Introduction to Excel Lookup Formulas (Video) (Course Id 2641)

• Who is this course for?
  This course is designed for anyone needing Continuing Professional Education (CPE), particularly CPAs, accountants, and professionals who want to improve their Excel skills.

• What is this course about or what problem does this course solve?
  The course explains Excel’s family of lookup functions, helping users transition from VLOOKUP to XLOOKUP and troubleshoot common formula issues, enhancing the accuracy and reliability of data analysis.

• How can the knowledge from this course be used?
  Learners can apply the techniques to build, debug, and improve lookup formulas in Excel, making their spreadsheets more efficient and error-resistant.

• Why is this course important to a CPA, Accountant, or IRS Enrolled Agent?
  Accurate data lookup is essential in financial modeling and reporting, and mastering these Excel functions helps professionals ensure data integrity and improve workflow efficiency.

• When is this course relevant or timely?
  This course is especially timely with the growing adoption of Microsoft 365 and its evolving Excel features, which differ from older, static versions like Excel 2016 or 2019.

• How is a course like this consumed or used?
  It is delivered as a video-based NASBA QAS self-study course, featuring step-by-step demonstrations and Excel workbook examples, and includes review and final exam questions to assess understanding.

In this presentation author and Excel expert David H. Ringstrom, CPA, demystifies Excel’s family of lookup functions, guiding you from the legacy VLOOKUP formula to the more versatile XLOOKUP. David shows how to build lookup formulas from the ground up, using Excel’s built-in help tools to enter lookup values, select arrays, and troubleshoot common issues such as #REF! and #N/A errors. He contrasts approximate and exact match behavior, explains how to eliminate errors caused by extra spaces or AutoCorrect quirks, and demonstrates how to handle missing matches gracefully using IFNA. Along the way, you'll explore best practices such as future-proofing lookup formulas, using tables for structured referencing, and pairing INDEX with MATCH to enhance flexibility. Whether you’re stuck on VLOOKUP or ready to dive into XLOOKUP, this session will deepen your understanding and improve your lookup reliability.

David is the author of “Microsoft Excel 365 for Dummies”, “Exploring Microsoft Excel’s Hidden Treasures”, and has written or co-authored six other books. He demonstrates every technique at least twice: first, on a PowerPoint slide with numbered steps, and second, in the subscription-based Excel for Microsoft 365. David draws your attention to any differences in Excel 2021, 2019 or 2016 during the presentation and in his detailed handouts. The handouts include an Excel workbook with most of the examples he uses during his demonstrations.

Excel for Microsoft 365 is a subscription-based product that receives periodic feature updates. Conversely, perpetually licensed versions have year numbers in their names and do not receive any feature updates.

Video - NASBA QAS - NASBA Registry - 2641

Course Learning Objectives

• State which XLOOKUP argument causes an alternate value to be displayed in lieu of #N/A.
• State the arguments for Excel's SUMIF function.
• Recall what to specify in the match_mode argument to cause XLOOKUP to return an approximate match based upon the next smaller item.

Chapter 1 - Introduction to Excel Lookup Formulas

Chapter 1 Review Questions

Key Terms