8 Simple Google Sheets Tips for Enhanced Productivity

Sheets were structured in light of the requirements of coordinated associations. Computer-based intelligence highlights taking advantage of the correct experiences to settle on essential business choices. Check the simple and essential Google Sheets tips for enhanced productivity and the best ideas on how to use the tool to its full potential.

A cloud-based design empowers you to work with anybody, whenever and wherever. Here are eight simple and helpful tips on using Google Sheets:

Google Sheets have a lot of formulas you could use, especially in universities or business corporations; however, some of those formulas in Google Sheets are unfamiliar to several people.

Also, those new employees don’t know how to use it properly, and even the purpose of every method. But Google Sheets is necessary for each company, which is why learning the primary usage of the platform is recommended.

Google Sheets is not overall challenging to understand because it has simple functions that are easy to use. This is the perfect time to learn more about formulas in Google Sheets.

For the past few years, there’s been a massive increase in how entrepreneurs depend on data. It looks like some of the businesses are tracking their data with the use of different Data Trends nowadays. It helps them learn how to improve their business and their know-how. Analytic tools also trend today; they can analyze a company’s data and predict what is likely to happen.

8 Google Sheets Tricks

Tip 1: Adding heatmaps with conditional formatting

Heatmaps help draw your attention to the essential data indicated in your sheets and use functions to help you identify the trends in your data.

Steps: 

1. Highlight a particular value, outline, or error in your sheets, then right-click, at the bottom of the dropdown menu, click the “Conditional Formatting.”
2. After clicking the “Conditional Formatting,” another window telling “Conditional Format Rules” will appear. Now, two rules will appear here: the “Single Rule” and “Color Scale.” Single Rules mainly focus on one value, and Color Scale value shows the scale of each value.
3. Then, for you to set the value, click Min Value, Midpoint Value, and Maximum Value and set all of these in numbers so that it will identify its value.
4. After you set the values, there different colors will appear where dark color shows the Minimum Value or the Least value, and the lightest one shows the Maximum Value or the Highest Value.

Google Sheets Tip 2: Send emails when you comment

You can put a comment on a particular cell and tag a specified person if you need to ask a question. By doing this, the person you mentioned or shared the file with will receive an email that serves as a notification of your comment. Check the simple and essential Google Sheets tips for enhanced productivity and the best ideas on how to use the tool to its full potential.

Steps:

1. Right-click the cell you want to leave a comment on and click at the dropdown menu near the bottom click “Comment.”
2. Another window will appear after you clicked the “Comment.” After that, a pop up will appear. Inside that pop-up, type what you want to comment on the text box, and put a “+” sign to tag a particular email address and send them emails.

Tip 3: Check for validation of email

If you have a list of emails and you want to confirm them, you can use “isemail” in Google Sheets. It won’t work if the given email addresses are invalid. It is, therefore, necessary to validate the emails before sending them.

To validate an email, click any cell that is containing an email address of a particular person to confirm if the email is valid or not. The formulas you will be using is “isemail.” Isemail will determine if the email is correct or not; it will be stating TRUE or FALSE, where true means the email is valid and false means invalid.

Note: 

Some of the emails become invalid because of the wrong URL in the email. These will help you identify email errors and prevent you from not sending such emails. Check the simple and essential Google Sheets tips for enhanced productivity and the best ideas on how to use the tool to its full potential.

Google Sheets Tip 4: Visualize data with sparklines

Sparkline’s use is to present a visual presentation of the data in charts and graphs. It is the most straightforward way of showing visual displays in Google Sheets.

Using google sheet sparkline feature, helps you gain insight into data, and it’s particularly important for digital marketers as it aids them in refining their content plan to market their business well. You can also view the changes in your data without creating an actual chart, which most employees can consider a hassle.

Steps:

1. Select any cell where you want your sparkline to appear. And then, type “=sparkline” and select enter.
2. Then, all you have to do is to highlight the area which you want the cells to include different data like numbers, currency, etc. and then select enter.

Tip 5: Use Data Validation to create a dropdown list in a cell

Creating a dropdown list with Data Validation is one of the best ways to determine a particular cell by indication of choices. The common purpose of the dropdown list is to make a list of options or items that will identify a specific cell.

Steps:

1. First, highlight the cells you want to include in your dropdown list.
2. Now, click “Data” on the menu tab of Google Sheet, then click the “Data Validation” from the dropdown list.
3. Then click “Data Validation,” there’s a window that will appear named “Data Validation.” from that window, from the Criteria at the right side of that there’s a dropdown list, and from that list click “list of items.”
4. Type what you want to be in your dropdown list in the text box.
5.  Then click the “save” button, the dropdown will appear in the cells you chose, then click the dropdown for to see the lists.

Google Sheets Tip 6: Translating text

If your Google Sheet contains different languages, you can use the “Google TRANSLATE” function to translate the words or texts you want to translate. Check the simple and essential Google Sheets tips for enhanced productivity and the best ideas on how to use the tool to its full potential.

