How to Make a Radar Chart or Spider Chart in Google Sheets

What is Radar Chart in Google Sheets?

A radar chart or spider chart is a two-dimensional chart showing at least three variables on an axis that starts from the same point. Radar Chart is best used to show outliers in your data. In this blog you will learn how to create Radar Chart in Google Sheets.

Every day, the world creates over 2.5 quintillion bytes of data. Google estimates by the end of 2021, every person will be creating nearly 1.7MB of data!

It is becoming crucial to organize, clean, analyze, and visualize this data to gain the ultimate business advantage.

If you don’t analyze, interpret, and most importantly visualize data, it holds no value in the real world. This is why data visualization is gaining increasing traction.

Essentially, data visualization charts radically change the way you access, present, and use insights to optimize.

The radar chart for Google Sheets is one of many easy-to-read chart examples that promote insight-driven decision-making and many other benefits.

Besides, this chart provides actionable insights into why your clients’ PPC ads perform against the desired objectives and goals.

This blog will walk you through easy-to-grasp and straightforward steps to visualize your data using Radar charts in Google Sheets.

Video Tutorial: How to Make a Radar Chart in Google Sheets

Learn in this video how to make Radar chart in few clicks.

Example of Radar Chart

The radar chart is straightforward to understand and customize. Furthermore, you can show several metrics across a single dimension.

Radar chart is best used for showing outliers and commonality in your data. Here is an example of using Radar Chart on PPC data. You can use radar chart to display performance metrics such as clicks, sessions, new users, and page views, among others.

Attributes (metrics + dimensions) can be easily compared along a single axis. The overall differences are depicted by the size and shape of the polygons, as shown below.

If you take a quick glance at the image above, you’ll notice that clicks outperform the cost per click (CPC) on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.  

Radar charts are considered a better alternative to column charts because they depict multiple variables with clutter-free clarity.

Types of Radar Charts for Google Sheets

• Single Axis Radar Charts for Google Sheets

Single-Axis radar charts can be used to compare multiple attributes to find differences or commonalities.

There are 3 distinct cases you can use a single-axis radar chart, namely:

• Uncovering the reach or distribution between variables.
• Comparing multiple variables to find commonalities.
• Visualizing past and current data set for in-depth insights.
  
  

• Dual Axis Radar Charts for Google Sheets

The dual-axis radar chart allows you to plot data across a very defined and limited range, such as:

• Days of week
• Hours of day
• Months of the year etc.

The Dual-axis Radar chart is a remarkable choice, especially when you want to compare two metrics across the defined limits.

The two metrics appear as blob-like shapes in the middle of the radar.

This shape reflects the performance across the limits you’ve set. You can also use this visualization chart to compare past and present performance of the same metric.

How can you create Radar charts in Google Sheets?

Google Sheets is a cloud-hosted spreadsheet with similar functions as Excel. This app is designed to facilitate data entry, editing, and collaboration for teams that may be apart.

Google Sheets is one of the commonly used analytics tools by small and medium-sized businesses and PPC ad agencies.

Google Sheets is free, and it’s bundled together with other freemium products, such as:

• Google Drive
• Docs
• Slides to share files, documents, and presentations online

Google Sheets come with a Radar chart template that’s very basic, less intuitive, and most importantly, time-intensive to set up.

Try it out and experience the above statement first-hand.

You need pretty advanced spreadsheet skills to visualize your clients’ ad campaign data using Radar charts in Google Sheets.

Pay-per-click (PPC) managers are very busy people forced to wear many hats to accomplish their business and clients’ goals.

They have to undertake various recurring tasks, such as keyword analysis, tracking key metrics, and optimizing ad campaigns continuously for exponential returns, which is not an easy undertaking.

Customizing the Radar charts generated by Google Sheets to fit your immediate needs is relatively problematic.

Google Sheets is not the tool you want to rely on fully to handle your massive campaign data. The freemium app is susceptible to human error, especially if vast amounts of data are involved.

Stick a little longer to discover the solution.

What’s the Solution?

What’s the Solution?

Well, there’s highly affordable data visualization tool called ChartExpo capable of visualizing your campaign data using its massive library of charts, including Radar charts.

This AI-driven data visualization tool comes as an easy-to-install add-on that integrates seamlessly with Google Sheets.

What’s ChartExpo Add-on for Google Sheets?

