How a Multi-Devices KPI Report App Can Improve Performance

Key performance indicators (KPIs) are metrics that are tracked to determine how a business, project, or even a person is performing. A typical KPI report app could include the number of daily visits that a website gets but also the gross profits made by a business over a period of time.

KPIs are essential because they provide information about whether a company’s goals are being achieved or not. For that reason, you must define them carefully so that they reflect performance in a meaningful and relevant way

Developing the proper KPIs is a whole project in itself since it requires a careful evaluation of the various goals of a business. Once they are set, KPIs can be monitored regularly and used to define new strategies that will help improve performance.

Open as App can play a crucial part in this process. Our no-code app creation platform can help businesses to monitor their KPIs more efficiently. It can also help them define what they should be in the first place. 

For example, you could create a KPI report app which you can use during meetings to draw on the data creatively and set new tasks or goals. You can also use such an app to communicate KPIs to team members and staff. That way, you can make sure that everyone understands them and knows their status.

Alternatively, by creating a survey app, you can reach out to a team to collect data about the proper KPIs to monitor within their particular part of the work process. Or you could request that employees provide you with feedback about their satisfaction – a type of internal human resources KPI for the team. 

These are some of the ways in which you can implement Open as App in your company to help you with tracking or determining your KPIs. Want to learn more about how to define your KPIs and how to create a KPI tracking app with Open as App? Keep reading!

What are KPIs, and how to define them?

Key performance indicators (KPIs) are a type of performance measurement. KPI is a metric that you follow to determine the development and performance of a task, project, or business as a whole. Understanding and measuring KPIs is vital in determining whether you are moving toward your goals or not. 

Apart from serving as indicators, KPIs also have some additional functions. These include:

• Help make your business strategy measurable
• Enable you to communicate your strategy more effectively and cascade that information down into the organization
• Assist you in achieving buy-in from team members to own performance measurement and progress
• Deliver informative and actionable reports that help you zoom in on growth and development
• Get a precise grasp on the status of your project and make informed decisions
• Establish correspondence between goals and measurements and become more skilled and confident in adapting to circumstances

These are some of the possible functions and applications of KPIs. But not every metric is a good KPI for your KPI report. Here is how to determine whether a KPI is useful or not.

What makes a good KPI?

Picking the wrong metric can lead you to misinterpret the signals that you are receiving and throw your whole strategy into disarray. A good KPI is distinguished from a bad one by the following criteria:

Quantifiable

Of course, for something to even be a KPI, it has to be measurable and available to you. If the KPI you pick cannot be quantified in some way or if there is no way for you to even access it as data, then it is not useful. 

Impactful

A good KPI is something that has a significant impact on performance and on the final target. If your KPI does not have a significant effect on your goals, it cannot guide you in your thinking and decisions. If your KPI provides you with information that helps you make important decisions – then it is impactful.

Relevant

Relevancy is a crucial aspect of a good KPI. Technically, an impactful metric is also a relevant one. Yet, it is essential to consider whether you can measure your intended results directly or indirectly. The more directly you can measure them, the more relevant your KPI will be. 

Available 

To be useful, your KPIs need to be available in a timely manner to allow you to change course quickly. If there is a significant delay between your actions and the measurement of their effects, then this KPI is not particularly useful. Of course, how frequently you need to be able to measure your KPIs will depend on your goals. If your goal requires you to have data available at the end of every quarter, then you don’t necessarily need to be able to measure your KPIs daily.

These are some of the criteria that you can use to determine whether a KPI is useful to you or not. So what are the different types of KPIs for KPI reports, and are some better than others?

What are the different types of KPIs?

KPIs are distinguished in several different ways. On the one hand, they differ with regard to the type of metric that is being monitored. Metrics can either be numbers or ratios. 

For example, number metrics can include things like website visits, conversions, or profit (gross, operating, or otherwise). Ratio metrics, on the other hand, are things such as conversion rate, a change in percentage, or return on investment (ROI).

KPIs can also be differentiated on the basis of their purpose. Here they can be divided into business, external, and internal KPIs and, thus, be included in various KPI reports. 

Business KPIs are used for the measurement of a central business goal and are typically determined at the company level. External KPIs are used to measure the performance of goals at the team or department level. Finally, internal KPIs are used to measure the achievement of an internal goal and are typically applied to the performance of individuals within a team.

How to define KPIs for your KPI reports?

To define your KPIs that are worth being included in regular KPI reports, you need to start with your business’s mission and vision and work your way down through your strategy and specific goals. Here’s what this process looks like in a nutshell:

Establish your mission and vision

Your company’s mission and vision are essential in defining how you will act in pursuing your goals. They determine the purpose of your organization, your values, and your core principles.

Define your strategy and goals

After determining the meta-level for your business, you can proceed with defining your core goals and a business strategy. These should detail what it is precisely you wish to achieve with your company in general as well as within a particular timeframe. 

Do you want to increase customer acquisition or sales? Or do you want to decrease certain costs? You need clear and specific goals so that you can determine how to measure them.

Ask key performance questions (KPQs)

Asking key performance questions (KPQs) in relation to your strategy will help you zoom in on the data, you will need to measure performance. Once you sharpen your KPQs, define the data that you need (ideally).

