Beyond Platform Analytics

Shopify, WooCommerce, and BigCommerce have built-in analytics. So why build a separate dashboard? Because platform analytics are limited. They show you what happened in their walled garden, but not the full picture of your business.

A custom dashboard lets you combine data from multiple sources (orders, marketing spend, inventory, support tickets), calculate metrics your platform doesn't offer (contribution margin, cohort retention), and share insights with team members who don't need platform access.

Preparing Your E-commerce Data

Export your order data from your platform. Most e-commerce systems offer CSV/Excel exports. Key fields to include:

Order Data:

Order ID - Unique order identifier

Order Date - When placed

Customer ID/Email - Who ordered

Product SKU - What was ordered

Product Name - Item description

Category - Product category

Quantity - Units ordered

Unit Price - Price per item

Discount - Coupon/promo value

Shipping - Shipping charged

Total - Order total

Status - Fulfilled, refunded, etc.

Customer Data:

Customer ID - Unique identifier

First Order Date - Acquisition date

Location - City/country

Acquisition Source - How they found you

Building the Revenue Dashboard

Start with the metrics every store owner checks first. Upload your order data and use this prompt:

"Create an e-commerce revenue dashboard showing daily revenue trend, orders per day, average order value, revenue by product category, and top 10 products by sales. Add comparison to previous period and filters for date range."

Key revenue visualizations:

Revenue trend: Line chart showing daily/weekly revenue
Order count: Number of transactions over time
AOV trend: Average order value changes
Revenue by category: Where money comes from
Period comparison: This month vs last month, YoY

Product Performance Dashboard

Understand which products drive your business:

"Build a product analytics dashboard showing top sellers by revenue and units, product category breakdown, best and worst performing SKUs, product trends over time, and frequently bought together analysis."

Product analysis views:

Top Sellers Leaderboard

Rank products by revenue, units sold, and profit margin. Know your heroes and underperformers.

Category Performance

Revenue and margin by product category. Which categories are growing or shrinking?

Product Velocity

How quickly products sell after listing. Identify trending items early.

Bundle Analysis

Which products are frequently purchased together? Opportunity for bundles and upsells.

Customer Analytics Dashboard

Customer insights are where e-commerce dashboards shine:

"Create a customer analytics dashboard showing new vs returning customer revenue, customer lifetime value distribution, cohort retention analysis, customer acquisition trend, and repeat purchase rate."

Customer metrics to track:

New vs returning: What percentage of revenue from repeat customers
Customer lifetime value: Average revenue per customer over time
Cohort analysis: How do customers from different periods perform
Repeat purchase rate: What percentage buy again
Time between orders: Average repurchase cycle
Customer segments: High-value, at-risk, churned

Geographic Sales Dashboard

Visualize where your customers are:

"Build a geographic dashboard showing revenue by country and city, shipping destination map, regional growth trends, and delivery performance by location. Identify high-potential markets."

Geographic insights:

Revenue by country: Where orders come from
City-level breakdown: Urban concentration
Regional trends: Growing and declining markets
Shipping analysis: Cost and time by destination
Market opportunity: High-traffic, low-conversion regions

Essential E-commerce KPIs

Add KPI cards for at-a-glance store health:

Revenue

Total Revenue
Average Order Value
Revenue per Visitor
Gross Margin

Orders

Total Orders
Orders per Day
Items per Order
Refund Rate

Customers

Total Customers
New Customers This Month
Repeat Customer Rate
Customer Lifetime Value

Conversion

Conversion Rate
Cart Abandonment Rate
Add to Cart Rate
Checkout Completion Rate

Promotional Effectiveness Dashboard

Track how promotions and discounts perform:

"Create a promotions dashboard showing revenue with vs without discounts, coupon code usage and revenue, promotional ROI, discount depth analysis, and promotional period comparison."

Promotional analysis:

Discount impact: Revenue attributed to promotional orders
Coupon effectiveness: Codes by usage and revenue generated
Discount depth: Average discount percentage given
Promotional periods: Black Friday vs regular days comparison
Promo ROI: Additional revenue vs discount cost

Inventory + Orders Dashboard

Combine sales data with inventory for operational insights:

"Build a sales-inventory dashboard showing sell-through rate by product, days of stock remaining, stock vs sales velocity alignment, and potential stockout warnings."

Stockout Prevention

Combine order velocity with inventory levels to predict stockouts before they happen. A simple formula: Days of Stock = Current Inventory ÷ Average Daily Sales. Alert when below reorder lead time.

Time-Based Analysis

Understand when customers buy:

"Create a time analysis dashboard showing orders by hour of day, revenue by day of week, monthly seasonality patterns, and year-over-year trends. Identify peak selling times."

Temporal insights:

Hour of day: When do orders peak? Schedule email sends and ads accordingly.
Day of week: Weekend vs weekday patterns
Monthly patterns: Seasonal trends and holiday spikes
Year-over-year: Growth trajectory

Shipping and Fulfillment Dashboard

Track operational performance:

"Build a fulfillment dashboard showing order-to-ship time, shipping method usage, delivery success rate, and shipping cost as percentage of order value. Highlight delayed orders."

Fulfillment metrics:

Order-to-ship time: How quickly you fulfill
Carrier performance: On-time delivery by carrier
Shipping cost ratio: Shipping as % of revenue
Delivery issues: Lost, damaged, delayed packages

Common E-commerce Dashboard Mistakes

Revenue-only focus: Track margins, not just top-line. A $100 order at 10% margin is worse than $50 at 50%.
Ignoring customer metrics: Acquisition matters, but retention drives profitability.
Missing refund adjustments: Gross revenue is misleading without subtracting returns.
No cohort analysis: Averages hide trends. Track cohorts to see if quality is improving.
Forgetting attribution: Know which marketing channels drive profitable customers, not just traffic.

Example Prompts for E-commerce Dashboards

Try these with your store data:

"Show me which products have declining sales over the last 3 months"
"Create a customer segmentation view with RFM analysis"
"Build a cohort retention chart for customers acquired each month"
"Compare AOV across traffic sources to find highest-value channels"
"Show cart abandonment patterns by time of day and product category"
"Create a promotional calendar view showing sales impact of each promo"

E-commerce Dashboard from Excel: Orders, Revenue & Customer Analytics

What You'll Build