Take Excel to the next level Excel is the world’s leading spreadsheet application. It’s a key module in Microsoft Office—the number-one productivity suite—and it is the number-one business intelligence tool. An Excel dashboard report is a visual presentation of critical data and uses gauges, maps, charts, sliders, and other graphical elements to present complex data in an easy-to-understand format.  Excel Data Analysis For Dummies explains in depth how to use Excel as a tool for analyzing big data sets. In no time, you’ll discover how to mine and analyze critical data in order to make more informed business decisions. Work with external databases, PivotTables, and Pivot Charts Use Excel for statistical and financial functions and data sharing Get familiar with Solver Use the Small Business Finance Manager If you’re familiar with Excel but lack a background in the technical aspects of data analysis, this user-friendly book makes it easy to start putting it to use for you.

Table of Contents:
Introduction 1 About This Book 1 What You Can Safely Ignore 2 Foolish Assumptions 3 Icons Used in This Book 3 Beyond the Book 4 Where to Go from Here 4 Part 1: Getting Started with Data Analysis 5 Chapter 1: Learning Basic Data-Analysis Techniques 7 What Is Data Analysis, Anyway? 8 Cooking raw data 8 Dealing with data 8 Building data models 9 Performing what-if analysis 9 Analyzing Data with Conditional Formatting 9 Highlighting cells that meet some criteria 10 Showing pesky duplicate values 12 Highlighting the top or bottom values in a range 13 Analyzing cell values with data bars 14 Analyzing cell values with color scales 16 Analyzing cell values with icon sets 16 Creating a custom conditional formatting rule 17 Editing a conditional formatting rule 20 Removing conditional formatting rules 22 Summarizing Data with Subtotals 23 Grouping Related Data 24 Consolidating Data from Multiple Worksheets 26 Consolidating by position 27 Consolidating by category 28 Chapter 2: Working with Data-Analysis Tools 31 Working with Data Tables 31 Creating a basic data table 32 Creating a two-input data table 34 Skipping data tables when calculating workbooks 36 Analyzing Data with Goal Seek 37 Analyzing Data with Scenarios 39 Create a scenario 39 Apply a scenario 41 Edit a scenario 41 Delete a scenario 42 Optimizing Data with Solver 42 Understanding Solver 43 The advantages of Solver 43 When should you use Solver? 43 Loading the Solver add-in 45 Optimizing a result with Solver 46 Adding constraints to Solver 48 Save a Solver solution as a scenario 51 Chapter 3: Introducing Excel Tables 53 What Is a Table and Why Should I Care? 53 Building a Table 55 Getting the data from an external source 56 Converting a range to a table 56 Basic table maintenance 58 Analyzing Table Information 59 Displaying simple statistics 59 Adding a column subtotal 60 Sorting table records 62 Filtering table records 64 Clearing a filter 66 Turning off AutoFilter 66 Applying a predefined AutoFilter 66 Applying multiple filters 69 Applying advanced filters 69 Chapter 4: Grabbing Data from External Sources 75 What’s All This About External Data? 75 Exporting Data from Other Programs 77 Importing External Data into Excel 78 Importing data from an Access table 78 Importing data from a Word table 79 Introducing text file importing 80 Importing a delimited text file 81 Importing a fixed-width text file 82 Importing data from a web page 83 Importing an XML file 85 Querying External Databases 87 Defining a data source 88 Querying a data source 91 It’s Sometimes a Raw Deal 95 Chapter 5: Scrub-a-Dub-Dub: Cleaning Data 97 Editing Your Imported Workbook 97 Deleting unnecessary columns 98 Deleting unnecessary rows 99 Resizing columns 99 Resizing rows 99 Erasing unneeded contents in a cell or range 100 Formatting numeric values 100 Copying worksheet data 101 Moving worksheet data 101 Replacing data in fields 102 Cleaning Data with Text Functions 103 The CLEAN function 103 The CONCAT function 104 The EXACT function 105 The FIND function 105 The LEFT function 106 The LEN function 107 The LOWER function 107 The MID function 107 The NUMBERVALUE function 108 The PROPER function 109 The REPLACE function 109 The RIGHT function 110 The SEARCH function 111 The SUBSTITUTE function 111 The TEXT function 112 The TEXTJOIN function 112 The TRIM function 112 The UPPER function 113 The VALUE function 113 Converting text function formulas to text 114 Using Validation to Keep Data Clean 114 Chapter 6: Analyzing Table Data with Functions 119 The Database Functions: Some General Remarks 120 Retrieving a Value from a Table 121 Summing a Column’s Values 122 Counting a Column’s Values 123 Averaging a Column’s Values 125 Determining a Column’s Maximum and Minimum Values 126 Multiplying a Column’s Values 127 Deriving a Column’s Standard Deviation 128 Calculating a Column’s Variance 130 Part 2: Analyzing Data with PivotTables and PivotCharts 133 Chapter 7: Creating and Using PivotTables 135 Understanding PivotTables 135 Exploring PivotTable Features 137 Building a PivotTable from an Excel Table 138 Creating a PivotTable from External Data 141 Refreshing PivotTable Data 143 Refreshing PivotTable data manually 144 Refreshing PivotTable data automatically 144 Adding Multiple Fields