Find the data

After defining the data, you would need to be able to measure your performance, assess the data you actually have. Sift through the data to find those indicators that apply to your goals. Sometimes you may find that several different measurements taken together (as a composite index) add up to the KPI that you are looking for.

Determine how your measurement approach and frequency

When you’ve established what kind of data you need, you need to determine how you will measure it. In addition, you must also determine how often you will measure your data. This depends on how often you will report and review the data you’ve measured.

Delegate KPI ownership

Once you’ve defined your KPIs, you need to assign them to people who will be responsible for the data collection and interpretation.

Communicate your KPIs 

Finally, you need to make sure that your KPIs are clear to everyone within the company or team. This means that you must continually report the purpose of the KPIs as well as the result of their measurement.

These are the main steps that you need to take to define KPIs for your KPI reports. Of course, this process is a lengthy one, and there are many details and extra steps that aren’t covered here. The following below are also some of the common mistakes that companies commit when creating KPIs.  

Common mistakes when setting your KPIs

There are several different mistakes you can commit when creating or implementing your KPIs, and then, of course, your KPI reports might be irrelevant or even be misleading. These include:

• Not aligning your KPIs with your strategy and goals: KPIs need to be relevant, and if they’re not, then they’re of little use.
• Measuring too much: Just because you can measure something doesn’t mean you should. Unnecessary data can overwhelm you and cloud your perception about what’s important.
• Measuring what you think you’re supposed to measure: When creating a KPI, there is always the temptation to simply measure what others in your field are measuring. While that’s not entirely wrong, it can miss the specifics of your business and your particular way (strategy) of achieving your goals.
• Failing to analyze your KPIs deeply: KPIs are sometimes taken as standalone “results” about how the business is doing. This can end up deceiving you about what’s going on and how it relates to your actions. To be meaningful, KPIs need to be analyzed thoroughly and in the context of both targets, benchmarks, goals, and change over time.
• Not assessing your KPIs critically: Just because you settled on a KPI at one point, that doesn’t mean you need to keep measuring it forever. As your strategy changes, so do your KPIs. Challenging your KPIs periodically will allow you to stay in touch with what it is they are designed to measure. 

So how does Open as App fit into this picture, and what can you use it for when creating and monitoring your KPIs in your reports?

How Open as App can help you with your KPI reports

There are several dimensions to keeping up with KPIs in your organization. On the technical side, you need to be able to collect and analyze the data. On the organizational side, you need to communicate the purpose of your KPIs and share and distribute relevant information within your teams. 

Here’s how Open as App can help you with all of these.

Using Open as App to establish KPIs in your organization

Open as App allows you to create KPI report apps from your data. As long as your data is structured in a spreadsheet, database, or log file, you can use our app creation platform with it. 

When you upload or link a spreadsheet to the Open as App platform, it will analyze the structure of the file. It will then allow you to select from a list the type of app you would like to create and customize it. App types supported by Open as App include dashboard apps, calculator apps, survey apps, list apps, and more. 

KPIs are typically tracked in spreadsheets or in Business Intelligence (BI) tools that allow for export in a spreadsheet format. This means that your data is a natural fit with the Open as App platform.

KPI report apps created from your data are also a right way of securing the data and protecting it from leaking or corruption. App creators are given the option to select who they share the app with. If your KPI data is sensitive, you can only share it with stakeholders and executives. Alternatively, you can also share it with the whole organization so everybody can keep track of KPI performance.

Finally, apps are instantly available after creation and are very easy to distribute. This means that you can create several apps within a concise amount of time. After that, you can distribute them to the individuals or teams that they are for with just a few clicks.

Two of the KPI report apps that you can create using our no-code app creation include:

Multi-channel KPI report app

This type of app can provide you with real-time data on the performance of your KPIs. Like all our apps, it can be used as a native app on iOS and Android. It can also be used as a web app on any tablet or computer and integrated as a tab in MS Teams, which is what makes it usable on multi-channels.

This is a convenient app to use during meetings. It allows you to draw on the data immediately and steer the conversation in a meaningful direction. And by adding Excel functionality to the app, you can also simulate KPI trends within the app.

Among other things, you can include a print button in your KPI report app to generate a PDF file and send it out on the spot. You can also include a KPI dashboard that will visualize the data and help you see it in a different way.

Survey app for KPI reports

A survey app can help you to collect data from employees or team members for your KPI reports. For example, it could be used to measure satisfaction (i.e., external or internal KPIs). A survey app can also be used to gather data on employee knowledge and understanding of KPIs. Or, you could create an app to request input when designing KPIs in the first place. 

Collecting data of any kind through an app is significantly more comfortable and handier – both for you and for survey respondents. Providing many respondents with one spreadsheet to fill out often goes wrong. Instead, offering them an app with an easy-to-use interface guarantees that there will be no issues with the answers. It also lets you process and analyze the data much easier. 

These are some of the ways in which Open as App can help you with your KPI reports. You can use the platform to create apps to report KPIs. But you can also create apps that allow you to communicate your KPIs in a better way or to collect data on whether they are useful in the first place.

Are you looking to create your first KPI report app? Go to our app creator, sign up, and get started right away!