph b">Reports</strong> page, click <strong class="ph b">New report</strong>.</li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">On the <strong class="ph b">Select a dataset</strong> page, choose <strong class="ph b">Support</strong> &gt;
<strong class="ph b">Support - Tickets</strong>, and then click <strong class="ph b">Start report</strong>.</li>
</ol>
<p class="p" dir="ltr">The report builder opens with a blank report.</p>
<p class="p"><img alt="Blank report page" class="image img-screenshot" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b__image_mqx_hr3_x2b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore-444.png" width="750"></p>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title5" class="topic nested2" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b1">
<h3 class="title topictitle3" id="ariaid-title5">Define the report's metric</h3>
<div class="body">
<p class="p" dir="ltr">The first thing you need to add is the metric for this report. This
means what you are measuring. In this example, it’s the total number of tickets
stored in Zendesk Support. Perform the following steps to define your report's
metric.</p>
<ol class="ol" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b1__ol_fyc_syd_t2b">
<li class="li" dir="ltr">In the <strong class="ph b">Metrics</strong> section of the report builder, click
<strong class="ph b">Add</strong>. </li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">From the list of Metrics, expand <strong class="ph b">Tickets</strong>, choose
<strong class="ph b">Tickets</strong>, then click <strong class="ph b">Apply</strong>. </li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">Explore takes the metric you added, and automatically displays
results based on it. </li>
</ol>
<p class="p" dir="ltr"><img alt="Simple Explore query" class="image img-screenshot" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b1__image_ywv_n5h_x2b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore_gsg_query.png" width="850"></p>
<p class="p">While simple (a count of how many tickets you have), it’s a good example of how
Explore dynamically displays results based on your metrics and attributes. Now,
you can add attributes to get more interesting results.</p>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title6" class="topic nested2" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b2">
<h3 class="title topictitle3" id="ariaid-title6">Define the report's attributes</h3>
<div class="body">
<p class="p">Now that you’ve defined your report's metric, you’ll make this report more
interesting by adding some attributes. First, you’ll add a column to the report
so you can see which agents are assigned which ticket.</p>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title7" class="topic nested3" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b3">
<h4 class="title topictitle4" id="ariaid-title7">Add the assignee name</h4>
<div class="body">
<div class="p">
<ol class="ol" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b3__ol_kyc_syd_t2b">
<li class="li" dir="ltr">In the <strong class="ph b">Columns</strong> section, click <strong class="ph b">Add</strong>.</li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">From the list of attributes, expand <strong class="ph b">Assignee</strong>, choose
<strong class="ph b">Assignee name</strong>, and then click <strong class="ph b">Apply</strong>. </li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">Once again, Explore automatically processes the change you’ve
made, figures out the best way to present it (in this case, a bar
graph), and displays your results.</li>
</ol>
<img alt="Adding a column to an Explore query" class="image img-screenshot" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b3__image_csz_nvh_x2b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore_gsg_column.png">
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title8" class="topic nested3" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b4">
<h4 class="title topictitle4" id="ariaid-title8">Add the ticket status</h4>
<div class="body">
<p class="p" dir="ltr">Remember that we also want to be able to filter the results by the
ticket status. For example, we might want to only display tickets for ‘Robert
Stack’ with a status of Solved.</p>
<ol class="ol" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b4__ol_nyc_syd_t2b">
<li class="li" dir="ltr">In the <strong class="ph b">Rows</strong> section, click <strong class="ph b">Add</strong>.</li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">From the list of attributes, expand <strong class="ph b">Ticket</strong>, choose
<strong class="ph b">Ticket status</strong>, and then click <strong class="ph b">Apply</strong>. </li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">Once again, Explore recalculates the report and displays the
results. Now, when you choose a ticket status, you’ll see only the
number of tickets with that status for each agent.<div class="p">
<div class="note note">
<span class="notetitle">Note:</span> You can select one or more of the Ticket Status items, or
select them all by clicking the <strong class="ph b">Ticket Status</strong>
heading.</div>
