Charting User Growth

How to chart user growth? Sounds like a simple question. Yet I got asked a number of times on the topic. It may not be as straightforward as one might have thought. Seems no one is documenting it. So I decided to write it down.

What is user growth?
- it is not the count of active users per month/week/day and the accumulation thereof.
- it is the accumulation of unique users along time.

It takes 3 steps to do it. We will use the Superstore as the data set for illustration in charting the growth of customers who ordered products from the superstore.

1.Find the first time when the user activity is recorded.

• [First Order Date]={fixed [Customer Name]: min([Order Date])}

We will use [First Order Date] as the date axis.

2.Count the first time users

• CountD(Customer Name)

3.Calculate the running total of the above count of customers.

Right click the CountD(Customer Name) pill and select the Running Total in Quick Table Calculations.

Voila it's done. Click the image below to access the viz. Included also is a step chart version. Zen Master Rody Zachovich used it in a recent viz. Tableau will integrate it in the coming version 2018.1 already.