Tutorial: work with CSV reports in Google Sheets

Many of our labels want specific views, charts and reports of their performance. This tutorial give you a basic understanding of how to turn your Labelcaster CSV file data into something usable.

You’ll need a Google account. If you have a Gmail address, you are good.

If you haven’t downloaded it already, download your CSV file. We suggest starting with just a few months so the data isn’t that huge. Instructions are in this article:

Import the CSV and set up your data

1. Create new Google sheets document. Start off here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets

2. Click the big plus sign that says Blank spreadsheet at the top left of the page. You create a new spreadsheet.

3. Import the CSV
   1. Choose menu item: File > Import

   2. Upload and browse to find your CSV file.

   3. You can just use the defaults for now

4. Format the date data to be in months since we only care about that
   1. Select columns B, C, and D (report_date, sales_start_date, and

   2. Choose menu item: Format > Number > Custom date and time

5. Turn into a table
   1. Select all the data cells [Shortcut tip: select cell A1 then click Command-shift-Right Arrow and then Command -Shift-Down Arrow (MacOS) or Control-shift-Right Arrow and then Control -Shift-Down Arrow (Windows)]

   2. Choose menu item: Format > Convert to table

Create your first pivot table

1. Choose Insert > Pivot table

2. Notice the range says Table1 (or whatever you renamed the table to). Create a new sheet

3. Click Add button next to Values in the Pivot table editor Values are things you wan to sum, count or aggregate in some way.

4. Select total_royalty_revenue Notice that it created a SUM

5. Now lets pivot the data to show how each of our artists did, on Rows click Add and choose track_artist

6. Voila, you have just built your first pivot table!

Displaying values by month

We’ll use the same concept we used to get artists in rows to split the data by month in columns.

1. In the Pivot table editor, click Add in Columns and choose report_month

If the pivot table editor disappears or seems to be missing, click the pencil icon on the left side of the window just underneath the picot table itself top open the editor.

Cleaning it up and formatting

1. Make the numbers easier to read. Format the numbers to be Euros.
   1. Select cells with number values ( in the image above it is cells B3:F9))

   2. Choose menu item: Format > Number > Custom currency

   3. Choose the Euro sign and two decimal places and Apply

   When you format like this the values round to 1/100ths, so they can round up or down a bit depending

2. Alternate colors in rows to make it easier to read
   1. Select all the cells of the pivot table (in this example it is cells A2:F9

   2. Choose men item Format > alternating colors..

   3. An editor comes up on the right part of the window. check Header and Footer to have those highlighted. You can choose a color combination you like or customize your own.