Master Excel Power Query - Beginner to Pro

Power Query is an Essential tool for Data Analysis. Learn to Collect and Analyze Data with Ease.

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How This Single
Button
Can Change Your Life


Make Your Excel Life Easier with Power Query

Inside your Microsoft Excel window sits a magic button.

Those who have pressed this button are familiar with the relief it brings.

If you’ve never clicked this button, keep reading, because this will be the most important message of your day.

This magic button? It’s called the “Refresh” button, and it looks like this:

You’re probably asking…

“Okay Leila, you’re making a big deal about this button. What makes it so special?"

Because, my dear, just one click of this button can replace hours and hours of manual labor.

It can save you from pulling your hair out as you clean data. And it allows you to ship reports to your boss and colleagues faster – winning you praise and promotions.

We’ll revisit our magic button shortly. First, let’s visit a typical day in the life of an Excel user.

“Here’s Your Data Dump. Enjoy!”

Ugh.

Is there anything that spikes your blood pressure more than being sent a massive data file you’ll need hours to clean?

You reply to your colleague through gritted teeth:

“Thanks! Will have you those reports asap!”

You stare at the file the same way you stare at that closet you haven’t cleaned in seven years.

“I’m afraid to even touch it.”

Yet, you must. So, you open the file…

“My gosh, it’s even worse than I thought.”

You’re staring at a crime scene.

“I’ll try copy & pasting…”

Is copying and pasting your method of choice? It makes sense.

After all, a quick Ctrl-c and Ctrl-v and voilà! Everything is perfect, right?

In our dreams.

Copying and pasting is fraught with problems:

  • It’s frustrating, especially if you’re dealing with multiple sheets and workbooks
  • It’s too easy to make a mistake and leave data behind (Repeat after me: “No data left behind!”)
  • Each time you receive new data you must repeat the copy/paste over and over and over and over…
  • What if the data is in a text file which has more data rows than Excel can handle?

Get my point?

But let’s say you’re able to get the data into Excel.

Off to the races?

Hardly!

It’s one thing to have data in Excel, it’s another to have clean data in Excel.

Oh, how we wish all data could be delivered to us on a silver platter. We’d give our colleague a warm, “Thank you!” and maybe even a hug.

Instead, we groan…

“You put the data in a PDF? Really?!”

Or…

“Why the heck would you put the customer ID and the customer’s name in the same freaking column!?”

Or…

“Why does your SAP export have leading spaces?"

But you push your frustration down deep, check how many days are left til’ Friday, and soldier on…

“Let me add a helper column”

You get to work cleaning and shaping the data. It’s like ironing a crumpled suit you found in the back of that long-neglected closet.

You need a tool.

“I’ll add a helper column,” you say to yourself. “That will help me remove these dang spaces."

You add a helper column. Then another, and another.

Next, you start adding complex formulas. You’re hoping they will do the heavy lifting and iron out your messy data.

They do, but at a cost.

After lunch, you sit back down at your desk and re-launch your Excel file.

“Uh-oh.”

Excel freezes for a split-second, and then finally, your file opens.

“It’s slowing down.”

All those lengthy formulas and helper columns bloated your file.

“If I send my boss this 40MB file, she’ll kill me.”

You look down at your coffee mug and decide it needs refilling.

Your Excel life doesn’t need to be this way!


If you regularly import data into Excel, please, let me make your life easier.

I have two words for you: Power Query.

Often overlooked because Microsoft tucked it away inside the “Data” tab back in 2016, Excel users worldwide are finally waking up to the gift that is Power Query.

Because you’re not alone in your struggles to add and clean data in Excel. Not by a long shot.

Before graduating from our Power Query online course, our students felt the same way.

"Many times we receive our data in less than pristine condition. This course is filled with tools and techniques that will allow us to solve these problems with much less effort. Tasks that we would not undertake due to complexity and effort are now enjoyably achievable.

- Stephen Azzarello

"“I underwrite value on mobile home parks and RV’s.

99% of the time, the books and records come to me as PDF documents. If it wasn't for Power Query, I would spend more time converting than actually doing my core job of underwriting.”

- James W.

"I was still going through the course when my wife, who is a consultant, received an assignment from a client to help them recover the data about their P&L after virus compromised their data.

She had to reconcile the current data with some older extracts and the files were huge and not easy to reconcile with normal look-ups due to multiple instances of the same account.

