Getting Started with Flarelight: Your First Data Analysis

Welcome to Flarelight! This comprehensive guide will walk you through creating your first data analysis project from start to finish. Whether you're new to business intelligence tools or an experienced analyst, you'll find Flarelight's no-code approach intuitive and powerful.

We've created a complete video tutorial series that demonstrates how a small business (a hair salon) can turn everyday Excel data into actionable insights using Flarelight. Follow along with the videos below, or use this guide as a reference.

Video Tutorial Series

This tutorial series uses a real-world example: "The Hair Studio" — a busy salon tracking appointments in Excel. You'll learn how to transform messy spreadsheets into AI-powered analytics and automated reporting.

Playlist: Flarelight Tutorial Series: Hair Salon Data Made Simple

Part 1: How to Import and Clean Your Data

In this first video, you'll learn how to:

• Connect Flarelight to real Excel data using the Flarelight DataLink Add-in
• Import data directly from Excel spreadsheets
• Review and identify data quality issues (missing values, typos, inconsistencies)
• Use Flarelight's visual data preparation tools to clean your data
• Filter out test data and fix common data issues

Key takeaway: Flarelight makes it easy to connect to your existing Excel files and automatically identify data quality issues that need attention.

Part 2: How to Quickly Get Value from Your Data

Once your data is clean, it's time to create your first dashboard:

• Build an interactive report dashboard with KPI widgets
• Create visualizations (pie charts, bar charts) to understand your data
• Run statistical analyses to reveal insights
• Add summary statistics to your dashboard
• See immediate value from your data

Key takeaway: You can go from clean data to meaningful insights in just minutes with Flarelight's drag-and-drop interface.

Part 3: Deeper Analysis and AI Insights

Take your analysis to the next level:

• Customize dashboard layouts for better visibility
• Add interactive filters and drill-down capabilities
• Create clustered bar charts for multi-dimensional analysis
• Generate point-in-time report snapshots
• Use AI to automatically generate comprehensive insights from your dashboard

Key takeaway: Flarelight's AI can analyze your entire dashboard and provide summaries, takeaways, and recommendations automatically.

Part 4: Automation

Automate your entire workflow:

• Set up automated data processing pipelines
• Configure triggers to run when new data is uploaded
• Automatically generate new dashboard versions each month
• Review execution history and monitor your automations

Key takeaway: Once configured, you can get fresh dashboards every month by simply uploading new data — no manual work required.

What You'll Learn

By following this tutorial series, you'll master:

• Data Import: Connect to Excel files using the Flarelight DataLink Add-in
• Data Preparation: Clean and structure messy data with visual tools
• Dashboard Creation: Build interactive reports with drag-and-drop widgets
• Data Analysis: Run statistical analyses and uncover insights
• AI-Powered Insights: Automatically generate summaries and recommendations
• Automation: Set up workflows that run automatically when new data arrives

Real-World Scenario: The Hair Studio

Throughout this series, we follow "The Hair Studio" — a salon tracking:

• Stylists: Maria, Jess, Alex, Sam, Taylor
• Services: Haircut, Color, Highlights, Styling, Treatment
• Appointment types: Normal, Private
• Customer types: New, Returning

The owner wants to answer questions like:

• Which stylists generate the most revenue?
• Do private appointments really pay off?
• Are certain months or services driving growth?

By the end of the series, you'll have a complete automated workflow that answers these questions and more.

Getting Started

Ready to try it yourself? Here's what you need:

1. A Flarelight account — Start for free
2. The Flarelight DataLink Add-in — Install from Microsoft AppSource
3. Your data — Any Excel spreadsheet with business data

Next Steps

After completing this tutorial series, explore more advanced features:

• Set up integrations with other data sources (SQL databases, APIs, Google Sheets)
• Create custom data models and calculated fields
• Build predictive analytics models
• Set up scheduled reports and email notifications
• Share dashboards with your team

Subscribe for More Tutorials

Want to stay updated with new Flarelight tutorials and tips? Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get notified when new videos are released.

Conclusion

Flarelight makes data analysis accessible to everyone, regardless of technical expertise. With its no-code interface and AI-powered assistance, you can go from raw data to actionable insights — and even automated reporting — in just a few steps.

The tutorial series above shows you exactly how, using a real-world example that you can follow along with. Start with Part 1 and work your way through to automation!

Ready to get started? Start for free and begin your data journey today!