Tired of staring at endless Zendesk exports and wondering what’s actually going on with your support team? This guide is for anyone who wants to turn a mess of tickets and tags into dashboards your team will actually use. We’ll walk through connecting Zendesk to Geckoboard, picking the right metrics, and setting up dashboards that make sense—without getting lost in the weeds.
Why bother with dashboards?
Let’s be honest: most teams either obsess over metrics or ignore them completely. The sweet spot is somewhere in the middle—seeing what matters, in a way that’s dead simple to understand. Dashboards help you:
- Spot issues before they become fires
- Keep everyone on the same page
- Avoid wasting time digging for the same numbers every week
If you just want to tick a reporting box for your boss, this isn’t for you. But if you actually want to know how your support team’s doing, read on.
STEP 1: Decide what you really need to track
Before you start wiring up tools, get clear on what you want to see. Zendesk records everything, but most of it’s noise. Here are the support metrics that actually tell you something useful:
- Ticket Volume: How many tickets are coming in? Spikes can signal product issues or a broken process.
- First Response Time: How long do customers wait before hearing back? This is the #1 thing customers get mad about.
- Resolution Time: How fast do you actually solve problems?
- Customer Satisfaction (CSAT): Are customers happy after interacting with support?
- Backlog: How many tickets are sitting, waiting for attention?
- Tag Trends: Are certain issues spiking (e.g., “login problems” or “refund request”)?
Pro tip: Don’t track more than 5-6 metrics on your main dashboard. The rest should go in a secondary view or a weekly report. If everything’s important, nothing is.
STEP 2: Get your Zendesk data ready
You can’t build dashboards on a pile of garbage data. Take five minutes to make sure Zendesk’s set up in a way that won’t make your dashboard a dumpster fire.
- Check your tags and ticket fields. Are they consistent, or is “Password” sometimes tagged as “pw” and sometimes as “password-reset”? Clean it up.
- Make sure you’re actually collecting CSAT surveys. No survey, no satisfaction data.
- Double-check ticket statuses. If agents forget to close tickets, your “resolution time” will be meaningless.
If something’s a mess, fix it now. It’s way harder to clean up once you’ve automated reports.
STEP 3: Connect Zendesk to Geckoboard
Now for the fun part—actually connecting the two tools.
- Sign up or log in to Geckoboard. If you’ve never used it, there’s a free trial. Don’t buy anything until you’ve seen whether it works for you.
- Add a Zendesk data source:
- In Geckoboard, click 'Add widget', then find and select Zendesk.
- You’ll be asked to connect your Zendesk account. You’ll need Zendesk admin access for this.
- Authorize Geckoboard to pull your Zendesk data. Yes, it’s safe—Geckoboard doesn’t let you edit or delete Zendesk tickets from their side.
- Select the data you want to use. Geckoboard lets you pull in:
- Tickets (by status, group, assignee, etc.)
- Satisfaction ratings
- Metrics like first response time, resolution time
- Custom fields and tags
Honest take: The Zendesk integration in Geckoboard is way easier than building your own reports or wrangling spreadsheets. But it still has limits—you can’t slice and dice as much as you could in a BI tool. For most teams, that’s fine. If you need ultra-custom metrics, look elsewhere (and be ready for more work).
STEP 4: Build your first useful dashboard
Here’s where most people get stuck: they add 15 widgets, and nobody ever looks at the dashboard again. Don’t be that team.
1. Pick a clear layout
Start with a single dashboard. Put your top 3-4 metrics in big, obvious spots. Hide the rest—or make a second dashboard for more detail.
Example layout:
- Top left: Ticket volume (today, this week, and trend)
- Top right: First response time (average, with goal line)
- Bottom left: Resolution time (average, with trend)
- Bottom right: CSAT score (with breakdown)
If you must, add a table of “tickets by tag” underneath. But only if someone will actually look at it.
2. Add widgets (the right way)
In Geckoboard:
- Click ‘Add widget’
- Choose Zendesk as the source
- Select the metric (e.g., “Number of new tickets today”)
- Pick the visualization: number, line chart, bar, gauge, etc.
- Set filters (by group, status, or tag) if you want to focus on a specific team or issue
Pro tip: Don’t just show averages. Highlight outliers or trends. For example, if response time spikes on Mondays, make that obvious.
3. Set up goals and thresholds
It’s easy to get lost in numbers. Add a goal line or color rule so you can see at a glance if you’re on track.
- Is your CSAT above 90%? Good—make it green.
- Did response times jump above 2 hours? Turn it red.
- Backlog crossed 50 open tickets? That’s a problem—make it obvious.
STEP 5: Share your dashboard (or don’t)
Dashboards are only useful if people actually see them.
- Display on a big screen: Most teams put a dashboard up on a TV in the office or share a live link in Slack.
- Schedule snapshots: Geckoboard lets you email daily or weekly snapshots. Handy for managers who ignore live dashboards.
- Lock down sensitive data: If you have personal or customer info, use Geckoboard’s sharing settings to restrict who can view.
Reality check: If nobody asks about the dashboard in a week, it’s probably not useful. Ask your team—what do they actually care about? Adjust as needed.
STEP 6: Iterate, don’t set-and-forget
Your first dashboard won’t be perfect. That’s fine.
- Review it monthly. Are you still tracking what matters? Has the team changed focus?
- Drop metrics that nobody uses. Don’t keep “average handle time” just because it sounds impressive.
- Add new widgets only when you have a clear question. (“Are refund requests spiking this month?”)
Don’t get fancy for the sake of it. The best dashboards are boring, obvious, and actionable.
What to ignore (and what to watch out for)
Ignore: - Vanity metrics like “total tickets ever.” Nobody cares. - Widgets just because they look cool. Don’t add a pie chart for the sake of it. - Overly granular filters—if you need a microscope to see a trend, it’s not dashboard material.
Watch out for: - Data lag. Geckoboard updates Zendesk data every few minutes, not instantly. - Inconsistent tags. If agents tag things differently, your charts will be garbage. - Dashboard blindness. If people stop noticing the dashboard, it’s time to change it up.
Keep it simple, keep it useful
Dashboards aren’t magic—they just make what’s happening more visible. Start small, focus on what actually helps your team, and don’t be afraid to kill metrics that nobody cares about. Iterate until the dashboard sparks real conversations. That’s when you know you’ve got it right.