The word “spreadsheet” probably conjures up thoughts of Microsoft Excel – and for many, it’s the program that has been the most popular no-code tool. If you’ve ever played around with recording Excel macros (essentially an action that can be set up to repeat over and over again), you know how efficient and time-saving the simplest automation can be.
Automation, remember, is when a process or action is set up to run automatically – with minimal human involvement. In recent years, a whole world of code-free tools has emerged to create even more powerful automations that run on top of spreadsheets.
You can connect applications, manipulate data, manage databases, and even create custom interfaces for spreadsheets without resorting to complex code or programming. Tools like Stacker and Zapier integrate seamlessly with spreadsheets, while others like Rows or Sheetgo are cloud-based spreadsheet alternatives with other features.
Entering data manually is probably not something you prefer to spend your time on; it also increases the likelihood of human error. By connecting spreadsheets to other tools, you can collect and combine data automatically and accurately.
- Zapier: Connect a spreadsheet to another spreadsheet
This simple automation allows you to transfer data from one spreadsheet to another. It copies all the data accurately and updates it when the original data changes. It also instantly reformats the data to match the new spreadsheet, making it more efficient than copy and paste.Zapier connects multiple Google Sheets spreadsheets to each other using “Zaps” (that’s the cute name Zapier gives each of its automated workflows). A single Zap can automatically copy data from a single sheet, but once you get the hang of the program, you can combine multiple Zaps to create more complex workflows.
- Zapier: Inserting a Google Sheet into a Google document
If you’ve ever wanted to automatically insert data from spreadsheets into a Google Docs document, you’ll love this Zapier automation. It’s great for creating reports that need to be updated regularly and sent to others. The advantage of this automation over the spreadsheets found in Google Docs itself is that it allows you to sort and manipulate the data in Sheets and automatically updates when the data changes. You can even use the charting feature in Google Sheets to visualize data and insert a chart into your document.
- Sheetgo: Link multiple Google Drive spreadsheets to create a database
Code-free apps like Sheetgo allow you to collect data from many spreadsheets in one place. With this tool, you can set up a simple automation that pulls data from spreadsheets saved in Google Drive and copies it to any other spreadsheets you need to access. This is useful if you get spreadsheets from colleagues or clients in several different programs. Just save all those spreadsheets to Google Drive and Sheetgo imports and reformats them to pull all the data together.
- Zapier: Manage inventory by linking Google Forms to a spreadsheet
This automation uses Zapier to connect Google Forms to a Google Sheet so you can automatically update the sheet via submitted forms. This means multiple people can update inventory without touching the data directly, minimizing any spreadsheet errors.
- Zapier: Get metrics from multiple sources to create an analytics dashboard
This Zapier automation pulls data from multiple sources into a single Google Sheet with the Google Analytics add-on, allowing you to create your own data dashboard. That’s right – your own data dashboard. This means you can track all your metrics in one place. Simply determine which metrics you want to focus on (such as users, sessions, subscribers, or sales) and pull that information from programs like Mailchimp, Eventbrite, PayPal, or Twitter.
- Strings: Track SEO by creating a dashboard in Google Search Console
Track your website’s performance over time by integrating Google Search Console with your Rows spreadsheets. Rows replaces traditional spreadsheet programs like Excel and adds code-free functionality. You can automatically capture your site’s performance data and then create summary reports to compare different time periods in your dashboard. Use this template to try automation in Rows.
- Parabola: Combine and reformat data from many spreadsheets
If you have data from many different spreadsheets and need to reformat and clean them up, Parabola can help you do that. You can automatically merge data, combine columns, combine values, and filter tables with other spreadsheets to sort and analyze information. Merging data in Excel using functions like VLOOKUP can be messy and time-consuming. Parabola automatically extracts this data from any number of sources you need.