If you haven’t created a chart in Excel before, type a few numbers into a worksheet and select them. Click on the toolbar’s Chart Wizard button (the one with the magic wand).

Excel’s Chart Wizard makes it easy to create and format charts and graphs. By default, however, those charts aren’t too visually exciting.

For instance, you can create a chart that displays two unique sets of data. Use Excel's chart wizard to make a combo chart that combines two chart types, each with its own data set.

It's easy to turn an Excel chart into a visually compelling object. Susan Harkins walks through the steps for jazzing up data points with a simple formatting trick.