Last week, I received an email from Francis, with the following message.
Hi Channdoo,
I would like to express my gratitude for sharing with me using Excel to create dashboard !
I have spend 2 days over the weekend and learn as much as I could and came up with a dashboard for my company Sales and Marketing Meeting !..
Attached is the print screen…
Without you, this is not Possible !!!
Thanks so much !!! The more I learn, the more I know what I dont know !!!
Readers like Francis inspire me most. Despite doing all the work himself, he showed extreme kindness in emailing and making me happy.
Naturally, I replied to him and asked “if he can share original excel file with dummy data so rest of our readers can learn from what he produced.”
Francis agreed for this and shared a version of dashboard with me.
The Travel Site Dashboard Francis Made:
Here is a screenshot of the dashboard Francis made.
Video Review of the Dashboard in Action:
The image doesnt do justice to the awesome work by him. So I made a short video review of the dashboard (6 min). Watch it below:
Techniques used in this Dashboard:
Francis used a variety of techniques in making this dashboard. Some of the important ideas are,
- Using a bullet chart to show current performance vs. last year (tip: making bullet charts in excel)
- Showing a sortable KPI grid to provide on-demand analysis (tutorial: making KPI dashboards in excel)
- Showing key messages as text at the top (idea: use tweetboards instead of dashboards)
- Adding a month selection option at top (formulas: INDEX and OFFSET)
- Dynamic charts that are connected to drop-down boxes (reference: dynamic charts in excel)
How to Make Dashboards in Excel?
Here is our how to make dashboards in excel page. I am sure it will blow your mind. Go check it out.
Download the Dashboard
Click here to download the source file of this dashboard and play with it. [mirror]
Thank you Francis
Thank you so much for sharing your awesome work with all of us Francis. You inspire me and our readers to go that extra mile. 🙂
Send your tips / downloads for Reader Awesomeness Week:
You too can participate and share what you know by simply filling up online form. Be awesome. (details here)
12 Responses to “Analyzing Search Keywords using Excel : Array Formulas in Real Life”
Very interesting Chandoo, as always. Personally I find endless uses for formulae such as {=sum(if(B$2:B$5=$A2,$C$2$C$5))}, just the flexibility in absolute and relative relative referencing and multiple conditions gives it the edge over dsum and others methods.
I've added to my blog a piece on SQL in VBA that I think might be of interest to you http://aviatormonkey.wordpress.com/2009/02/10/lesson-one-sql-in-vba/ . It's a bit techie, but I think you might like it.
Keep up the good work, aviatormonkey
Hi Chandoo,
You might find this coded solution I posted on a forum interesting.
http://www.excelforum.com/excel-programming/680810-create-tag-cloud-in-vba-possible.html
[...] under certain circumstances. One of the tips involved arranging search keywords in excel using Array Forumlas. Basically, if you need to know how frequent a word or group of keywords appear, you can use this [...]
@Aviatormonkey: Thanks for sharing the url. I found it a bit technical.. but very interesting.
@Andy: Looks like Jarad, the person who emailed me this problem has posted the same in excelforum too. Very good solution btw...
Realy great article
"You can take this basic model and extend it to include parameters like number of searches each key phrase has, how long the users stay on the site etc. to enhance the way tag cloud is generated and colored."
How would you go about doing this? I think it would need some VB
Hi,
I found the usage very interesting, but is giving me hard time because the LENs formula that use ranges are not considering the full range, in other words, the LEN formula is only bringing results from the respective "line" cell.
Using the example, when I place the formula to calculate the frequency for "windows" brings me only 1 result, not 11 as displayed in the example. It seems that the LEN formula using ranges is considering the respective line within the range, not the full range.
Any hint?
@Thiago
You have to enter the formula as an Array Formula
Enter the Formula and press Ctrl+Shift+Enter
Not just Enter
Thank you, Hui! I couldn't work out how this didn't work
is there a limit to the number of lines it can analyse.
Ie i am trying to get this to work on a list of sentances 1500 long.
@Gary
In Excel 2010/2013 Excel is only limited by available memory,
So just give it a go
As always try on a copy of the file first if you have any doubts
Apologies if I am missing something, but coudn't getting frequency be easier with Countif formula. Something like this - COUNTIF(Range with text,"*"&_cell with keyword_&"*")
Apologies if I missed, but what is the Array Formula to:
1. Analyze a list of URL's or a list of word phrases to understand frequency;
2. List in a nearby column from most used words to least used words;
3. Next to the list of words the count of occurrences.