to a PivotTable Area 145 Pivoting a Field to a Different Area 146 Grouping PivotTable Values 147 Grouping numeric values 147 Grouping date and time values 148 Grouping text values 148 Filtering PivotTable Values 149 Applying a report filter 149 Filtering row or column items 151 Filtering PivotTable values 151 Filtering a PivotTable with a slicer 152 Chapter 8: Performing PivotTable Calculations 155 Messing around with PivotTable Summary Calculations 156 Changing the PivotTable summary calculation 156 Trying out the difference summary calculation 158 Applying a percentage summary calculation 160 Adding a running total summary calculation 162 Creating an index summary calculation 164 Working with PivotTable Subtotals 166 Turning off subtotals for a field 166 Displaying multiple subtotals for a field 167 Introducing Custom Calculations 168 Formulas for custom calculations 168 Checking out the custom calculation types 169 Understanding custom calculation limitations 169 Inserting a Custom Calculated Field 171 Inserting a Custom Calculated Item 173 Editing a Custom Calculation 175 Deleting a Custom Calculation 176 Chapter 9: Building PivotCharts 177 Introducing the PivotChart 177 Understanding PivotChart pros and cons 178 Taking a PivotChart tour 179 Understanding PivotChart limitations 180 Creating a PivotChart 181 Creating a PivotChart from a PivotTable 181 Embedding a PivotChart on a PivotTable’s worksheet 181 Creating a PivotChart from an Excel table 183 Working with PivotCharts 185 Moving a PivotChart to another sheet 185 Filtering a PivotChart 186 Changing the PivotChart type 188 Adding data labels to your PivotChart 189 Sorting the PivotChart 190 Adding PivotChart titles 191 Moving the PivotChart legend 193 Displaying a data table with the PivotChart 194 Part 3: Discovering Advanced Data Analysis Tools 197 Chapter 10: Tracking Trends and Making Forecasts 199 Plotting a Best-Fit Trend line 200 Calculating Best-Fit Values 202 Plotting Forecasted Values 204 Extending a Linear Trend 206 Extending a linear trend using the fill handle 206 Extending a linear trend using the Series command 207 Calculating Forecasted Linear Values 208 Plotting an Exponential Trend Line 210 Calculating Exponential Trend Values 211 Plotting a Logarithmic Trend Line 213 Plotting a Power Trend Line 215 Plotting a Polynomial Trend Line 216 Chapter 11: Analyzing Data with Statistics 219 Counting Things 220 Counting numbers 220 Counting nonempty cells 221 Counting empty cells 221 Counting cells that match criteria 221 Counting cells that match multiple criteria 222 Counting permutations 223 Counting combinations 224 Averaging Things 225 Calculating an average 225 Calculating a conditional average 225 Calculating an average based on multiple conditions 226 Calculating the median 227 Calculating the mode 227 Finding the Rank 228 Determining the Nth Largest or Smallest Value 230 Calculating the nth highest value 231 Calculating the nth smallest value 231 Creating a Grouped Frequency Distribution 232 Calculating the Variance 233 Calculating the Standard Deviation 234 Finding the Correlation 235 Chapter 12: Analyzing Data with Descriptive Statistics 237 Loading the Analysis ToolPak 238 Generating Descriptive Statistics 240 Calculating a Moving Average 243 Determining Rank and Percentile 245 Generating Random Numbers 247 Creating a Frequency Distribution 250 Chapter 13: Analyzing Data with Inferential Statistics 253 Sampling Data 254 Using the t-Test Tools 256 Performing a z-Test 259 Determining the Regression 261 Calculating the Correlation 264 Calculating the Covariance 265 Using the Anova Tools 267 Performing an f-test 268 Part 4: The Part of Tens 271 Chapter 14: Ten Things You Ought to Know about Statistics 273 Descriptive Statistics Are Straightforward 274 Averages Aren’t So Simple Sometimes 274 Standard Deviations Describe Dispersion 275 An Observation Is an Observation 276 A Sample Is a Subset of Values 276 Inferential Statistics Are Cool but Complicated 277 Probability Distributions Aren’t Always Confusing 278 Uniform distribution 279 Normal distribution 280 Parameters Aren’t So Complicated 281 Skewness and Kurtosis Describe a Probability Distribution’s Shape 281 Confidence Intervals Seem Complicated at First, but Are Useful 282 Chapter 15: Ten Ways to Analyze Financial Data 285 Calculating Future Value 286 Calculating Present Value 287 Determining Loan Payments 288 Calculating a Loan Payment’s Principal and Interest 289 Calculating Cumulative Loan Principal and Interest 289 Finding the Required Interest Rate 290 Determining the Internal Rate of Return 291 Calculating Straight-Line Depreciation 292 Returning the Fixed-Declining Balance Depreciation 292 Determining the Double-Declining Balance Depreciation 293 Chapter 16: Ten Ways to Raise Your PivotTable Game 295 Turn the PivotTable Fields Task Pane On and Off 296 Change the PivotTable Fields Task Pane Layout 296 Display the Details Behind PivotTable Data 298 Apply a PivotTable Style 300 Create a Custom PivotTable Style 301 Preserve PivotTable Formatting 303 Rename the PivotTable 304 Turn Off Grand Totals 305 Reduce the Size of PivotTable Workbooks 306 Use a PivotTable Value in a Formula 306 Appendix: Glossary of Data Analysis and Excel Terms 309 Index 319