Old habits die hard. One of my 2018 new year resolutions is to reduce talking about myself online. I have talked too much about every tiny bit of my life the past four years that I want to try not talking anymore and put more effort into doing. That is why you have stopped receiving daily blog posts from me. 

Then again, old habits die hard.

Since the last time I talked about myself -- getting into IoD (Institute of Directors), trouble with VIO (my car finally passed on 3rd retry) and French adventures -- a lot has happened in my life.

1. I lost my phone (pickpocket guy) and bought the most amazing phone I have ever had. An LG G4 with camera module. It's camera is WOW. Got it at a crazy deep discount (approx. 60% discount) at SLOT.



See a picture I took with it

Where I stayed In South Africa
2. Executed Power BI consulting project in Ghana and South Africa (same client). Not sure I have cool pictures from the Ghana one. The host company folks were very nice and took me to very nice places in Ghana and South Africa. I went to the tallest building in Ghana where one of the company staff lives, Villagio and the bar on the roof (Skybar). Ate at amazing Chinese restaurant (Imperial Peking Chinese Restaurant).
Tried out the local Ghanaian dishes

The view from on top Skybar (the cars and all look like Christmas light)
In South Africa, I went to the popular Mandela Square. Ate at Butcher's Shop, The Baron and Hard Rock cafe.

Took advantage of my IoD benefits to use SDS lounge at MMA (paid a ridiculously low amount due to deep discount for IoD members)

The Game of the Day (animal in the pics) I ate at Butcher's Shop
Nelson Mandela Square

Me, in jeans 😀

On the very street I stayed
3. We now Have Two Full-Time Staff. They are simply the best! And business is getting better and better. Thinking of adding a third full-time staff. I still have other non full-time team members. In fact, the two full-time staff used to be non full-time team members. Our business monthly overhead/expenses is now over N500,000. I am now learning to not just lead a team but build a proper company. Thanking everyone of you who has morally and technically supported me thus far.

4. My Power BI book is on fire on Amazon. Sales are like I have never experienced for all my prior books combined. Almost, everyday I am generating sales across the e-book and more expensive print version.



You can grab your copy at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B078NF5XYP 

5. I got a new Microsoft Certification this month. Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP). Did the qualifying exam last year but result just came out a few days ago. I am now on course (just one remaining exam away from MCSA BI Reporting certification).


Done with the 70-779 exam, 70-778 is left to earning the MCSA BI reporting certification






Now you can get iTunes Cards extremely easily and pay in Naira from www.usitunescard.com The cards are valid for US iTunes account only.

And here is a personal story that led to this.

It all started in 2013 (or so) when I needed to buy a movie on iTunes and it was no small trouble. Many contents aren't available for the Nigerian iTunes account. The changing your country to US makes those contents available but then you have to pay with a US debit card (one with a US billing address). After hours and days of troubles, I ended up buying a US iTunes gift card and loading on my US iTunes account.


Soon, I started buying more gift cards. And then I noticed that there would be people like me needing such cards too. So I did a market entry test. And was amazed by how much demand there is for US iTunes cards, even had a few people contact me from outside the country (India, Pakistan etc). Seems the problem isn't just here in Naija.

So I have now built www.usitunescard.com to solve that problem easily for all Nigerians.

I sell the cards at almost the same amount it costs to get them directly from Apple (actual face value). Added the Paystack transaction charge and accommodation for exchange rate fluctuation but it still comes at less than N400/$ to the buyer/customer. While others on Konga and other e-stores are selling as high as a rate of N600/$ and more.


$5 iTunes card sells for N1,999
$10 iTunes card sells for N3,999
$15 iTunes card sells for N5,999
$25 iTunes card sells for N10,999
$50 iTunes card sells for N19,999
$100 iTunes card sells for N39,999

It is the cheapest I have seen anyone sell iTunes Cards here in Nigeria. Below are screenshots of how much the same cards are sold for on Konga





Again, the store link is www.usitunescard.com 

Guaranteed low prices and instant delivery always!

 Power BI visuals are the actual elements — tables, charts, filters/slicers, maps, etc — that present the data in your report. By default, Power BI comes with 29 visuals.




