Your ticket backlog is a snapshot of your unsolved tickets at the end of any given date and can be a useful indication of how your support organization is doing. To help you report on your backlog, Zendesk Explore includes the Support: Backlog history dataset. This dataset functions a little differently than other Explore datasets. For example, the Support: Tickets dataset shows you the current state of the tickets in your Support account, and the Support: Ticket updates dataset can show past events and changes to tickets.
The backlog history dataset is different in that it shows a snapshot of unsolved tickets at the end of any given date. Unlike the other datasets, this information cannot be found anywhere else in your Zendesk account. Explore collects backlog information every time your data synchronizes with Explore.
If you're used to other Explore datasets, you'll find that the backlog dataset contains fewer metrics and attributes than other Explore datasets. This is because of the large amount of historical ticket information it stores. However, this does mean that backlog history reports can be a little easier to create.
Use this article to learn more about how to examine your ticket backlog using Explore.
This article contains the following sections:
Using the pre-built backlog history reports
To make things easier for you, Explore contains a selection of pre-built backlog history reports.
To view the pre-built backlog history reports
- In the Zendesk product tray, click the Explore icon (
).
- From the list of dashboards, select the Zendesk Support dashboard.
- In the Support dashboard, click the Backlog tab.
On the Backlog tab, you can view the following reports:
- Daily historical backlog by status (30 days): A list of your open ticket backlog over the last 30 days to help you identify trends.
- Weekly historical backlog by status (12 weeks): A list of your open ticket backlog over the last 12 weeks to help you identify trends.
- Weekly historical backlog by selected attribute (top 10/12 weeks): The number of unsolved tickets at the end of each week for the last 12 weeks. Choose a tab to display results by ticket brand, group, channel, priority, or type.
For more information about the Backlog tab and the other tabs on the Support dashboard, see Analyzing your Support activity with Explore.
Creating a backlog history report (Explore Professional and Enterprise)
If you can't find what you need in the pre-built reports and you're using Explore Professional or Enterprise, you can use the supplied metrics and attributes in the backlog history dataset to build your own reports.
Here's an example report that displays the number of tickets that were unsolved in your account at the end of each month. If you need help building Explore queries, see Creating queries.
To create the query
- In Explore, click the query (
) icon.
- In the Queries library, click New query.
- On the Choose a dataset page, click Support > Backlog history > Support: Backlog history, then click New query. Query builder opens.
- In the Metrics panel, click Add.
- From the list of metrics, choose Backlog tickets (unsolved) > Tickets, then click Apply.
- In the Rows panel, click Add.
- From the list of attributes, choose Time - Backlog recorded > Backlog recorded - Year andTime - Backlog end of period > End of month, then click Apply.
For this example, the finished report is displayed with the Table visualization, but you can use any chart type you want.
For a list of all the metrics and attributes you can use to build backlog reports in Explore, see Metrics and attributes for Zendesk Support.
3 Comments
I am hoping to filter beyond ticket brand, group, channel, priority, or type. I would like to filter by subtype or tag if at all possible. Could you leverage filters on the dashboard for this? Or perhaps create a report outside of the backlog?
Hi Nathaniel,
Unfortunately, it is not possible to filter any queries using the Support: Backlog dataset by custom fields or ticket tags. Our Product Managers are aware of the need for this functionality and are planning for updates to the Backlog dataset this year.
Be sure to check our Announcements page for updates!
Best,
Thanks Taylor Bowser. Definitely looking forward to being able to do more with the Backlog dataset, inlcuding filtering by custom fields and tags.
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