Her colleagues tried to do the job for some time and failed so they asked her to try to solve the issue. I managed to help her using Power Query with some of the techniques from this course, I finished the task in a couple of hours (since I am not yet familiar with PQ and it took me some time to troubleshoot some issues, otherwise would have been minutes). And my file ended up only at 1.5 MB, very fast to open and work with. The previous attempt was about 45 MB, full of formulae, heavy to open and work with and also it caused occasional Excel crashes... I can't believe how easy this was really!"

- Dragan Yordanov

Today, these students and thousands more are saving hours each day thanks to Power Query.

I swear, using Power Query must be the same feeling people had 100 years ago when they drove a car for the first time. It lets you go fast.

In that spirit, it’s time for you to trade in your horse & buggy and enter the Excel fast lane.

Data to Dashboard in 60 Seconds


Need to send a dashboard to your boss or colleague?

Ah, we finally return to that magic refresh button. Because do you want to know the best part of Power Query?

  • It’s not that it can connect to almost any data source, even data sitting on a webpage.
  • It’s not Power Query’s ability to clean data with a flick of its wrist.
  • It’s not how Power Query eliminates complex formulas, liberating you from having to become Severus Snape, Excel potions master.

Yes, those are all wonderful benefits provided by Power Query. But its best feature?

It’s this: Power Query remembers.

Yes, you can record the steps you take to import and clean your data. That way, when a new batch of data arrives, all you need to do is click “Refresh.”

Instantly, your data is imported, cleaned, and beautifully presented.

No more copy & paste. No more helper columns. No more mixing together complex formulas.

You simply click that magic button. That’s how you go from data to dashboard in 60 seconds.

This has saved me quite some time which I used to spend doing things manually.

I have prepared some other reports by combining data from multiple files in a folder. Any time a new file was added to the folder, I would see the latest numbers in my report.

I helped a colleague with a CAPEX report using PQ, and she told me that I saved her one whole day of work.

In the words of José Carlos (a student of ours) - "Can we call that magic :)?"

How many hours are you losing
by not fully harnessing Power Query?


If you regularly import data into Excel, it’s a no-brainer. Your time is too precious to not use Power Query.

But in my experience, even most daily Power Query users are only scratching the surface of what’s possible.

For example, they don’t realize Power Query allows them to:

  • Connect directly to websites and fetch data
  • Remove duplicates in an intelligent way
  • Hunt down errors inside columns (for example, when different date formats are used in the same column – don’t you love that?)
  • Combine data from multiple Excel workbooks into a single Table (or Pivot Table)
  • Consolidate data from all files in a folder (and make exceptions as you need)
  • Connect your Excel workbook to Microsoft Outlook

Not to mention the file-shrinking wonders Power Query provides. Look at this experiment I ran…

Without using Power Query, the size of this Excel file was a whopping 41MB. After Power Query?

The file size shrank to 5MB!

Would you rather send a 41MB or a 5MB file to your boss?

I Avoided Power Query For a Long Time

If you’re new around here, I’m Leila Gharani, founder of XelPlus.

I avoided Power Query for a long time. I had watched multiple videos and I thought,

“This is a Power Tool. I don’t work with millions of rows of data. I don’t need this.”

But then in 2018, the Microsoft Team presented some updates they’d implemented in Power Query. And I realized, I had watched the wrong videos. There was an easy side to Power Query and an advanced side. I’d jumped right in with advanced techniques. No wonder I tried to avoid it.

You see, as a Microsoft MVP, I get invited to Redmond, Washington each year for the Global MVP Summit. In between the yearly visits, we have monthly sessions where the Microsoft Excel team gives us updates on the latest features (yes, it’s pretty cool).

It was on one of these calls where I saw the easy side of Power Query in action for the first time. My initial reaction was, “Wow! That is incredible.”

I also realized my mistake. You see, at first, the name Power Query fooled me.

Judging by the name, I thought it was a tool for power users. When actually, it’s a power tool – for everyone.

Power Query is not reserved for Excel masters. Rather, it’s a powerful tool that can benefit even the Excel beginner. At the end of the day, Power Query is nothing more than a series of clicks.

After that meeting with the Microsoft team, I knew I must teach Power Query to our XelPlus audience. That’s when I started working on our online course.

Today, I’m excited to invite you to become a student in that course. It’s now helped thousands of Excel users shave hours off their workday tasks, and it can help you too.

Introducing: Master Excel Power Query

A step-by-step online course by Leila Gharani to help you leverage Excel’s biggest time-savings feature


Enroll in our Power Query course today and you’ll:

  • Get up and running with Power Query in just an hour or two
  • Get 18 hours of video tutorials, covering everything you’ll need to know about Power Query (Beginner all the way to pro)
  • Challenge yourself by downloading our Excel challenge files
  • Test your knowledge with quizzes at the end of every section
  • Ask questions and get answers from our helpful teaching assistants

You can view the detailed curriculum below.