They are:

1. Stacked Bar Chart: This allows you to create a bar chart with the breakdowns (field in legend) stacked on top of each other. It can be used to show total sales with breakdown by products or region. It has five components — Axis (where you put the field that should have separate bars, like date), Legend (where you put the field to stack one on another for each category in the axis, e.g. products or regions; anything you drag into Legend comes out with different colors), Value (where you put the field with the figures you want to plot), Color Saturation (allows you to represent the values in a field on a light to dark color intensity on the plotted value bars. You can’t use it and Legend together. A likely use will be to show volume/quantity of products sold while the bar values present the sales amount), and Tooltips (allows you to show extra details, like price per unit of the product).




2. Stacked Column Chart: Technically same as the Stacked Bar Chart just the orientation is different, its bars are vertical.




3. Clustered Bar Chart: The difference between this and the stacked one is that it has the breakdowns (legend values) plotted on independent bars rather than stacked one on another.





4. Clustered Column Chart: The difference between this and the stacked column chart is that it has the breakdowns (legend values) plotted on independent bars rather than stacked one on another.




5. 100% Stacked Bar Chart: This has the legend values (breakdown) expressed as percentages of the total value per axis item. Useful for showing relative contribution of sales by the different branches to total sales each day/month. And if you work with market research data, excellent for market share representation.



6. 100% Stacked Column Chart: Just as you would have guessed, it is the column version of the 100% Stacked Bar Chart.




7. Line Chart: Has all the components of the Bar/Column chart except the Color Saturation one. The line chart is to show trend (change over time), so you should always put a date or time field in the Axis.




8. Area Chart: It is very much like the line chart but with the area under the lines shaded. Has same components as the line chart.






9. Stacked Area Chart: You already know area chart, this is when you stack the legend entries one on another.







10.        Line and Stacked Column Chart: This is just combining line chart with column chart in the same visual. It is what we call Combo Chart in Excel and can be useful for showing two distinct insights in one visual — like the gross margin as a line chart and the revenue as a column chart over a period of time.




11.        Line and Clustered Column Chart: Again, just like the line and stacked column one except that the columns aren’t stacked.




12.        Ribbon Chart: This chart is a lot like the area chart but with the added advantage that it makes it easier to see the changes in the values of the entries in the legend.





13.        Waterfall Chart: This chart is for showing the movement in a metric over a period of time, emphasizing the initial value and the end value. It is a beloved chart of finance analysts, it is often used to present changes in a company’s cashflow from opening cashflow to closing cashflow over a reporting financial period.





14.        Scatter Chart: This chart is for showing the relationship between two variables. That is why it requires you put a field in X-axis and another in Y-axis. And it can also serve as bubble chart, you only need to drag the field to determine the bubble size into Size.










15.        Pie Chart: This chart shows relative contribution of entries in the field put in the Legend to the field put in the Values. You can also put a field with additional useful information in the Details.




16.        Donut Chart: It is exactly pie chart but with the traditional donut hole.





17.        Treemap: This chart shows relative contribution but unlike pie chart that fits everything in a big circle this one fits everything in a resizable rectangle.



18.        Map: The name is very self-explanatory. Normally, you would drag countries/cities or any location field to Location but if the locations are not very popular places you might need to get the GPS coordinates and place in the Latitude and Longitude.



19.        Filled Map: It is like the Map but fills the entire location area on the map taking the shape of the country/state/city.





20.        Funnel: This chart is best for stage-like fields and values. Popular for sales conversion records. You can put the sales/conversion stages in the Group.




21.        Gauge: This chart is great for showing the values against target on a gauge-like scale. And you can set the dimensions (minimum and maximum of the scale).  It is one of the few visuals that allow you to set an alert on in the published Power BI dashboard






22.        Card: It displays just one thing. Can be very useful for showing total sales, KPI figure and counts (like number of stores or orders). It is also one of the visuals that allow you to set an alert on it in the published Power BI dashboard.




23.        Multi-row Card: It is like card with extra features — ability to display values of more than one field. An example is sales by branch.






24.        KPI: It shows the variance between a value and its set target. Very useful for key performance indicators (KPIs).






25.        Slicers: I often call them nicer filters. Work exactly as a filter.



26.        Table: It is an intuitive table that aggregates the fields you put in intelligently.





27.        Matrix: It is exact replica of PivotTable. We have already used it in the last sample project.



28.        R Script Visual: This allows you to run R scripts in Power BI. Might be of particular interest to people already proficient in data analysis using R.





29.        ArcGIS Maps for Power BI: This is very much like Map but with some peculiar features you might find very useful.


Lastly, Power BI allows you to access more visuals to use in your reports via Custom Visuals on the Home menu.