ChartExpo is an easy-to-use Google Sheets add-on you can use to visualize your data.

With just a few clicks, you can transform your gigantic data into a Radar chart to see the whole picture.

How to Create a Radar Chart or Spider Chart in Google Sheets?

You can create Radar Chart in Google Sheets very easily just by following simple step by step guide. Remember, you won’t be installing anything on your device.

You’ll be installing a cloud-hosted add-on on your Google Sheets.

To get started with ChartExpo for Google Sheets add-on, follow the simple and easy steps below.

• • Open your Google Sheets desktop application.
  • Open the worksheet and click on the ‘Add-ons’ menu.
  • You’ll see the ‘ChartExpo’ option in the dropdown menu.
  • Click on ‘ChartExpo’ to install your Add-on.

• • If you don’t, please click on the ‘Refresh’ button.
  • Again select ChartExpo add-on and click on the ‘Insert’ button.
  • Once the add-on will be added to the Google Sheets application, you can open the ChartExpo.
  • Click Create New Chart button to continue.

• Once you’re fully set, you’ll see an extensive library of visual charts categorized into different groups.
• More so, you can expand any group by clicking on it to see a list of available visualizations.

How to visualize your data using a Radar Chart

• Single Axis Radar Chart

Imagine you’re running a Google Ads campaign on behalf of your client. You want to know your hourly expenditure.

The easiest way to evaluate your performance with regard to ad budget is to compare your past spending data with the current one.

This is where the Radar chart comes in to help you fill voids in your story.

Let’s use this chart to visualize sample data to map out the patterns in spending with regard to overall campaign performance.

On the left, there’s a table with ad budget spending data.

Let’s power up the ChartExpo in Google Sheets to visualize the data.

Let’s recap of how to unleash the power of Radar visualization in Google Sheets using ChartExpo.

• Click Add-ons > ChartExpo > Open and then PPC Charts.
• Look for Radar Charts.
• Select Sheet Name (sheet holding your data).
• Click Add new metric and select the Column with a numerical value (Count).
• Clicked Add New Dimension button and then select required dimension column.
• Click on Create Chart……BOOM! You have your beautiful Radar chart.

Let’s Look at the Insights

It seems the current spending is incredibly high between 9 am and 7 pm. This could be because the competition is raising the average CPC by bidding more at peak times to maximize conversion.

The spending has more than tripled compared to previous data. This is a critical insight that your client would be interested to know.

• Dual Axis Radar Chart

Imagine you’re running a campaign for a client that deals with sneakers. Your client is interested in knowing the average cost per click (CPC) and clicks for the past week for planning and budgeting purposes.

The screenshot below shows a sample PPC data.

The first column has the day of the week (DoW) data. The second and third columns have CPC and clicks, respectively.

Let’s power up the ChartExpo add-on for Google Sheets to visualize the data above for insights.

Follow the instructions below:

• Click Add-ons > ChartExpo > Open and then PPC Charts.
• Look for the Dual Axis Radar Chart.
• Selected Sheet Name (the sheet that’s holding your data).
• Click Add New Metric button
• Select Avg CPC and Clicks column
• Click Add New Dimension and select the column with Day of Week.
• Click Create Chart

What are the Insights?

It’s incredibly easy to compare the performance of clicks (the orange shape) and the average cost per click (blue) for each day of the week.

Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday are performing very well with regard to clicks.

There’s a possibility that during the aforementioned days, there’s a surge in conversions of sneakers as well. This campaign should be optimized to maximize the clicks generated during these days.

Tuesday seems to be a disastrous day for the campaign because the competition drives average CPC to unprofitable levels.

There’s a lot of ad budget wastage during the aforementioned day.

Essentially, the Radar chart above tells you to avoid the days where the average CPC is higher than clicks to mitigate ad budget wastage.

What are the Benefits of Using ChartExpo?

• ChartExpo has an in-built library with over 50 custom charts designed purposely for pay-per-click (PPC) management.

Among those charts is the Radar chart.

• • ChartExpo add-on for Google Sheets comes with a free 7-day trial. Essentially, if you’re not satisfied with the tool within a week, you can opt-out as quickly as signing up for a trial.

• • ChartExpo add-on is ONLY $10 a month after the end of the trial period.

