In this session, you learnt about using functions in Excel.

Let’s summarise the learnings

from each segment.

Delimited files are data files that have values separated by certain special characters (for
example, tab, comma, semicolon). They are in widespread use because they can be easily
accessed by various platforms and spreadsheet software apart from Excel. Some of the most
commonly used delimited file formats are as follows:

● Comma-Separated Values Files (CSVs)

● Semicolon-Separated Files
● Tab-Separated Files

For example, the following fields in each record are separated by semicolons and each record by
new lines.

The following image shows how the same file would look after exporting to MS Excel.

In this segment, you learnt about extracting data (to MS Excel) from one type of delimited files,
i.e., semicolon-separated files. In the process, you learnt some important functions such as Text to
Columns.
Keyboard shortcuts are beneficial for better efficiency. But, when it comes to Excel, there are
multiple hundred shortcuts. One should press the Alt key to discover shortcuts for a command.

Make it a habit of using shortcuts religiously. With time, your fingers will get habituated to the
most commonly used shortcuts, and you will no longer have to spend time remembering
shortcuts. It also helps to remember some of the commonly used shortcuts (for example, insert a
column, advanced formatting, insert charts, etc.).

In this segment, you learnt about formulae through an example.

A bank contacted approximately 45,000 people for a telemarketing campaign and recorded their
opinion on purchasing a new product. You analysed the dataset to find profiles of people who
should be targeted, i.e., categories of people who have a higher propensity to buy the new
product.

Why is this important?

A focussed targeting will not only increase the sales of the new product but also reduce the
marketing cost.
This is a fairly common analysis, and a lot of you would have faced similar questions at work:
1. Which customers to reach out for an email marketing campaign?
2. Which customers to target based on their demographics?

Important insights that you learnt while working on this example are as follows:
1. Cells are named as a combination of the respective rows and columns, i.e., the cell at the
intersection of Column A and Row 2 is named as A2.
2. Formulae can use cell references. Copy and pasting formulae adjusts the input cells
references appropriately.
3. Double click on the Autofill square at the bottom right of a cell to fill an entire range. Excel
is smart enough to change the input references for each cell.

You used the Insert Function tab (FX) in the formula bar to search for functions. In the Insert
Function dialogue box, each function has an explanation.

In this session, your primary aim was to find the types of people who are most likely to respond
positively to a campaign. You analysed various attributes such as age group and marital status
one at a time and later automated the task to do the same in a fraction of seconds. In this
segment, you learnt faster ways to extract the important pieces of information from the data.
Some of the important points to remember are as follows:

● Use 0 and 1 instead of No and Yes. The use of binary values (especially 0 and 1) makes
the computation of average easier.
● Remove duplicates from the Data tab. Remove Duplicates feature can be used to find only
the unique values in a column.

Until now, you have analysed one variable at a time, i.e., age, marital status, etc. In reality, it is
possible that a combination of variables affects the propensity of a person to buy a product. For
example, it is possible that married and tertiary educated people do not buy many banking
products, but unmarried and tertiary educated ones do.

In this segment, you analysed multiple variables at a time. In the process, you learnt text functions
and a few more techniques to combine variables.

Logical formulae are used to manipulate variables that can take only two values. For example,
you may want to divide the data into two parts based on age - young (< 40 years) and old (> 40
years). You can use logical formulae to do the same. The word 'logical' indicates either of two
values, for example, 1 or 0.

Charts and visualisations are how data analysts communicate with the business. You may have
seen presentations made by managers, CEOs and analysts. Charts are widely used because they
are simple to understand and communicate the key information quickly.

It is important to understand that data visualisations can be used in two ways: 1) to explore
insights in the data and 2) to present insights to other people. A typical presentation contains
insights for other people. While analysing data, you can (and should) use charts to understand
patterns and trends. In fact, conditional formatting is also a type of data visualisation and is
usually used to explore data.
Excel offers a wide range of charts such as line charts, pie charts and scatter plots, and it is
natural to get overwhelmed with the choice.
The most important thumb rules to choose charts are as follows:

1. Bar charts are used when one variable is categorical and the other is numeric, for
example, marital status (three categories) and age.
a. Stacked bar charts (or simply, stacked charts) are used when there is more than
one categorical variable, for example, marital status and gender plotted in two
different colours.
2. Line charts are used with one categorical variable and one numeric variable.
a. If time is a variable to be plotted, it is almost always plotted on the X-axis of a line
chart.
3. Pie charts have poor readability, and thus, you should avoid using them.
4. Scatter plots are used when you want to plot two numeric variables, for example, age and
income.
a. You can add transparency in scatter plots to improve readability.

Despite having a wide range of options of chart types, the most commonly used ones are bar
charts, line charts and scatter plots. The reason is that these are easy to read. In fact, pie charts
sometimes decrease the readability of data.
Disclaimer: All content and material on the upGrad website is copyrighted, either belonging to upGrad or
its bonafide contributors and is purely for the dissemination of education. You are permitted to access
print and download extracts from this site purely for your own education only and on the following basis:

● You can download this document from the website for self-use only.
● Any copy of this document, in part or full, saved to disk or to any other storage medium may only
be used for subsequent, self-viewing purposes, or to print an individual extract or copy for
non-commercial personal use only.
● Any further dissemination, distribution, reproduction, copying of the content of the document
herein or the uploading thereof on other websites, or use of the content for any other
commercial/unauthorised purposes in any way which could infringe the intellectual property
rights of upGrad or its contributors, is strictly prohibited. 
● No graphics, images or photographs from any accompanying text in this document will be used
separately for unauthorised purposes. 
● No material in this document will be modified, adapted or altered in any way.
● No part of this document or upGrad content may be reproduced or stored in any other website or
included in any public or private electronic retrieval system or service without upGrad’s prior
written permission.
● Any right not expressly granted in these terms is reserved.