Re: How to invert difference arrows

Kessa · 01-17-2025 06:40 AM

Hi.

We have a report with various chart types in (Tables, Scorecards etc). Apparently there should be an option to tick "Positive values are bad" (see https://cloud.google.com/looker/docs/single-value-options) but the view we have is significantly different to the images shown in that article, and so I'm unsure if the feature has subsequently been removed or the mechanism for managing that behaviour has changed.

To give an example:
The following is a snippet of a table which shows changes in average SEO rankings using data pulled from GSC.

Whilst we can change the colour so that an improvement in ranking would show a green arrow, what we cannot currently seem to do is invert the arrow to point upwards (indicating they are climbing rankings)

Any ideas?

Thanks

ArkadyZagdan

@Kessa
Your doc related to Looker and your screenshot to Looker Studio,
Those are totally different solutions juts similar naming. In looker studio you cannot do this.
A workaround is to compute changes yourself and add additional field with an image of arrow and some simple IF formula like here:

Setting them as two separate cloumns (one close to each other) will allow you to display it like you needed.
Just not sure hwat your data source is. This would be easier to set-up with BigQuery as a data source.

Kessa

Thanks for the clarification re Looker vs Looker Studio. Yes, it's Looker Studio which we're using.

Seems a shame that a data visualisation tool can't do this (especially if other parts of the suite can). Is there a way to request this as a new feature request?

Data sources vary. Some data will come from Ahrefs, some from GSC and some from GA4. Typically it's for changes in ranking where we need to change it so most likely Ahrefs and GSC.

Thanks

ArkadyZagdan

Consider using solution i gave you, its easy to implement and will even give you ability to get rid of custom ugly arrows and actually improve visual part of your table.

Welcome to BI world, where best developers do a lot of work arounds making non existing feutures doable:)