In cases where your Google Sheet is publicly exposed and you have a lot of clients or participants with different languages, you can easily convert those words or languages immediately with the “GOOGLE TRANSLATE” formula.

Steps:

1. First, type “=GOOGLETRANSLATE” and select to enter.
2. Next, enter the “GOOGLE TRANSLATE” and click the cell you want to translate. Then select enter. Sometimes, bringing a word or phrase takes time, but it won’t take a long while.

Google Sheets Tip 7: Change capitalization in the cells

In changing the capitalization of the words and phrases in the cells, there are three functions you could choose: Proper, Upper, and Lower function. These options allow you to apply different capitalization to your text in your sheets.

Steps:

1. There are three types of Capitalization: PROPER, UPPER, and LOWER. Just type “=PROPER,” “=UPPER,” or “=LOWER.”
2. For proper function, it makes the word or phrases standard or formal sentence like capitalizing the first letter of a sentence.
3. Then, click the cell with the capitalization you want to change and select enter. You can choose any of the mentioned functions, whichever you prefer.
4. The upper function allows you to change the capitalization of your text in uppercase. It’s just the same process as to how it is done in the Proper function; however, the purpose is different.
5. The lower function allows you to change the capitalization to lowercase. It also has the same process with the other two services.

Tip 8: Protected data cells

If many people are working on a sheet, you might want to lock down some of the data to prevent mistakes. Protecting data cells allows you to enclose the data in the cells and lock it, enabling the protection of your data so that no one can edit it.

Steps:

1. Highlight the cell/s you want to protect.
2. Then, from the menu bar, click “Data.” After you click it, a dropdown menu will appear. Click the “Protected Sheets and Ranges.” You may choose from these options and click whatever you prefer.
3. Once you type what you want to say in the cells or ranges, you can seal it and put something in a description box for the protected cells. Then, click “Set permission.” After you click it, there’s another window that will pop up. It will show you that there are two options to set the permission.

Notes:

The use of the first option is: if somebody tries to change the range you protected. There will be a pop-up, or in other words, “a warning,” that will appear if someone tries to edit it. The second option aims to enable you to select the whole range you protected. Click “Done” after choosing what kind of permission you want.

To see the protected ranges, click “View” from the menu bar and its dropdown list. Click “Protected Ranges.” Stripes will appear in the ranges you protected, showing that this is the range you sealed.

Extra Tips

1. Use Keyboard Shortcuts:

• Ctrl/Cmd + Z: Undo
• Ctrl/Cmd + Y: Redo
• Ctrl/Cmd + C: Copy
• Ctrl/Cmd + V: Paste Knowing keyboard shortcuts can speed up your work significantly.

2. Conditional Formatting: Highlight data based on specific conditions. For instance, you can easily color-code cells that are above a certain value. Just go to Format > Conditional formatting.

3. Data Validation: Ensure that the data entered into a cell follows a specific format or set of rules. This is particularly useful for creating drop-down lists. Find it under Data > Data validation.

4. Use Google Finance to Fetch Real-time Data: Enter =GOOGLEFINANCE("NASDAQ:GOOGL") to get the current stock price of Alphabet Inc.

5. Creating Pivot Tables: Pivot tables can help in summarizing vast amounts of data. Select your data and click on Data > Pivot table.

6. Import Data from the Web: Utilize =IMPORTHTML, =IMPORTXML, or =IMPORTDATA to fetch live data from websites directly into your sheets.

7. Utilize the Explore Feature: Located at the bottom right corner, the Explore button can help you find insights, create charts, and ask questions about your data.

8. Create Custom Formulas with Google Script: For advanced users, Google App Script allows you to create custom formulas, automate tasks, and even build web apps.

Advanced Tips for Enhanced Productivity in Google Sheets

1. Protect Specific Cells or Sheets: This ensures that particular data isn’t accidentally modified. Right-click on a cell or range and choose Protect range.

2. Use Add-ons: Expand the functionality of Google Sheets by exploring add-ons. Go to Extensions > Add-ons > Get add-ons.

3. Linking Between Sheets: Use =IMPORTRANGE to link data between different sheets or even different spreadsheet files.

4. Named Ranges: Instead of remembering cell references like B2:C10, you can name a range. Go to Data > Named ranges.

5. Use ARRAYFORMULA: This allows you to apply a formula to an entire column without dragging down the formula cell.

6. Schedule Automatic Data Refresh: For sheets linked to external data sources, schedule regular data refreshes so your analysis or reports are always up-to-date.

7. Filter Views: Instead of filtering data for everyone viewing the sheet, you can create a personal filter view under Data > Filter views.

Google Sheets Tips Conclusion

Google Sheets platform has so much in store to make your organization of files more accessible. However, it is recommended to practice while reviewing these tips. These are some simple but helpful tips for those using Google Sheets. I hope these tips will make learning Google Sheets much easier.