If you’re responsible for getting your sales team the info they actually need—without burying them in fluff—this is for you. Fancy dashboards are everywhere, but most aren’t built for the way real sales teams work. We’re going to cut through the noise and show you how to use Browse to set up dashboards your team will actually use. You don’t need to be a data scientist. But a little planning goes a long way.
Step 1: Figure Out What Your Sales Team Actually Needs
Don’t jump straight into Browse and start dragging widgets around. Take 20 minutes to talk to your sales team first. Ask:
- What numbers do you check every day? (Pipeline? Closed deals? Activity?)
- What’s a pain to track right now?
- What do you wish you had on one screen?
Write down the answers. You’ll probably get a mix of the usual suspects (pipeline, conversion rates), some personal requests (“Can I see my own numbers next to the team’s?”), and maybe a few oddballs. Don’t try to please everyone, but spot the patterns.
Pro tip: If you build a dashboard that tries to show everything, nobody will look at it.
Step 2: Get the Data Ready
Dashboards are only as good as the data behind them. Browse is pretty flexible, but garbage in, garbage out.
Before you get fancy:
- Make sure your sales data is up-to-date and clean. If your CRM is a mess, fix that first.
- Decide where your data will come from. Browse can connect to spreadsheets, databases, or direct integrations. Don’t overcomplicate it. If your team lives in Google Sheets, start there.
- Test a small sample. Import a week’s worth of data and make sure it shows up right.
If you’re fighting with missing fields or weird formatting, sort that out now. You don’t want to troubleshoot broken charts later.
Step 3: Set Up Your First Dashboard in Browse
Alright, now the hands-on part. Log in to Browse and head to the Dashboards section.
- Click “New Dashboard.” Give it a name that makes sense (not “Sales Dashboard 2024 Final FINAL”).
- Choose your data source. Pick the integration that matches where your sales data lives.
- Add your first widget. Don’t add ten at once—start with one or two of the most important metrics.
- Pick the right chart type. For example:
- Pipeline totals: Simple bar or funnel chart.
- Closed-won vs. lost: Pie chart or stacked bar.
- Individual rep performance: Table or leaderboard.
- Configure filters. Let users filter by date, rep, region, or whatever matters most.
Pro tip: Resist the urge to make everything a chart. Sometimes a good old-fashioned table says more than a donut graph ever will.
Step 4: Customize for Clarity (Not Flashiness)
It’s easy to get lost in colors, animations, and fancy layouts. Don’t. The best dashboards are boring but clear.
- Limit the number of widgets. 5-7 per dashboard is plenty. More than that, and people tune out.
- Use plain labels. “Deals Closed This Month” beats “Q2 Revenue Performance Snapshot.”
- Arrange widgets by importance. What do you want people to see first? Put it at the top.
- Choose colors carefully. Use color to highlight, not decorate. Red for trouble, green for good—don’t overthink it.
Ignore anything that looks cool but doesn’t help someone make a decision. If you’re not sure what a widget adds, leave it out.
Step 5: Share and Get Feedback
Don’t just email a link and hope for the best. Schedule 15 minutes with your team. Walk through the dashboard together.
- Ask what’s useful.
- What’s missing?
- What’s confusing?
You’ll get some honest (possibly brutal) feedback. That’s good. If your reps ignore a widget, kill it. If they ask for something specific, see if you can add it.
Pro tip: Dashboards are never “done.” Treat them like a work in progress.
Step 6: Set Up Alerts or Scheduled Reports (If You Really Need Them)
Browse lets you set up alerts or scheduled reports. Use this sparingly. Alerts are great for things like:
- When a big deal closes
- When the pipeline drops below a threshold
- When activity tanks
But don’t go overboard. If people get 10 emails a day, they’ll just ignore them.
What to ignore: Most sales teams don’t need real-time dashboards. Hourly updates are overkill unless you’re running a call center. Daily or weekly is usually plenty.
Step 7: Lock Down Permissions
You don’t want everyone seeing everything. Browse has decent permission controls. Decide:
- Who can edit dashboards?
- Who can only view?
- Do you need private dashboards for managers?
Set this up before you roll it out to the whole team. Mistakes here can lead to awkward conversations if someone sees data they shouldn’t.
Step 8: Keep It Simple—and Iterate
You’ll get requests for more dashboards, more filters, more everything. Don’t say yes to all of it. Start small. See what people use. Iterate every month or so.
- Remove unused widgets.
- Add what’s genuinely helpful.
- Archive dashboards nobody opens.
Your goal isn’t to make a dashboard that does everything—it’s to make one that gets used.
Summary
Custom dashboards in Browse aren’t magic, but they can save your sales team a ton of time—if you keep things simple, focus on the metrics that matter, and treat feedback as a feature, not a bug. Don’t try to build the ultimate dashboard on your first try. Build, test, tweak, repeat. That’s how you make something your team will actually use.