48 - A DataViz is Worth a Thousand Words: Storytelling with PowerBI

CDC’s Division of Birth Defects and Infant Disorders aims to increase effectiveness of its messages, materials, and other communication products spanning several topic areas, including congenital heart defects, spina bifida, fetal alcohol spectrum disorders, and folic acid. To achieve this aim, various metrics are used to assess end-users’ awareness and engagement with a myriad of products (e.g., web pages, social media messaging, downloadable flyers), which is one strategy to help characterize the impact of communications activities. In addition, the use of different data sources ranging from social media metrics to web metrics can become cumbersome to manage over time and given limited evaluation capacity. Therefore, a web-based dashboard was developed utilizing Power BI to integrate metrics from various sources and visually depict awareness and engagement with different products. These visual depictions help staff determine what is working well and better direct resources toward activities with the most reach and engagement. This poster will highlight:

• A process used to organize and create a central repository of communication data


• How to tell a story using a data visualization platform like Power BI


• How monitoring metrics using Power BI can be used to inform communication strategies