30 example questions that get good results

How to use this list

Copy a question into Ask clariBI, then change the names, dates and metrics to match your data. The documentation's writing better questions covers the phrasing rules in short form. Each question notes the data it needs. If that data is not in the session's sources, clariBI tells you which fields are missing instead of guessing.

Sales

1. "What was total revenue for each of the last three months?" Needs an order or invoice date and an amount. Add "and the change from month to month" for growth rates.
2. "Which 10 customers brought in the most revenue this year, and what share of total revenue is that?" Needs a customer column. Use your own word for customers (accounts, clients).
3. "Compare Q1 and Q2 sales by product category." Needs a date, a category and an amount. Quarters are read relative to the year in your data.
4. "What is the average deal size per month over the last 12 months?" Needs closed deals with values and close dates, for example from a CRM connector.
5. "Which sales rep has the highest win rate this quarter?" Needs deals with an owner and a won or lost status.

Marketing

1. "What were the top five traffic sources by sessions this month?" Works with Google Analytics (Traffic Sources report).
2. "How has the conversion rate from sessions to sign-ups changed over the last six months?" Name the events: "from session_start to sign_up".
3. "Which campaign had the lowest cost per conversion last quarter?" Works with Google Ads or Meta Ads (campaign reports).
4. "What was total ad spend by channel last month, Google Ads versus Meta Ads?" Needs both ad sources in the session. clariBI lines the two up by date; the spend column needs the same name in both for a side-by-side series.
5. "Which search queries brought the most clicks from Google in the last 28 days, and what was their average position?" Works with Search Console (Top Queries report).

Finance

1. "What was our monthly spend over the last six months?" Needs expenses with dates and amounts. Say whether you mean gross or net.
2. "Break down operating expenses by category for this quarter, top 10 plus other." Needs an expense category column.
3. "What is gross margin by month this year?" Needs revenue and cost of goods sold. clariBI calculates (revenue minus cost) divided by revenue.
4. "How much of our invoiced amount is 0 to 30, 31 to 60, 61 to 90 and over 90 days overdue?" Needs invoice due dates and paid or unpaid status.
5. "What was MRR at the end of each month this year?" Works with Stripe as an MCP app, or any source with subscription amounts and dates.

Operations and support

1. "What is the average time from order to shipment, by warehouse?" Needs order and ship dates and a warehouse column.
2. "Which products are below 100 units in stock?" Needs current stock levels. Put the threshold in the question.
3. "What share of deliveries arrived on time, by carrier?" Needs actual and promised delivery dates.
4. "How many tickets were created each day last week, and what was the average resolution time?" Works with Zendesk, Freshdesk, Gorgias or Jira.
5. "Which ticket categories take longest to resolve?" Follow up with "How many of those were reopened?"

People

1. "What was employee turnover by department this year?" Needs leave dates and headcount per department.
2. "Show headcount by month for the last 24 months." Follow up with "Split hires and leavers."
3. "What is the average time to fill an open role, by role type?" Needs posting and offer-accepted dates.
4. "How many hours were logged per person in Jira last month?" Works with Jira work logs.
5. "Which projects had the most issues resolved per sprint over the last six sprints?" Works with Jira issues and sprints.

Product

1. "Which features were used most in the last 30 days?" Needs product events, for example from PostHog, Mixpanel or Amplitude.
2. "Show daily active users for the last 90 days." For unusual days, forecast the metric; forecasting flags anomalies.
3. "What share of users who signed up in January were still active after 7, 14 and 30 days?" Needs sign-up dates and activity dates per user.
4. "How do mobile and desktop compare on sessions, engagement rate and conversions?" Works with Google Analytics (Devices report).
5. "Which pages have the most views but the lowest engagement?" Works with Google Analytics (Page Performance report).

Tips for better answers

1. Name the period. "March 2026" or "the last 30 days" instead of "recently".
2. Name the metric. "Revenue" instead of "the numbers".
3. One question at a time. Split a long question into steps and use follow-ups.
4. Use follow-ups. "Break that down by region" works because the session remembers the previous answer.
5. Pick the right sources when you start the session. Fewer, relevant sources give clearer answers and use fewer credits.
6. Ask about data you have. clariBI does not look things up on the internet, so questions about industry benchmarks or competitors' figures cannot be answered from your sources.

The blog post writing better questions for AI analytics has 40 more examples.

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