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Custom Metrics

Suite

Customer Experience Employee Experience Strategy & Research

Product

Qualtrics

What's on this page

About Custom Metrics

Custom metrics are created in the dashboard’s settings. You can use custom metrics to build equations based on one or more data fields. This allows you to create a single custom metric that pulls in data from different fields in your dashboard.

Note that custom metrics are not project-wide; they will only be available in the dashboard where you created them and in copies of that dashboard.

Feature Availability

Custom metrics are only available in the following types of dashboards:

Creating a Custom Metric

You can create as many custom metrics as you’d like. To create a custom metric:

Navigate to your dashboard settings by clicking the gear icon.

Go to Custom metrics.

in the custom metrics section of dashboard setttings, creating a new metric

Click Add custom metric.

Enter a Metric label so you can identify your custom metric.

Click the Equation box to begin building your custom metric’s equation.

You can now start building your equation. In most situations, you will start with an existing field from your dataset. To do this, click Metric.

By default, a count metric will be added to your equation. If you wish to use a metric besides count, click on Count to bring up the metric editing menu.

Click on the Metric dropdown box to choose a different metric.

Attention: Do not select Subset Ratio from the Metric dropdown when you create a Custom Metric. Instead, see the linked section in order to add a Subset Ratio Metric.

If a metric requires an additional field from your dataset, be sure to choose the correct Field that you want used in your custom metric.

Qtip: You can also filter your metric by switching to the Filters tab when choosing a metric.

Choose the Calculation Level for your metric, which determines the data included in the widget:

Default: Calculate data at the most granular level applying all row, column, or axis dimensions.
Total: Calculate data at the widget level, ignoring all row, column, or axis dimensions.
Parent: Calculate data one level up from the most granular level, using the parent row, column, or axis dimension.

Qtip: “Calculation Level” replaced an option called “Ignore Breakouts.” The same widget behavior is accomplished by selecting “Total” for the calculation level.

Click Save.

Build your custom metric by using the different mathematical functions and metrics.

using math equations to build the custom metric

Click Save when your equation is complete.

Qtip: If you see a red triangle with a “!” inside of it, this means that the equation is currently invalid. Check to make sure you do not have unnecessary mathematical functions or two metrics next to each other that are not separated by mathematical functions. Both of these instances could cause the equation to be invalid.

Adding a Custom Metric to a Widget

Click the page editing icon.

For a widget you want to add a custom metric to, enter the widget editing pane in one of the following manners: either create a new widget or click on the Edit button of a pre-existing widget.

When you are in the widget editing pane, click the Add button in the Metrics section.

Add Metric button in left hand editing pane. Count is the default metric

By default, the metric will be count. Click on the Count metric.

Select the Metric dropdown.

Hover over Custom metrics.

Select the custom metric you want to report on.

Subset Ratio Metric

Qtip: This metric is available on line, horizontal bar, vertical bar, and table widgets in CX and EX dashboards. Although this page specifically relates to CX, the directions for using the subset ratio metric are consistent across both CX and EX dashboards.

If you would like to display a proportion of values in a line, bar, or table widget, we recommend that you use a subset ratio metric instead of a custom metric. Subset ratios are especially useful in Brand Experience dashboards and can help reduce load times.

Keep in mind that when selecting the numerator and denominator for the ratio, each respective field will be independent. The numerator will represent one count metric, regardless of the denominator you choose (although they can be related), and vice versa. In other words, the subset ratio metric can be thought of as (Item 1 count) / (Item 2 count), where Item 2 does not automatically tie Item 1 to the proportion.

When reporting on imagery attributes in line and bar charts, the base size needs to be set to the number of people who are aware of the brand. For example, you may want to create a custom metric that takes the number of people who selected a specific brand in an attribute question and divide by the number of respondents aware of the brand. The subset ratio metric makes it easy to calculate this proportion by automatically selecting the correct numerator and denominator.

Qtip: The numerator and denominator fields must be numeric or have numeric recode values. Numeric values, number sets, text sets, and multi-answer text sets that can be recoded as numeric values are compatible with the subset ratio metric. This includes measure group fields with one of those fields types. For example, a text set field labeled “one” can be recoded as “1” in the dashboard recode editor. Text iQ fields mapped as text sets are not compatible with this metric, since they do not have numeric recode values.

Adding a Subset Ratio Metric to a Widget

Click the edit icon to start editing your dashboard.

Either add a new widget or click on the Edit button of a pre-existing widget.

Qtip: The metric setup for line, bar, and table widgets will be the same.

When you are in the widget editing pane, click the Add button in the Metrics section.

Subset Ratio is selected in the Metric drop down menu while configuring a widget

The default metric is count. Click on the Count metric.

Under Metric, choose Subset Ratio.

Select your Numerator Field.

Qtip: The numerator field should be the present values. In a Brand Experience project, this will be one of the imag questions.

Choose your Numerator Field Data.

Qtip: These values will help you visualize the number of people who selected a specific answer choice. For example, we would choose the specific brands we’d like to analyze, Gartells and Jones.

Select the Denominator Field.

Qtip: The denominator field should be the total values. In a Brand Experience project, this will be the aided question.

Choose the Denominator Field Data.

Qtip: These values will help you visualize the number of people who were aware of a specific answer choice. For example, we would choose the same brands as the numerator values, Gartells and Jones.

Attention: If you are applying the subset ratio metric to a table widget, make sure to adjust the Decimal Places in the Options menu when configuring your metric. This will ensure that you can properly view the subset ratio in your widget.

Compatible Widgets

Below is a list of widgets that have a metrics field. If a widget has a metrics field, you can add your custom metric to it.

Qtip: Even though they allow you to select a metric, neither breakdown tables nor multiple source tables are compatible with custom metrics. Key drivers are also incompatible, as “Outcome Metrics” are not the same as the metrics included in other widgets.

Editing a Custom Metric on a Widget

Click to edit the widget.

Click on the custom metric in the Metrics section of the widget editing pane.

In the first tab named Metric, the label of the metric can be renamed.

In the second tab named Options, you can change the format and the amount of decimal places used when the metric is displayed in the widget. The three formats are number, percent, and currency.

In the Filters tab you can add a filter.

Qtip: Please note that custom metric filters, much like regular metric filters, will override both page level filters and widget filters.

FAQs

How do custom metric filters interact with page filters in BX dashboards?

For custom metrics in BX dashboards, you have the option of changing how metric-level and page-level filters interact when applied simultaneously. More information about this setting can be found on the Filtering Dashboards support page.

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