Endorsing content within Power BI encourages a flourishing data culture through the increased availability of standardized, trustworthy data and content. It provides a definitive way to announce across an organization that “this content right here is reliable and should be used and shared”.
While endorsing Power BI content can apply to any organization that creates Power BI content, it provides the most benefits to companies that have large amounts of content and have extensively adopted Power BI. With a multitude of reports and content to choose from, including some similar and overlapping content, it becomes more necessary for organizations to provide users at every level and analytical experience with a way to discern the most trustworthy content. This is where Power BI endorsements can step in and save the day.
In this post, we’ll answer the following questions:
- What are the different ways to endorse content?
- How can I endorse content?
- What content can be endorsed?
- Who can endorse content?
What is an Endorsement in Power BI?
An endorsement in Power BI is a way to call attention to content you think is valuable, helpful, and ready for usage by others in your organization. It fosters the spread of specific content within an organization while making it easier for users to find the right data or content to leverage insights.
There are four types of Power BI content that can be endorsed:
- Reports
- Apps
- Datasets
- Dataflows
Power BI offers two different types of endorsements: promotions and certifications. I will now briefly explain the difference between these two.
Power BI Promotions
Promotions mark content as reliable, worthwhile, and available for use across the organization. The mark acts as a way to amplify the content and encourage its usage. This endorsement is available to a greater number of the workspace.
Power BI Certification
Promotions are pretty similar to certifications. Like promotions, certifications indicate that content is trustworthy, however, this endorsement is a step up from promotions. Certifications illustrate that content is even MORE trustworthy than promoted content.
Because there are fewer people who are able to certify content than there are who can promote content, certifications imply a level of prestige and a higher certainty that the content is authoritative and reliable. This content meets all of the quality standards of the organization and has usually been through some selective process to ensure it qualifies to receive this endorsement. Like promotions, this endorsement amplifies the content and encourages its widespread usage.
**It is important to note that certification is only accessible within a workspace if a Power BI administrator has enabled and configured it.
How to Endorse Power BI Content
Now that you understand the Power BI endorsements, promotions and certifications, it is time to finally show HOW to endorse content. I will go through the steps and illustrate how to endorse reports, but all content is endorsed similarly. Endorsing is simple and quick—it only takes a couple of steps.
1. Navigate to Content to be Shared
So you’ve toiled away and now have some reliable content that is ready to be shared with your colleagues. To endorse this content, you start in Power BI Service, and go into the workspace that houses the content. Endorsements can only be made in Power BI Service.
2. Go to the Content Settings
To promote any of the optional Power BI content, you must go to the content’s settings. For reports, datasets, and dataflows, you can reach the settings by going to the list view, hovering over the content you want to promote, and selecting the … for more options.
From the popup, select Settings.
To get to an app’s endorsement section, go to the app’s list view and click on the … in the menu bar for more options, from the popup click Endorse this app.
3. Click on the Promoted Option
Next, find the Endorsement section. This will look a little different for reports, datasets, dataflows, and apps. Within this section, click either the Promoted or Certified radio button option, depending on which endorsement is suited best for the report. If the certification option is unavailable as shown below, it means certifications have not been enabled or you do not have permission to certify content. For the latter, click the “How do I get my reports certified?” link or reach out to the Power BI admin for the workspace to request certification.
4. Save or Apply
Click Save or Apply.
5. See the Endorsement Appear
Finally, when you return back to the list view, you can see that your content has a shiny new endorsement label. The endorsement now shows that your content is ready to be used by your colleagues. Congrats, you did it!
Closing
With just a couple clicks, Power BI endorsements produce a simple way to show “this content right here is trustworthy, and should be used encouragingly”. It provides users a reliable way to sort through an organization’s Power BI content and find the most relevant, trustworthy reports, apps, datasets, and dataflows. Include Power BI endorsements in your organization’s best practices to support a thriving data culture and bring more order and transparency to your workspaces.
Want to learn about more cool Power BI features? Talk to our expert consultants today!
FAQs
This differs based on if you would like to promote or certify content.
Any content owner with write permissions in the workspace where the content is located ie a user with an admin/member/contributor role can promote their content.
Only authorized members as selected by the Power BI admins are able to certify content. Content owners who are not authorized but would like to have their content certified need to follow their organization’s guidelines about getting their content certified.
Unfortunately, only content within the new workspace experience has the endorsement options.