</div>
</li>
</ol>
<p class="p" dir="ltr"><img alt="Adding a row to an Explore report" class="image img-screenshot" id="topic_rfn_sw4_z2b4__image_lkv_fwh_x2b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore_gsg_row.png" width="850"></p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title9" class="topic nested2" id="topic_rl1_dy4_z2b">
<h3 class="title topictitle3" id="ariaid-title9">Name the report</h3>
<div class="body">
<p class="p">Explore automatically names the report when you save it. In the case of the
example report above, Explore saves it as <strong class="ph b">COUNT (Tickets) crossed with Ticket
status per Assignee name</strong>. You can either use this name, or give the
report a name of your own.</p>
<p class="p"><strong class="ph b">To name the report</strong></p>
<div class="p">
<ol class="ol" id="topic_rl1_dy4_z2b__ul_zvc_txh_x2b">
<li class="li">In the report builder, click the report name text.</li>
<li class="li">Enter a name for the report (for example, New test report).</li>
</ol>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title10" class="topic nested2" id="topic_rl1_dy4_z2b2">
<h3 class="title topictitle3" id="ariaid-title10">Save the report</h3>
<div class="body">
<p class="p">Now you have a completed the report, make sure that you save it. If you close
your browser, or navigate to another page without saving, your changes will be
lost.</p>
<div class="p">
<ol class="ol" id="topic_rl1_dy4_z2b2__ol_fyw_rwh_x2b">
<li class="li">In the report builder, click <strong class="ph b">Save</strong>.</li>
<li class="li">You'll see a confirmation message to indicate your report was
saved.</li>
</ol>
</div>
<div class="note tip">
<span class="tiptitle">Tip:</span> You can also save a report directly to a new dashboard by
selecting <strong class="ph b">Add to Dashboard</strong>.</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title11" class="topic nested1" id="topic_qtr_nvd_t2b">
<h2 class="title topictitle2" id="ariaid-title11">Step 2: Create a dashboard</h2>
<div class="body">
<p class="p">Usually, after you've created reports, you’ll want to group a bunch of them together,
add some interactivity (for example, selecting a date range), and add other text and
graphics to make a really great looking report. In this step, you’ll learn how to
make a dashboard from the reports you created in Step 1.</p>
<p class="p">There are two ways to create a dashboard. You can save a report right into a new
dashboard, or you can create the dashboard first, and then add in the report. In
this example, you’ll use the second method.</p>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title12" class="topic nested2" id="topic_s2d_hw4_z2b">
<h3 class="title topictitle3" id="ariaid-title12">Get started</h3>
<div class="body">
<ol class="ol" id="topic_s2d_hw4_z2b__ol_v4n_d14_52b">
<li class="li" dir="ltr">Click the Zendesk products menu in the top bar, then select
<strong class="ph b">Analytics</strong>.</li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">In the sidebar, click the dashboards icon (<img alt="Dashboards button" class="image" id="topic_s2d_hw4_z2b__image_sp2_yd3_x2b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore_dashboard_icon.png" width="16">).</li>
<li class="li" dir="ltr">On the <strong class="ph b">Dashboards</strong> page, click <strong class="ph b">New dashboard</strong>.</li>
</ol>
<p class="p">A new, blank dashboard opens in the dashboard builder.</p>
<p class="p"><img class="image img-screenshot" id="topic_s2d_hw4_z2b__image_vt4_fb4_52b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore_gsg_blankdashboard.png"></p>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title13" class="topic nested2" id="topic_s2d_hw4_z2b1">
<h3 class="title topictitle3" id="ariaid-title13">Add a widget</h3>
<div class="body">
<p class="p">If you've read <a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408831710618-Getting-started-with-Zendesk-Explore" target="_blank">Getting started with Zendesk Explore</a>,
you'll know that <em class="ph i">widgets</em> add information and interactivity to a
dashboard. Widgets might include a report, an image, and interactive elements
like a date chooser.</p>
<p class="p">The most important widget you need in this dashboard is your report. Use the
following steps to get the report onto your dashboard:</p>
<div class="p">
<ol class="ol" id="topic_s2d_hw4_z2b1__ol_zs3_vb4_52b">
<li class="li">In your blank dashboard, click <strong class="ph b">Add</strong> &gt; <strong class="ph b">Add report</strong>.</li>
<li class="li">On the <strong class="ph b">Add report</strong> page, click the report you created in <a class="xref" href="#topic_uqw_jvd_t2b">Step 1: Create a report</a>, then click <strong class="ph b">Add
reports</strong>.</li>
<li class="li">After a moment, the report will be displayed on your dashboard.</li>
<li class="li">Click and hold in the title bar of the widget to move it where you want
it on the dashboard.</li>
<li class="li">Select the widget, then drag any corner or edge to resize the
widget.</li>
</ol>
</div>
<p class="p">Finally, give your dashboard a title like <strong class="ph b">People and tickets analysis</strong>.
