Daily use

Pivot table: build the report by dragging fields

In Reports, the Pivot table tab lets you build a report the way you would in a spreadsheet: drag fields into Rows and Columns, measures into Values, and the matrix appears. It is the way to answer cross questions such as the best selling product by rep, without knowing the name of the grouping and the measure by heart.

Building a report has always meant knowing the name of the grouping and the name of the measure up front, and that is where most questions die. The pivot table turns it around: the fields and measures of your dataset are listed on the left, you drag what matters into three zones, and the report builds itself. No formulas, no SQL.

Where it is

Open Reports from the menu.
The Pivot table tab is the first one and it opens by default. The other tabs (Simple, Advanced and Explore) are still there.
Pick a Dataset: it decides which fields and which measures show up in the palette on the left.

Rows, Columns and Values

The palette on the left has two lists: Fields (what you can group by) and Measures (what you can count, sum or average). Each one only goes where it makes sense.

Rows: one or more fields, stacked in the order you drop them. This is the vertical axis of the matrix.
Columns: one field. Dropping another one replaces it, because two levels of nested headers make the table unreadable.
Values: the measures, in the order you drop them. Each measure becomes a column of numbers.
A measure only goes into Values and a field only goes into Rows or Columns. Drag one into the wrong zone and nothing happens.

💡 You do not have to drag. Clicking a field puts it in Rows; clicking a measure puts it in Values. The Search fields and measures box filters the palette when the dataset is large. To take something out of a zone, use the ✕ on the chip.

The example this feature was built for: best selling product by rep

In Dataset, pick Sold items (the product line of a deal: the only place where product, quantity and the price actually charged live together).
Drag Product name into Rows.
Drag Owner into Columns.
Drag Revenue into Values. If you also want volume, drag Quantity sold in next to it.
Click Run report.

The result is the matrix you drew: one product per row, one rep per column, and the number where they cross. The last column carries the Total of each row, and the last line carries the Total of each column.

Date fields: day, week, month, quarter or year

When the field you drop into Rows or Columns is a date, the chip gets a grouping picker with Day, Week, Month, Quarter and Year. It starts on Month. Changing it is what turns the same table from a daily follow-up into a quarterly close, without rebuilding anything.

Period, filters and comparison

In Period, pick a relative window (today, last 7 days, this month, this quarter, rolling 12 months and so on). The default is All time.
If the dataset has more than one date, use Date field to say which one anchors the period. Leave it alone and the dataset default applies.
In Filters, click Add filter and pick a field, an operator and a value. The operators offered change with the type of the field.
Once a period is set, Compare with appears: Previous period or Same period last year.

With comparison on, each measure gets an extra column beside it marked (change): the percentage difference between the window you chose and the comparison window. Previous period goes back by the same length as the period you chose; Same period last year goes back a year, which is what compares December with December instead of December with November. When there was no earlier base, the change is left empty instead of showing zero, because zero would claim nothing moved exactly where everything did.

Ready-made reports

At the top of the screen there is a Ready-made reports strip, grouped by section. Click a section to see its reports, then click a name to open it already built in the pivot table.

Executive, Pipeline, Conversion and Sales activity
Forecast and quota, Quotes and proposals, Lost deals
Customers and accounts, Marketing, Campaigns, Email marketing
Marketing funnel, Source and attribution, SDR and inside sales
Channels and partners, Revenue and retention, Data quality

💡 A ready-made report is a starting point, not a cage: once open, everything is still draggable. Swap the measure, move a field from Rows to Columns, add a filter. You only see the sections and the reports that make sense for your organization: anything that depends on a module you have turned off simply does not show up, instead of showing up and failing on the click.

After running it, type a name in Report name and click Save. It joins the Saved strip, and one click on the name reopens it exactly as it was.
People who manage settings see a Share with the organization option when saving, which makes the report visible to the whole team.
To delete one, use the ✕ next to its name. You can only delete reports you saved yourself.
With the table on screen, click Export CSV. The file is the matrix you are looking at, total columns included, not the raw list that came back from the database.

Three things that keep the numbers honest

Totals add up only what can be added. Sums and counts roll into the total; rates, averages, minimums, maximums and the change column show a dash, because adding two rates does not give a rate. When that happens the table says so underneath, instead of printing a number nobody would check.
An empty cell is not a zero. Empty means that combination does not exist in the data: that rep did not sell that product. Zero would be a different claim, and in a sales table the two lead to opposite decisions.
No value is a category of its own. Records where the field is blank land in a row or column marked No value, always last, because absence is not a category that competes for first place.

Money is already taken care of: values in different currencies are never added together. When the measure is in currency, the CRM computes the numbers split by currency and the table itself adds the Currency column, with an ⓘ in the header, even if you never dragged it anywhere. Below the table a line explains the column that showed up on its own: “The report was split by Currency so that values that cannot be added are not added.” If you would rather read the currencies side by side, move Currency to Columns; and if you had already put it in Rows or in Columns, it does not appear twice.

Limits

Up to 3 fields across Rows and Columns together. At the cap the screen says so and new fields stop going in: take one out before adding another.
Columns takes one field at a time; Rows takes the rest of the budget.
Up to 12 measures in Values.
The table brings back the first 1,000 rows. If there are more, a warning asks you to refine the filters or shorten the period; refining always beats reading a sample without knowing it is one.

You only see the fields and measures you are allowed to see. A protected field used without permission makes the report refuse with a clear message, instead of returning an incomplete number without telling you.

Example: Monday morning meeting. Dataset Sold items, Product name in Rows, Owner in Columns, Revenue and Quantity sold in Values, Period set to This quarter and Compare with set to Same period last year. In one screen you see who sells what, what each product brought in overall, and how much each number grew or dropped against last year. Save it as Mix by rep, tick Share with the organization, and next week it is one click.

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