If you’re looking to gain valuable insight into your company’s data and information, look no further than color-coded maps. These maps assign different colors to specific values, bringing powerful visualization to your organization. Whether sales team development or a political determination, color-coded maps bring key communication to otherwise static data.
With mapping software, individuals, businesses, and volunteer organizations can turn simple spreadsheets into powerful, interactive maps. This visualization brings opportunities for a deeper understanding of data in a simple and easy-to-understand format.
Table of Contents
What are Color-Coded Maps?
A color-coded map helps users visualize different variations in data by organizing different ranges of values into specific colors. Color-coding occurs in several ways, from individual pins to predefined areas like territories, cities, census tracts, or states. Incorporating sales areas, location boundaries, or other personalized boundaries is possible for businesses wanting further personalization. From there, these organizations will display appropriately on the map.
Understanding the Visualizations
Color-coded maps can be complex or relatively simple to understand, with many third-party mapping software capable of producing thematic maps.
Differences Between Color-Coded Maps and Heat Maps
Although both types of maps use color to express a range of values, these maps serve two different purposes overall. A heat map measures the density of a specific value in a geographic location. A core difference with the heat maps is the lack of boundaries on the data. The heat map is inherently less absolute than a color-coded map, making them ideal for qualitative analysis.
The color-coded map is an idea for precise or straightforward analysis. Color-coded maps don’t require interpretation, highlighting specific information with predefined colors.
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How to Apply Color Coding with Mapping Software
Look for mapping software that matches all the features and skills you require to make informed and educated decisions about your business. It’s essential to recognize the popular application Google Maps doesn’t currently offer color-coding capabilities. If you’re looking for a custom Google map, you’ll need to branch out beyond the original application and use a third-party platform.
Once you’ve decided on the software, log into the platform and upload your data to generate a map. The map will generate all points automatically from importing the data, allowing a streamlined application. Use the boundary tool within the interface to color code the map. Alternatively, you can use the pin markers with the grouping function to establish map coloring.
The Benefits of Color-Coded Maps
Understanding the benefits of color-coded maps is imperative, but not a singular definition. There are countless options available, resolving any problem or situation that requires an established relationship between geography and data’s value. For example, sales and marketing teams might use color-coded maps to determine territories or track regional sales volumes. The sales team might use the maps to establish new or undefined markets, integrating population density or demographics into the mapping functionality.
Teachers, students, and academics can observe deeper insight in spreadsheet data, including educational areas like geography, ecology, and sociology. These maps are popular within economics, building a better understanding of results through powerful visualizations.
Color-coded maps can track or predict voter turnout, qualify election results, and forecast outcomes from a political standpoint. These maps are standard with media outlets wanting to highlight election results.
Finally, government or public health agencies often use color-coded maps when measuring a variable’s effect within a specific region. Public health often uses these maps to track disease, illness, or transmission rates according to geographic area. For example, monitoring vaccine rates within a state or establishing demographics for new services can provide extensive insight into the planning or execution phases.
Conclusion
Getting a better understanding of your data often requires an individual to look at the contents differently. Maps can connect businesses with their current customers in a simplified way. Color-coded maps connect individuals to their existing data in a way that’s easy to understand and navigate. Users can focus on a specific component or evaluate the entire sales process with a few clicks.
Although Google Maps doesn’t currently offer color-coded maps, many reliable mapping programs directly integrate the application into the software. The integration brings users the same look and feel of Google with the professional features of outside software.
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