Course Curriculum


  ******* POWER QUERY ADVANCED TO PRO *******
Available in days
days after you enroll
  🎁 YOUR BONUS! Reference & Solution Books.
Available in days
days after you enroll
  🎁 Power Query Pro Techniques
Available in days
days after you enroll

"This is the best money I ever spent on my education. Leila has changed the course of my career. Her teaching skills are unmatched. I used to direct live news and have a master’s in communication. I am now a Business Analyst and manage reporting requirements for my company."

- Amrita O'Sullivan

"This is the definitive course for Power Query. It's a fun, engaging way to learn with a perfect amount of theory and practice."

- Mark Theirl

Yes, it’s a BIG course. Which means it has everything you need for Power Query.

But it might also be intimidating, too. Don’t worry. You don’t need to go through every single lesson before seeing benefits. In fact, go through just 5% of the course and you’ll save hours of time in Excel.

Plus whatever you learn in this course you can apply 1-to-1 to Power BI as well.

In addition to the main course, we also have a few excellent bonuses. I want you to have as few “Excel headaches” as possible, and these bonuses are like an Excel aspirin.

Bonus 1: Power Query
Quick Reference Guide


When you have a tight deadline and the pressure’s on, you don’t always have time to log into an online course and go through lessons.

That’s why I’m giving you this 222-page quick reference guide as a bonus.

Simply look through the table of contents to find what you need.

Caption: Sample from the Reference Guide bonus

Bonus 2: Power Query
Solutions Book


Excel is a problem-solving tool. Well, the way you solve problems is with good solutions, right? That’s what this second bonus gives you.

It contains 107 pages of common Excel problems – and good Power Query solutions.

You’ll find solutions to problems like:

  • Combining data from multiple workbooks and sheets
  • Creating buckets for your data
  • Finding mismatches in your data
  • Searching and replacing bulk values
  • Unpivoting data with multiple headers

And more.

Caption: Sample from the Solutions guide bonus

Bonus 3
Pro Section


Are you already familiar with Power Query? Maybe even an expert at it? This bonus is for you, the Power Query ninja.

You’re at the point where you’re ready for the advanced techniques. This third bonus will give them to you.

60 days after you enroll in the course, this Pro section will appear inside your account. Inside, you’ll find those advanced techniques.

Such as:

  • How to create a mapping table for column headers when combining files from a folder
  • Tackling complex pivot issues.
  • Add validation reports to make sure business rules are met
  • Dynamically keep and replace column names based on a master table
  • Split columns by multiple delimiters instead of just one

Not to mention the powerful List.Accumulate function. With this function, you can "loop" through a list and adjust the values as you go.

This way, you can achieve tasks that are otherwise not possible or might require a lot of steps.

It's not an easy function to understand, and there isn’t much documentation online, either. But we’ve got you covered.

You’ll find an entire section on List.Accumulate in your course area.

Armed with these three bonuses plus our main curriculum, you’re all set to make Power Query your best friend.

New! Earn CPD credits


I’m excited to announce this Power Query course is now CPD certified. The Continuing Professional Development is a top global accreditation, trusted by companies and industries worldwide.

When you complete this course, you’ll get a special certificate with the official CPD stamp. You will earn 18 CPD hours with the course.

If CPD credits can help in your career, this isn’t a course to skip.

Enroll Now in Mastering Power Query

Wave “goodbye” to manual work inside Excel.

Stop being the Excel janitor, always cleaning up messes.

Shrink those file sizes and stop freaking out about “the freeze.”

Enroll today and make your Excel life faster & easier.

 

It doesn’t matter if you’re a beginner, either.

  • You don’t need to be an advanced Excel user
  • You don’t need to understand “M Logic”
  • You don’t need to be working with BIG data
  • You don’t need to invest hours of learning Power Query before reaping the benefits

In fact, I give you this challenge...

Go through just a couple modules. Pick whichever ones jump out at you. Then, test your new skills at work. Give it an honest effort.

I promise your eyes will open to all the hours you’ve been wasting.

If you’re not impressed? We have a 30-day refund policy and will gladly return your enrollment fee.

But I don’t think that will happen, because once you get the hang of Power Query, you’ll never look back. Nobody does.

If you want to enter the Excel fast lane, click the button below and enroll today.

 

"I never explored power query or even knew it existed. I became aware of it with the introduction in the Excel Essentials Course.

This course really shows the user a lot of tools to manage and present data with less effort and time than the old way of excel formulas and referencing other workbooks or sheets.

