Note: This feature will be available on Pro and Enterprise plans only.
Reports in Freshservice Analytics and Project Analytics help monitor service deck performance and improve it by tracking certain industry-accepted metrics and attributes.
Custom Metrics and Custom Attributes are criteria or measures that are specific to a team’s or organization’s requirement and provide a way to measure their performance as defined by its administrators.
Before we dive into the specifics of Custom Metrics and Attributes, let’s start by understanding the basics of metrics and attributes within Freshservice Analytics.
What is a metric?
A metric is a property with a numerical data type that can be measured or operated upon. Metrics represent the effectiveness of a service deck and its processes. For example, Associated Assets Count in the Tickets module is a metric that defines the total number of assets associated with a particular ticket.
What is an attribute?
An attribute is a criteria that can have any datatype (i.e. integer, long text, big decimal, string, boolean, timestamp or date) and is used to organize (filter or group by) data to allow further drill down for better analysis. For example, Urgency is an attribute and data can be grouped by low, medium or high urgency.
Why do we need custom metrics & attributes?
Freshservice Analytics has an exhaustive list of metrics and attributes used to build reports and widgets by default. However, we acknowledge that not all businesses measure performance the same way.
With custom metrics and attributes, we let you define your own metrics and attributes by applying arithmetic and logical operators (like +, &, <, !=) and a variety of functions (like DAY, FLOOR, REPLACE, ISNULL) on existing metrics & attributes.
Custom Metrics
How to create custom metrics?
Within the Freshservice UI, navigate to Analytics > Settings > Custom Metrics.
Click on ‘Create Metric’. On the ‘New Metric’ page, give a Name and add a small Description (optional) to the new metric.
Choose the Module under which you want to create the metric.
Next choose a Default Date Dimension from the available options. A Date Dimension is the timeframe within which the value of a metric or attribute is considered in any report. The chosen default date dimension is applied whenever a time period is specified without selecting a date range dimension.
Under the Formula section, you can configure the metric by applying different functions & operators on the columns existing in that module.
Columns: Field values/default metrics present in the data.
Functions: Includes date functions (like DATEDIFF_HOUR, YEAR), number functions (like CEIL, LEAST), string functions (like LEFT, REPEAT) and logical functions (like BETWEEN, ELSE_IF) that can be performed on columns.
Operators: Includes arithmetic operators (like +, -, *, /) & logical operators (like &, <, !=, >=).
The filter dropdown can be used to ensure that the filter condition/s is/are satisfied whenever the said metric is used in a report. The user needn’t additionally apply this condition in the group-by options available on the report configuration section, thus making sure the right conditions are applied by default whenever the custom metric is chosen.
Once you have entered the formula, you can check if the syntax is correct with the ‘Check Syntax’ button. The word ‘Valid’ will be displayed if the syntax is right. You can preview the metric in the Preview section.
Finally, click on ‘Save Metric’.
Example of a custom metric:
Let’s say, a customer wants to calculate the Total Interactions recorded between the customer and the agent for tickets. For this the user needs to specify the module as Tickets and enter the formula : Agent Reply Count + Customer Reply Count
Watch this video to see how this custom metric is created
The newly created custom metric will be available in the metric dropdown along with all other default metrics.
How to delete a Custom Metric
Within the Freshservice UI, navigate to Analytics > Settings > Custom Metrics.
From the three dots drop down menu, choose the ‘Delete Metric’ option.
Once the custom metric is deleted, the widget that used that metric will return a ‘Data Error’ message as shown below. Data related to the deleted custom metric will be removed from the underlying data as well.
Custom Attributes
How to create custom attributes?
Within the Freshservice UI, navigate to Analytics > Settings > Custom Attributes
Click on ‘Create Attribute’. On the ‘New Attribute’ page, give a Name and add a small Description (optional) to the new attribute.
Choose the Module under which you want to create the attribute.
Select a Data Type, to define whether the new attribute will be an integer, long text, big decimal, string, boolean, timestamp or date.
Under the Formula section you can configure the attribute by applying different functions and operators on the columns existing in that module
Columns: Field values/default metrics present in the data.
Functions: Includes date functions (like DATEDIFF_HOUR, YEAR), number functions (like CEIL, LEAST), string functions (like LEFT, REPEAT) and logical functions (like BETWEEN, ELSE_IF) that can be performed on columns.
Operators: Includes arithmetic operators (like +, -, *, /) & logical operators (like &, <, !=, >=).
The filter dropdown can be used to ensure that the filter condition/s is/are satisfied whenever the said attribute is used in a report. The user needn’t additionally apply this condition in the group-by options available on the report configuration section, thus making sure the right conditions are applied by default whenever the custom attribute is chosen.
Once you have entered the formula, you can check if the syntax is correct with the ‘Check Syntax’ button. The word ‘Valid’ will be displayed if the syntax is right. You can preview the attribute in the Preview section.
Finally, click on ‘Save Attribute’.
Example of a custom attribute:
Let’s say, a customer wants to view most reopened tickets (let's name the attribute 'Maximum Reopened Tickets') data filtered for only those tickets that were reopened 10 times or more. For this the customer needs to specify the module as Tickets and enter the formula: Reopen Count >= 10
Watch this video to see how this custom attribute is created.
The newly created custom attribute will be available in the group by dropdown along with other default attributes.
How to delete a Custom Attribute
Within the Freshservice UI, navigate to Analytics > Settings > Custom Attributes.
From the three dots drop down menu, choose the ‘Delete Attribute’ option.
Once the custom attribute is deleted, the widget that used that attribute will return a ‘Data Error’ message as shown below. Data related to the deleted custom attribute will be removed from the underlying data as well.
