Data is all we have, it’s how business runs today. It’s often said that data is the new world currency, and the web is the exchange bureau through which it’s traded. As a result, for the designer it’s becoming increasingly difficult to present data in a way that stands out from the mass of competing data streams. This can be done using a map data.
By visualizing information, we turn it into a landscape that you can explore with your eyes, a sort of information map. And when you’re lost in information, an information map is useful. Mapping is the biggest subsection of data visualization types.
The key to mapping and data visualization is finding hidden patterns and trends quicker. In business, the faster you see a negative trend, the faster the leadership team is able to respond and handle that issue.
Here are a few examples of data visualization maps.
Choropleth maps are one of the most frequently used maps in infographic style visualizations. As the name suggests, color is the important part to these maps. A color scale is assigned to categorical or numerical data, and the value for each region is used to color the region.
Symbol maps typically use circles or some other simple shape centered on each region. The size of the shape is connected to quantitative data. One common variation on the method is to use pie charts in place of the shape in order to add more data to a single map. Sometimes these maps suffer from occlusion problems, however this can often be alleviated with translucency and appropriate scaling of the symbols.
Pinpoint maps show the exact location of things. These are becoming more and more popular as more data sources include exact location. Twitter posts and Flickr photos are commonly mapped this way. Another ubiquitous version of this map is searchable maps like google maps that show the exact location of the items you searched for.
Connection maps are similar to pinpoint maps, although they have a small addition. The points have connections between them. In many examples of this technique, the connections are abstract (like phone calls or tweet replies), so the connections are represented with an arc or straight line. These maps are essentially graph or network data that has been drawn with a geo-spatial layout.
Become a data detective by finding hidden patterns. There may be a very interesting and odd pattern hidden in this data that you can only see when you visualize it.
To learn more about how GeoMetrx can help your business find hidden patterns, contact us.