I like that I can reduce the amount of requests to IT regarding report formatting and I can organize the data the way I need it."

- Mike Hoffman

"I have been a sales data analyst from 1999 to 2005. After I left the company, I moved out of data analysis. Now I find myself heading back into this field, and the data analysis tools have changed significantly!

Leila and her team have crafted a structured, thorough, and professional course on Power Query that will undoubtedly give your career an incredible boost. The course has been excellent and I'm excited to apply these new skills in my work and volunteer activities."

- Derek Capitaine

"I'm working in an hospital, and my data is coming mainly from our digital patients record and from our administrative patients records. Prior to this classes, I had to ask our informatic engineer on top of his job, to create the reports I needed.

Leila takes you from the very beginning to the maximum possible of Power Query. Not only does she teach, but the program offers you many add-ons. Imagine, in January I didn't even know about the words ‘Power Query’!"

- Philippe Courvoisier

At this point, you might be asking, “Do I have the time to go through this course?”

First, here’s the question you should really be asking yourself: “Do I have the time not to?”

Because if you’re tight on time, Power Query is your answer. Yes, you need to invest the time up front to learn it. But the ROI will show up in less than a month. In many cases, the first week.

But I get it – online courses take time. That’s why we’re rolling out this new time-savings feature to all our courses, including this one.

We call it: The Topic Transporter.

Beam Me Up, Scotty!
Jump into the Topic You Need – Fast


As a Star Trek fan, I was always in awe of the transporter technology. It blew my mind how Captain Kirk could spot a nearby planet, then instantly transport his team to that exact location.

I want your experience inside our course to be just as instantaneous.

Thanks to a new tool we created here in our XelPlus “laboratory,” now, when you want to find a topic, you can do so instantly.

We’ve gone through every second of every lesson and pulled out the key words & topics. Then, we created an interactive agenda which allows you to quickly locate exactly what you’re looking for.

Once you find your topic, it’s simply a matter of saying “Beam me up!” (not actually required). Click the link and you’ll instantly be transported to the correct lesson and timestamp.

No more wasting hours searching. Find what you need, then get back to work.

Get a Certificate of Completion

When you finish the course, you’ll get a certificate of completion. You can send it to your boss, upload it to LinkedIn or just add it to your own person library of learning achievements.

Your Next Steps

Click the button below to get started. Excel Power Query will give your career an incredible boost.

The investment for this course is only $179 (ex. VAT). What would it be worth to you to have this time-saving Excel skill in your skillset?

You'll get:

  • Access to our entire 23-module course (18+ hours of video tutorials)
  • Lifetime access, so you’re never in a rush to complete a lesson
  • The “Beam Me Up Scotty” topic transporter to quickly find what you need
  • 200+ Practice Workbooks (both START and SOLUTION files)
  • A comment section to get your questions answered by our staff (how awesome is that?)
  • Credits for CPD
  • English Captions so you can easily follow along each video
  • Quizzes to track how well you understand the concepts
  • Challenges to acquire your Power Query skills fast
  • Quick Reference Guide to review what you learnt
  • Solution Book to quickly find answers to your data analysis challenges
  • A bonus Pro Section covering topics only a few Power Query Pros know

You can be watching the first lesson in less than five minutes.

 

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

When does the course start and finish?

You’ll take this course in your own time. It is a completely self-paced online course – so you decide when you start and when you finish.

How long do I have access to the course?

How does lifetime access sound? After enrolling, you have unlimited access to this course for as long as you like - across any and all devices you own.

What if I am unhappy with the course?

We would never want you to be unhappy! If you are unsatisfied with your purchase, contact us in the first 30 days and we will give you a full refund.

What if I have questions about the lessons? Can I get those answered?

Yes! Most online courses leave you on your own, but not here at XelPlus.

We have a team of helpful teaching assistants (TA’s) ready to answer your questions about each lesson. Below each lesson, you’ll find a comment section where you can ask a question about the topic. Our TA’s will chime in and do their best to help you.

What’s required for the course?

This course is designed for Excel on Windows. Power Query is currently NOT fully available in native Mac.

You’ll need Microsoft Excel 2019 or Microsoft 365. General functionality is also available in Excel 2016, but some Power Query features require newer versions.

Any other questions?

Send us an email to [email protected] and a member of my team will get back to you ASAP.

"Leila consistently provides great education and training value in her courses. They are thorough and extensive. Leila uncovers key points that I overlooked. I gain useful information and examples that further my understanding. The documentation is thorough and easy to follow and helps me find answers when I get stuck. I look forward to her next course."

- Rusch Mauzy

Get started now!