5 Tiny Tips to get the most out of Tableau Public
It’s a new year — and that means at time of writing I’ve seen plenty of chatter about data viz resolutions. Whether your goal is to get started in the community, participate in different data viz challenges, maybe enter Iron Viz for the first time — if you’re using Tableau Public I want to make sure you’re getting the most out of the platform. So whether you want to post one viz this year or one hundred (if that’s you, please make sure to go outside once in a while) here are my top 5 tips for making the most of your online experience:
1. Check your settings
If you haven’t yet, check out https://public.tableau.com/app/profile-settings. Here, you can set some key defaults — including your profile url (I have mine set to the same as my social media handles), and visualization permissions. I have mine set so that:
- Allow Downloads and Copies — On. I benefit greatly from downloading other’s work — not to plagiarize, but to crack workbooks open to see how others did something. No shame in stealing techniques!
- Show Published Visualizations on Profile —Off. Since you can’t save locally on Tableau Public, I’m in the habit of saving early and saving often. This means I save first drafts that are far from ‘done’ but don’t want them published to the activity feed yet. By keeping this off, I can toggle my vizzes back ‘on’ individually once I’m happy with them.
2. Follow and Favorite
Tableau Public is a great resource for inspiration — but to get inspired you need to follow folks whose work inspires you! Not sure where to start? I recommend checking the list of featured authors (which updates regularly). Then click to see who they’re following — I do this to find folks outside my current data viz ‘bubble’.
Now that you’ve followed folks, when you log in to Tableau Public you’ll see a section called “Recent Activity” which shows all vizzes published or favorited since the last time you logged in. Which brings me to my next point — favoriting. Hitting the star will not only save a viz to your favorites for you to reference later, but will surface vizzes to the activity feed of the people that follow you. If you think someone’s viz is inspiring, give it a star!
3. Web Edit is your friend
When I started learning Tableau in 2019, Web Edit had nowhere near the functionality it does today. More and more features we’re used to having only on desktop are available on web edit, to the point you can do a decent amount of vizzing without ever having to download anything. That said, here’s what I find myself using it most often for:
- Adding hyperlinks to text
- Making adjustments to the layout of floating objects, or resizing objects
- Cracking open a viz to copy calculations to use elsewhere without needing to download/open a whole new workbook
4. Don’t neglect the Title and Description fields
When you publish your workbooks, you have to give them a name. But did you know you have more than just the title to give context to your viz? You have 231 characters in the “Viz Description” field to tell others more — this is a great spot to include features you used or hashtags for a community project. And if you don’t like the title you originally chose, or just want to make it a little more searchable, you can edit it directly from the Edit Details section instead of needing to republish your viz.
The inspiration field is a great spot to give credit to other’s work that’s inspired you, and the external link is perfect for if you have a blog or other site where your viz is published or embedded.
While Title is the only required field of the bunch, crediting others is a great way to give back to the community, which is an incredible free engine for learning and discovery.
5. Share your work externally
As much as I love the activity feed on Tableau Public, I have found added value in also publishing my work to other spaces, not only to share what I’m excited about, but also solicit feedback to improve my work. Based on where I currently hang out online, here are some of my recommendations:
- Twitter / X — if you’re already there, it’s a decent spot to share your work. If you don’t have an account, I don’t think I can in good conscience recommend it like I used to — my user experience has degraded over the last year or so. But I can’t deny that the hashtags are useful, and for better or worse, it’s all public (unless you choose to keep your profile private)
- Bluesky — while it doesn’t have as many users, it does have a growing data viz community. If you’re familiar with the twitter interface, you’ll find the feel of it familiar. No hashtags (yet) but you can follow curated feeds like Data Viz 📊. I’m liking that over there it’s a bit less noisy, and the curated feeds provide a better experience than hoping I get vizzes in my algorithms elsewhere.
- LinkedIn — not my favorite platform, but if you’re hoping to use your data viz portfolio to give you an edge in the job market, it’s worth publishing at least some of your work there. When I first started out in data viz I shared my weekly charts I was making with Makeover Monday — and people at my company took notice and came up to me at work to talk about what they had seen me post. How much you share is up to you, but I recommend adding some commentary about what you learned from making the viz to show how you are developing your skills.
- Slack — if you don’t like the idea of sharing your work for the whole internet to see / comment on, consider joining a slack community. I’m a big fan of the Data Visualization Society and Women in Dataviz spaces. Both offer specific channels to showcase your work, as well as ask for feedback. Since there’s no character limit on replies, you’re able to have different conversations than public facing forums offer.
These are just where I’m at — but the Tableau #DataFam is everywhere, so if you prefer discord, reddit, your work #tableau channel, or another forum, the world is your oyster!
Bonus tip: if and when you choose to solicit feedback, be specific about what you’re looking for! I’ve gotten better feedback when I’m specific (ex: “does the chart I used make my point clear?” or “is the layout intuitive” vs “feedback welcome”), and I’m able to give better feedback when I know what the author wants help with. For more about feedback, I’ve curated some resources here: Link Hoarding: Feedback.
That’s all for now! See you on the internet👋
