Blog

The Top 4 Tools to Import Live Data to Google Sheets

Emma Butler
Emma Butler
Jun 25, 2019 · 5 min read
spiral staircase

Spreadsheets are the easiest way to manipulate and visualize your data. A supposed 980 million people us Microsoft Excel and/or Google Sheets. What’s been customarily not so easy? Actually getting your data into a spreadsheet. 

We all know about how to manually export data to csv, and then copy paste it in our spreadheet. But how do you get rid of that manual and tedious process? It’d be great to link a spreadsheet to a data source and have that data frequently updated without having to do anything, right?

Good news! In recent years, a few platforms have made it easy to move external data to Google Sheets and keep it live, without having to write a single line of code.

I’ve outlined my 4 favorite tools based on price, types of integration and ease of use. Also, I’ve showcased a few integrations from each platform that I think sums up the overall type of integrations from the platform. You can easily get the gist of who each platform is geared towards.  I’m comparing them all at the most popular price point option for businesses.



SuperMetrics

Ease of Use: As a Google Sheets add-on, you don’t even have to leave Google Sheets to import data. In a sidebar on the right hand of your Google Sheets page, Supermetrics lists all of its integrations and allows you to select what type of data you want and how you want it presented on the spreadsheet.

Best for: Marketing Teams

Total Integrations: 45

A few featured integrations: Instagram, Facebook Ads, Google Analytics, Salesforce. It also has access to Public data from Facebook, Instagram, and other social media sites.

Check out all their integrations here.

Price & Scheduling: $149 per user per month. With this plan, you have access to all data sources and can update as frequently as every hour. 

 

data grabber tools Supermetrics

 

Actiondesk

Ease of Use: This one is my personal favorite solution to get your data into a spreadsheet: Actiondesk. Actiondesk is a spreadsheet software that lets you import and refresh data from other data sources, including HubSpot. So the main difference here is that instead of having (1) a HubSpot account, (2) a spreadsheet and (3) a connector to link them both ; you just have your HubSpot account and your Actiondesk spreadsheet, the integration being an integral part of the product. So your dashboard is done once and for all, updating itself automatically by retrieving data from HubSpot. Actiondesk is a slightly different option because it’s not a connector to Google Sheets or Excel. It's actually a spreadsheet software on its own. Yes, a full fledged spreadsheet software, that is natively connected to your external data. Meaning no more CSV copy-pasting: you just connect your data source once, the data gets imported directly in your spreadsheet, where you can play with this data (build dashboards, reports, or simply dig in the data to help you get your head into the numbers). And then, whatever you built is automatically refreshed 😎.

Best for: Marketing and sales analysts / managers

A few featured integrations: PostgreSQL, Salesforce, Hubspot, MySQL, Stripe

Check out all their integrations and use cases here.

Price & Scheduling: You have a 14-days free trial and then, if you like the product, it costs $20/month. You can update your data every 5 minutes.

If you want to request access to Actiondesk, you can go to: https://www.actiondesk.io/request-access-to-actiondesk and see for yourself if it suits your needs.

Actiondesk interface


Disclaimer: I might be a bit biased since I work at Actiondesk :)

Zapier

Ease of Use: To import data from your external source to Zapier, you need to create the “zaps” on Zapier’s interface. The interface is extremely user-friendly and easy to use. Unlike the other options on this list, Zapier does not account for past data and only triggers workflows with new data importing data. Zapier will show its limits when it comes to updating records. If you have to update records that were already pushed to google sheets, you’ll have to set up several Zapier workflows, which can quickly become hard to maintain. 

Best for: Teams who want to push data and not modify it afterward

Zapier has over 1,500 integrations with Google Sheets. 

See Zapier’s integrations here

Price & Scheduling: $12 per month with hourly updates

Zapier interface

 

Blockspring

Ease of Use: Like Supermetrics, Blockspring is a Google Sheets add-on; you never have to leave Google Sheets and work from a sidebar on your worksheet. Blockspring calls its workflows “Blocks” and it’s honestly not as easy and intuitive as Supermetrics, but it offers a more diverse range of integrations.

Best for: Marketing teams

A Few Featured Integrations: Amazon products, hunter.io, Linkedin, MySQL, The New York Times, 

Blockspring accounts for general data queries (i.e. searching the New York Times for relevant articles) and specific queries for personal data sources such as MySQL or Instagram. Like Zapier, you cannot create custom triggers.

See a list of Blockspring integrations here

Price: $29 per month for as fast as hourly updates

 

Blockspring interface

Conclusion

Ultimately, for marketing teams with basic marketing applications, Blockspring or Supermetrics is the way to go. If you are on the operations side of a business, data analytics team, or want to crunch your numbers and do complex manipulations, Actiondesk is probably the way to go (we might be a little bit biased).

 

Oh, and if you think this whole thing is a painful process, feel to check out our product Actiondesk, it's a spreadsheet software that lets you import and refresh data seamlessly from SQL, Stripe, Salesforce, Hubspot and more.

Keep reading

X
Please wait...
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.