This is part two of our three part series on how to analyze half a million customer complaints. Read part 1 here.

Analyzing Regional Trends

As introduced in part 1, our complaints dataset has geographical information too. We know the state & zip code for each complaint. Please note that zip codes are partial or missing for a 10% of the data.

In this article, let’s explore three ways to analyze regional trends.

1. Regional trends by state, product & issue
2. Complaints per million by state
3. Complaints by zip code

Continue reading →

How would you analyze data when you have lots of it? That is the inspiration for this series.

Let’s meet our data – Finance Industry Consumer Complaints

As part of open data initiatives, US government & Consumer Financial Protection Bureau maintain a list of all consumer complaints made against financial institutions (banks, credit unions etc.) You can download this data from the catalog page here. I have obtained the data on 1st of February, 2016. The download has 513,824 records. Each row contains one complaint.

In this and next two parts of the series, we are going to analyze these half a million complaints to find insights. Continue reading →

Lets look at how to apportion sales according to multiple criteria Continue reading →

In case, this is the first time you are hearing about Excel formula wildcards, check out the Using wildcards in Excel VLOOKUP formula tutorial.

So you know about wild cards like * ?, now how would you tell VLOOKUP to ignore them?

Say, you are genuinely interested in looking the value “* Payroll” in a lookup table. What then?

This is exactly the problem faced by Peter in our forum post VLOOKUP and cells with “*” NOT to be interpreted as wildcard Continue reading →

In case, this is the first time you are hearing about Excel formula wildcards, check out the Using wildcards in Excel VLOOKUP formula tutorial.

So you know about wild cards like * ?, now how would you tell VLOOKUP to ignore them?

Say, you are genuinely interested in looking the value “* Payroll” in a lookup table. What then?

This is exactly the problem faced by Peter in our forum post VLOOKUP and cells with “*” NOT to be interpreted as wildcard Continue reading →

In the 52nd session of Chandoo.org podcast, let’s discuss monkeys, Ok, I am kidding. We are going to talk about M is for Data Monkey book.

What is in this session?

In this podcast,

• Updates: Why so much gap between episodes?
• Quick introduction to Power Query
• Why you should get this book?
• What is in this book?
• A very cool example of the techniques you will learn
• Conclusions

Continue reading →

Hi friends & readers of Chandoo.org

I am very happy to invite you to our newest online class, 50 ways to analyze your data. This program is aimed to make you an awesome analyst, training you on vital skills like data analysis, data science, visualization of outputs, modeling business problems and finding best solutions.

Please take a few minutes to read this. If you are interested in the program, sign up for the waiting list. Continue reading →

Most advanced Excel users know that slicers are cool. Today, let’s learn how to use slicers to create an awesome selection mechanism for your dashboards and forms.

First see a quick demo

Looks slick, eh? Read on. Continue reading →

Few personal things are keeping me away from the blog & podcast. I promise to be regular from next week. Meanwhile, just a quick announcement.

I am doing an AMA (Ask Me Anything) on Reddit India website this Friday at 5PM (Indian time). More info here.

What is an AMA?

As the name suggests, it is an interview where you can ask me anything and I answer thru Reddit comments.

Who can participate?

Anyone. You just need a reddit account to ask. Continue reading →

Productivity requires a solid foundation if the methods are going to be successful. Just like every building must have a solid foundation if it is going to remain standing, productivity must also have a solid foundation unless you want it to crumble underneath you.

We are in a ten-article series on the foundations of productivity. Today we will look at another fundamental rule: focus on one thing. Continue reading →