What is the first step in creating a new report?

Identifying the data is indeed the first step in creating a new report. Before you can effectively format a report, select metrics, or run it, you need to establish what data you require to meet the objectives of the report. This step involves determining which data elements are relevant and necessary for the analysis you wish to perform.

In the context of SuiteAnalytics, this could mean deciding on the specific tables, fields, and types of records you will need to pull from the NetSuite database. Without first understanding the data landscape and what information you want to capture, subsequent steps such as formatting or metric selection would be done in a vacuum and might not yield meaningful results. Therefore, identifying the data lays the foundational groundwork that informs all the other steps in the report creation process.