Build good, interesting and valuable data analysis reports or dashboards (with Flipside and Velocity)
This article describes how you could build useful dashboards for data analysis and what should be included. It focuses on what kind of content a good dashboard needs and how to structure this content. The whole article is in the context of Flipside Crypto and Velocity, but could maybe also be useful for others.
What is Flipside Crypto?
Flipside Crypto offers free on-chain data for various crypto projects and provides free analytics and tools to the crypto community. With Flipside you can learn about new crypto projects, their data and how to handle those data with SQL to build exciting analyses. Besides this, you have the opportunity to earn some money or tokens while solving bounties and exploring these projects and data. If you are interested in doing bounties, just read my two other articles about doing bounties and Scavenger Hunts.
What is Velocity?
Velocity is an application of Flipside Crypto, on the one hand, a database (with all the data of different crypto projects) and on the other hand a presentation tool to display the generated data, graphs and also explanatory texts in useful dashboards. Ideal for creating data analysis reports.
How to build a good dashboard?
Generally, writing a good report is not super difficult, and it helps to have a plan and a structure on how to do this. A good structure for a data analysis dashboard (and maybe for a lot of other types of articles) is the following:
Intro, Methods, Analysis, Conclusion and Appendix.
This should be your basic setup for a dashboard. I will add to this structure, refine it and briefly explain what should be there.
What you should always have in mind is, that your data analysis report or dashboard is written for several different audiences at the same time and not everyone has the same knowledge and background!
So try to give readers all the (summarized) information and context they need to understand your analysis as easily as possible.
Therefore, I always try to follow these steps …
1. Do some research
Deal with the project (or blockchain) the bounty is about. Visit its website, Twitter, Discord, etc. and read about the project, get to know it, try it out and understand it. Only now you can analyze and understand the data. Make some notes!
Example Bounty: Terra — The Red Planet
I would at least visit the following websites to learn about the Terra Blockchain and the specific project Mars Protocol.
Please do not just copy & paste descriptions from other sites!
Instead of that, write down what you understood in a few sentences, that is good enough!
- Visit Mars Protocol on Twitter
In this case, I found additional valuable information on Twitter:
Now we know, that Mars protocol has just launched on March 7th. Make a note!
2. Understand the question(s)
Read the bounty description and questions carefully and think about the project in the context of the questions. Make some notes!
In this example bounty ‘Terra — The Red Planet’ you have to answer at least the following two questions or bullets:
- Define 2 metrics of your choice
- Interpret these metrics and infer how the Mars Protocol is doing
Often there are additional hints which help and make it easier for you to answer the questions!
Important: If you still do not understand the question(s), no problem, just go to Flipside Crypto Discord and ask for clarification. But please don’t ask for answers or results, that is your job!
3. Make a plan
Think about what you want to analyze and what you could add to make the analysis more interesting and meaningful. Write down some notes! Make a list of data or charts which you want to analyze and show.
- Define a timeframe, Mars Protocol has launched on March 7th. So the timeframe could be between March 7th and 31st. So all data we use is in this timeframe.
- Have a look at deposits and borrows because this is the main feature of Mars. In this case, it could be the number of wallets interacting with Mars or the value of deposits and borrows as metrics.
- Another metric could be the $MARS token price chart in this timeframe.
Important: Update your plan if you have any findings or ideas during the analysis! Make some notes!
4. Structure your dashboard
To save time in the future and not forget anything, you should define your own dashboard template and create it as a dashboard in Velocity. You can then simply duplicate it in the future whenever you want to create a new analysis.
Overview: I usually put the bounty title and the most important questions there.
Introduction: First of all, define the creation date of your data analysis. Then briefly describe the blockchain and/or the project of the analysis in your own words! Please do not just copy & paste descriptions from other sites! Describe the methods, data and time period you will use in the analysis in a few bullets.
Data Analysis: This section should contain all charts, insights and findings of your analysis.
Please don’t post just your query results in this section! Instead of this add some nice content. Use meaningful headlines, lable your charts, describe your charts and write about insights and findings after your charts.
For more details, please read Sam's excellent Bounty Dashboard Guide!
Conclusion: Write a compact summary of your analysis, answer the initial questions and add insights and findings.
Appendix: If used, list all your external sources here.
Contact data*: If you publish your analysis and want to get feedback or give people the chance to connect to you, add your contact data like Twitter, E-Mail, Discord, etc. … So readers know who created the analysis and have the possibility to ask questions and get into an exchange about the topic with you. *This part is for sure optional!
5. Fill your dashboard with content and finish it
Please do not just copy & paste descriptions from other sites or queries from other users!
Add all the sections from ‘4. Structure your dashboard’ and make it look nice and smooth!
Check your content to see if everything you wanted is in there, format the text, add images, label the charts, add sources … and finalize your dashboard!
Congratulations, you finished your dashboard! 🎉
Now it should be ready for submission and hopefully, you’ll get a high score in grading!
Thanks for reading!
Example dashboard
This is an example of a Gran Prize-winning dashboard for the bounty ‘Solana — Magic Eden Volume Trends’: https://app.flipsidecrypto.com/dashboard/solana-magic-eden-volume-trends-_bQvW0
Good resources
Sams bounty dashboard guide: https://teamflipside.notion.site/teamflipside/Bounty-dashboard-guide-442c0a79e7c04fc3b5a0b0c4d95f2133
If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to ask in the Flipside Crypto Discord.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/der_piper