• At ten bucks a month, you get to access over 50 custom charts purposely built for PPC ad agencies.
• ChartExpo is cloud-hosted, which makes it extremely light. You have a 100% guarantee that your computer or Google Sheets won’t be slowed down.
• When you sign-up for a trial to use ChartExpo, you get a free audit on your clients’ PPC ad campaigns.
• You can export your beautiful, easy-to-read, and intuitive charts in JPEG and PNG, the world’s most-used formats for sharing images.

Benefits of Radar Chart

Following are the benefits of radar charts.

Benefit #1: Radar Charts are Incredibly Easy to Understand

You can interpret vast quantities of data clearly and cohesively, thanks to Radar charts.

These charts empower you to understand the data, see interesting perspectives, and draw conclusions quickly.

Using this chart, you can consume important metrics and dimensions of your client’s ad campaigns rapidly.

If any of the metrics or dimensions have anomalies, you can easily spot anomalies on metrics and dimensions for timely optimization.

Benefit #2: You can Use Radar Charts to Spot Patterns

Radar charts empower you to see with ease the emerging trends. This increases your reaction time in mitigating risks and maximizing opportunities.

Trend, shifts, and outliers make more sense when graphically represented. This is because visuals and diagrams make it easier for you to identify strongly correlated parameters.

Certain correlations, associations, and distribution patterns in your PPC data may not be that obvious. You need charts like Radar to help you uncover relationships you didn’t even know existed.

Benefit # 3: Storytelling is More Engaging, Thanks to Radar Charts

A Radar chart is one of the revolutionary visualization charts you can use to create meaningful stories out of your PPC data.

Storytelling is incredibly vital in persuasion and simplifying communication. You can bet on Radar charts to help you communicate engagingly with both your clients and teams. Conveying a message in a story is much more engaging and easier to understand.

You’re more likely to remember images and stories than typical words and numbers.

Benefit #4: Radar Charts Speed up the Decision-Making Process

Humans can process visual images 60,000 times faster than text. A chart is more comfortable for your brain to process than reading text and then convert it into a mental visualization.

Radar can dramatically improve the speed of decision-making processes. According to the Wharton School of Business, data visualization can shorten business meetings by up to 24%.

Why?

It brings clarity to the communication, thus hastening decision-making process.

Benefit #5: Radar Charts Promotes Allocation of Resources Profitably

PPC managers are busy people who need tools that enhances their convenience and saves their time.

They don’t have to sift through humongous PPC data sets to troubleshoot the problems adversely affecting their clients’ ad campaigns.

This is where the Radar charts come in.

Seasoned PPC managers use Radar charts to visualize their data for efficient and insight-driven allocation of time, effort, and ad budgets for maximum returns possible.

Essentially, the Radar charts provide you (PPC manager) with insights into where your resources would produce the most significant effect, i.e., high ROIs or lower costs in your PPC campaigns.

FAQs:

• What is a radar chart good for?

Radar chart is good for when you have limited quality data to compare two or more sets.  This chart is good for displaying hour of day, day of week or similar dimensions based data.

• How do you complete a radar chart?

Radar chart can be completed if it qualifies the exact dimension and metrics required to draw it.

• How do you use a radar chart?

You can use radar chart to compare, contrast and find commonalities in the data based on distribution on different variables.

• How do I edit a radar chart?

If you are using radar chart from ChartExpo library, you can just edit the values in the cells and click on create the chart button again to draw it. You can then click on Edit button to see the pencil icons where you can further click to edit the required properties in chart.

• How do I make a radar chart in Google Sheets?

You can make single axis and dual axis radar chart by using ChartExpo add-on in Google Sheets.

Wrap Up

It’s crystal clear that Radar diagrams are well suited to visualize your campaign data for money-saving insights. These charts are easy-to-read and intuitive.

You can use this chart to streamline your communication with teams and pay-per-click (PPC) clients. Radar charts are designed to offer a bird’s view of your data.

Some of the incredible reasons why you should visualize your clients’ ad campaign data are highlighted below:

Benefit #1: Radar charts are incredibly easy to understand.

Benefit #2: You can use radar charts to spot patterns.

Benefit # 3: Storytelling is more engaging, thanks to radar charts.

Benefit #4: Radar diagrams for Google Sheets speed up the decision-making process.

Benefit #5: Radar charts promotes allocation of resources profitably.

Sign-up for ChartExpo today to visualize your clients’ campaign data using Radar charts for easy communication with your customers and teams.

You have everything to gain and nothing to lose by trying ChartExpo today.