Big Picture: Know What You're Trying to Say

It's vital that your visualization has a purpose. A great way to know if your viz has a purpose is to ask it a question. Next, click around your viz and view it for a while. What answers do you find? What other questions does it inspire?

The following viz is trying to make a point about the importance of company profitability at IPO.

Does your viz actually make that point? Ask it a question and find out:

Q: Does profitability at IPO affect stock performance?
A: You bet it does!
Q: OK fine, but if you remove all of those crazy IPOs from the 1990s, does that change?
A: Yes, but not as much as you might think.