Which dashboard or KPI tool should a small business use?
Google's Data Studio, the free tool many still call Looker Studio, for most small businesses: it reads Google Sheets, Analytics, Ads and many other sources and shares a live report by link at no cost, with Data Studio Pro at $9 per user per project a month only when the company must own the reports. Power BI suits a team that already works in Excel and Microsoft 365: build on a free account, then share with Power BI Pro at ₹1,165 per user a month paid yearly, GST extra, and every viewer needs a licence. Metabase is free and open source if a developer can host it beside your database, and its hosted Starter plan is $100 a month. Zoho Analytics fits a business whose books and CRM already run on Zoho. Rule: write down the five numbers you check every Monday, put them in a Google Sheet, and point Data Studio at it before you buy anything.
Google's free dashboard tool, sold as Looker Studio for a few years and now called Data Studio again. It connects to Google Sheets, Analytics, Ads and many partner sources, and shares a live report by link.
Google Cloud's page for Data Studio states the self-service tier is at no cost and Data Studio Pro is $9 per user per project a month, adding team ownership of reports and admin controls.
Microsoft's India pricing for Power BI: a free account to build reports, Power BI Pro at ₹1,165 per user a month paid yearly to share them, and Premium Per User at ₹1,995, GST extra.
Metabase is open-source business intelligence: the self-hosted edition is free with unlimited users and dashboards, and the hosted Starter plan is $100 a month ($90 billed yearly).
Lenny distills how the best product teams pick a single North Star that captures real customer value and drives the whole growth model, with concrete company examples.
