Quick Excel Analysis

Get the data in

Open Excel (or Google Sheets; almost everything here works the same). Copy the table below and paste it into cell A1 of a new sheet. It's two weeks of sales from a small drinks shop.

Date	Product	Category	Quantity	Price	Sales
03/06/2026	Zobo 50cl	Drinks	12	800	9600
03/06/2026	Chin chin	Snacks	5	1500	7500
04/06/2026	Kunu 50cl	Drinks	8	700	5600
04/06/2026	Zobo 50cl	Drinks	15	800	12000
05/06/2026	Plantain chips	Snacks	10	1000	10000
05/06/2026	Chapman	Drinks	6	1200	7200
06/06/2026	Chin chin	Snacks	7	1500	10500
06/06/2026	Zobo 50cl	Drinks	20	800	16000
09/06/2026	Kunu 50cl	Drinks	10	700	7000
09/06/2026	Plantain chips	Snacks	4	1000	4000
10/06/2026	Chapman	Drinks	9	1200	10800
10/06/2026	Zobo 50cl	Drinks	18	800	14400

If everything lands in one column, use Data → Text to Columns, choose Delimited and tick Tab.

Now click any cell in the data and press Ctrl + T, then OK. This turns it into an Excel Table: it gets filter buttons, neat formatting, and it grows automatically when you add rows.

Sort and filter

Click the arrow on a column heading:

• Sort Largest to Smallest on Sales shows your best sales at the top.
• Filter on Category: untick everything except Snacks to see only snacks.

Clear the filter when you're done (arrow → Clear Filter). Filters hide rows; they don't delete anything.

Answer questions with formulas

Click an empty cell to the right of the table, such as H2, and try these:

Formulas always start with =. If you change a number in the table, every answer updates on its own. That's the big advantage over a calculator.

Summarise with a PivotTable

A PivotTable answers "total by…" questions without any formulas.

1. Click inside the table, then Insert → PivotTable → OK.
2. In the field list on the right, drag Product to Rows.
3. Drag Sales to Values. It shows Sum of Sales for each product.
4. Click the arrow next to Row Labels → More Sort Options → descending by Sum of Sales.

You can now see at a glance that Zobo is the best seller. Drag Category into Rows instead of Product to compare Drinks with Snacks.

Show it in a chart

Click inside the PivotTable, then Insert → Recommended Charts and pick a bar or column chart. Give it a title that states the point, like "Zobo brings in the most sales", not just "Chart 1".

Use a line chart for changes over time, and a bar chart for comparing items. Avoid 3D charts and crowded pie charts.

Try it

Using the drinks shop data:

1. Filter to Drinks only, then clear the filter.
2. Use SUMIF to find total Snacks sales.
3. Build a PivotTable of Sales by Category.
4. Add a bar chart with a title that says what it shows.

Want to go further? The free Excel for Data Analysis course covers all of this in depth, with a real company dataset.