Double-click the existing title (on a new dashboard, it will read
<strong class="ph b">Untitled</strong>), then enter your new title. You'll end up with something
that looks like the following:</p>
<p class="p"><img class="image img-screenshot" id="topic_s2d_hw4_z2b1__image_ifx_b24_52b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore_qsg_draft33.png" width="850"></p>
<p class="p">You've now created a simple dashboard. We encourage you to explore all of the
settings and widgets on the Dashboard page. There is a lot you can do! </p>
<p class="p">For example, you could add a graphic containing your company logo, change the
colors and fonts used, or create and add more reports. If you want some starting
points for further exploration, see <a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408831595418-Adding-a-new-dashboard" target="_blank">Creating dashboards</a> and <a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408819770906-Customizing-your-dashboard" target="_blank">Customizing dashboards</a>.</p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title14" class="topic nested1" id="topic_ztf_pvd_t2b">
<h2 class="title topictitle2" id="ariaid-title14">Step 3: Share your dashboard</h2>
<div class="body">
<p class="p">In the previous lesson, you created a dashboard but, currently, only you can view it.
To get the most from it, you will likely want to share it with others. There are a
number of ways you can do this (see <a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408827282714-Sharing-dashboards" target="_blank">Sharing dashboards</a>), but as you are
already in the dashboard builder, you'll use that here.</p>
<div class="p">
<ol class="ol" id="topic_ztf_pvd_t2b__ol_hcj_y24_52b">
<li class="li">In the dashboard you created, click <strong class="ph b">Share</strong>.<p class="p"><img alt="Explore share dashboard button" class="image img-screenshot" id="topic_ztf_pvd_t2b__image_gt1_bc3_x2b" src="https://zen-marketing-documentation.s3.amazonaws.com/docs/en/Explore_gsg_share.png"></p>
</li>
<li class="li">In the <strong class="ph b">Share dashboard</strong> list, choose the Zendesk groups who you want
to share this dashboard with.<div class="note tip">
<span class="tiptitle">Tip:</span> <em class="ph i">Groups</em> are collections
of users that you set up in Zendesk Support. For details, see <a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408894175130" target="_blank">Creating groups</a>.</div>
</li>
<li class="li">Click <strong class="ph b">Invite</strong>.</li>
</ol>
</div>
<p class="p">After a few moments, the people you invited will receive an email with the subject line "(<em class="ph i">your
name</em>) has shared a Zendesk Explore dashboard with you". If they click the
<strong class="ph b">Start Exploring</strong> link in the email, they will see the dashboard you
created.</p>
<p class="p">Finally, an important point to remember. If you make changes to this dashboard after
you share it, you'll need to click <strong class="ph b">Publish</strong> to make the changes visible to
anyone you shared the dashboard with.</p>
</div>
</div>
<div aria-labelledby="ariaid-title15" class="topic nested1" id="topic_jnj_rvd_t2b">
<h2 class="title topictitle2" id="ariaid-title15">Next steps</h2>
<div class="body">
<p class="p">These steps have covered the basic Zendesk Explore workflow. However, Explore is a
powerful product that gives you many capabilities to query, present, and share your
business information. To continue learning about Explore, visit the following two
links:</p>
<div class="p">
<ul class="ul" id="topic_jnj_rvd_t2b__ul_mgb_lwd_t2b">
<li class="li">
<a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408831710618-Getting-started-with-Zendesk-Explore" target="_blank">Getting started with Zendesk
Explore</a> - Contains overview information about Explore, and links
to more in-depth information.</li>
<li class="li">
<a class="xref" href="https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408846357018" target="_blank">Zendesk Explore resources</a> -
Contains links to Zendesk and community tips to help you get the most from
Explore.</li>
</ul>
</div>
</div>
</div>
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