These 10 Excel consulting services can help you improve workbooks, develop macros using VBA, refine formulas, and perform data analysis. Some of these services also offer Excel training programs. Below is a summary of each service.
| Company | Rates | Key Services |
|---|---|---|
| SurveyKing | $75 hr | Financial models, VBA, tech company resources, custom apps. |
| Excel Complete | $50 hr | Custom formulas, macros, SQL, CPAs for accounting projects. |
| Automate Excel | $70+ hr | Automated VBA code writer tool, online resources. |
| Joshua Wilson Consulting | $200 hr | Dashboards, data analysis. |
| ProsperSpark | $1,424 project min. | VBA, automations using Zapier. |
| The Excel Experts | Not Listed | VBA, SQL, Power BI. |
| ExcelHelp | Not Listed | VBA, SQL, business intelligence. |
| Excel & Access | Not Listed | Support, training, VBA, Access development. |
| Excel4Business | Not Listed | Support, training, and a YouTube channel with examples. |
| Upwork | Varies | Worldwide freelancers. |
Free Excel Resources
Before using a consulting company, check out some of the free online resources. These resources offer Excel demos, sample formulas, VBA code, and training programs. The forums contain common business-related Excel questions.
- MrExcel – The largest online help forum for Excel. Very organized layout and many of the threads contain sample code and workbooks. They also have a list of consultants that may be able to help with your project.
- OzGrid – Another online help forum. They have paid help section where you can post a question and then hire someone to build a solution.
- Exceljet – The largest online resource for Excel help topics. Tons of sample formulas and functions. They offer training books for a cost. Their help resources lack VBA code.
1. SurveyKing Consulting
Being one the most popular online survey tools, SurveyKing has the unique ability to offer Excel consulting services and assistance on business-related IT tasks.
SurveyKing has a staff with a wide variety of skills, including VBA, SQL, and app development. Completed projects include pricing analysis, budgets, forecasts, market research, and operational metrics. In addition, many projects have included automated uploads to SharePoint or network drives.
SurveyKing Consulting is based in Detroit, Michigan, but services clients worldwide. SurveyKing Consulting can meet in person to build your project or conduct training depending on project requirements.
Quick Summary:
- Transparent pricing – $75 an hour.
- Wide range of technical skills. VBA + Business tools like SAP.
- SharePoint development.
- The resources of a large tech company to help solve complex business problems.
2. Excel Complete
Excel Complete is a versatile Excel consulting company. They provide additional programming services such as SQL and app development. They offer a simple and transparent pricing model and provide on-demand support for Excel troubleshooting.
Their website has a dedicated VBA development and consulting section and a help document section with code and formula examples. They have licensed professionals such as CPAs to help streamline business functions like budgets and forecasts.
Quick Summary:
- Simple pricing – $50 an hour for projects.
- Schedule a Zoom project consultation at your convenience.
- VBA development, website building, SQL, and statistical consulting.
- SharePoint development services + VBA (save and read files).
- Employs business professionals like CPAs.
3. Automate Excel
Automate Excel has very transparent pricing and a simple way to submit your documents to request a quote. This service also has a list of functions and code examples to help get you started.
One of the coolest features of Automate Excel is a custom plugin they created to help your write VBA code, called AutoMacro. This makes learning a few advanced VBA concepts easy.
Quick Summary:
- Simple, transparent pricing. $97 for smaller projects that take an hour. $71 an hour for larger-scale projects.
- Sample VBA code and online resources to get you started.
- A fantastic tool to help you write your own VBA code.
4. Joshua Wilson Consulting
Joshua Wilson Consulting focuses on finance and accounting-related projects. Process improvement and workflow automation are the most significant selling points.
While the rates at $200 may be a little higher than those of other firms, the apparent quality of the work and a focus on how the data can improve your business are worth discussing.
Quick Summary:
- Accounting and finance focused.
- Can help export data from QuickBooks to Excel.
- Offers services such as an on-call/temporary financial analyst.
- A phone number listed on the website.
5. ProsperSpark
Founded in 2018 by Brandon Zobel, ProsperSpark is an Excel consulting firm offering a wide variety of services, including project—and retainer-based services. ProsperSpark is passionate about helping small businesses.
One unique feature of ProsperSpark is its ability to offer automation using Zapier, Which allows you to push and pull data from your company’s applications, such as Salesforce.
Quick Summary:
- $99 support calls – 30 minutes for on-demand Excel help.
- For project-based work, there is a minimum $1,424 charge; working on a retainer has a minimum cost of $1,733.
- VBA development and support. Some exceprice in other programming languages like C#.
- Additonal consulting services like Salesforce.
6. The Excel Experts
The Excel Experts offers general consulting services and VBA development. They also offer Power BI solutions. The Excel Experts is a service that sees the value in eliminating repetitive tasks. This firm also mentions the use of SQL.
The Excel Experts are based in the UK, so there may be a slight time zone difference for US clients.
Quick Summary:
- Pricing is not listed on the website.
- Their contact form does not allow you to attach a file. This can increase the amount of communication before starting the engagement.
- Additional services like Power BI and SQL.
7. ExcelHelp
ExcelHelp offers a lot of Excel services, including VBA consulting. ExcelHelp has many examples and case studies on its website, a great resource. In addition, their home page has a phone number, making it easy to talk to someone for immediate help.
One of the biggest selling features is in-person or remote training. This training could be ideal for large-scale VBA projects requiring multiple employees to share/use a central file.
Quick Summary:
- No pricing is listed on their website.
- Phone support.
- In-person or remote Excel training.
- Many case studies on their website are organized by industry or job type.
- They offer additional services like database implementation and SQL support.
8. Excel & Access
Excel & Access is a company that focuses on Excel Troubleshooting, VBA development, and database development. They also offer Access and Azure support, which are staples in an organization that uses Microsoft products exclusively.
Excel & Access has a solid track record of reviews on Google. While rates for their services are not listed on their website, many reviews mention an affordable cost.
Quick Summary:
- They have reasonable rates based on reviews.
- Offers Excel and VBA consulting.
- Database consulting, including SQL Server, Access, and Azure.
- Office locations in the US, Canada, and the UK.
9. Excel4Business
Excel4Business has a simple website but offers Excel support on demand. Their website doesn’t list specific prices but mentions offering fixed prices per job, which can prevent consulting fees from piling up from billed hours.
Excel4Business also has a YouTube channel that can help you understand the basics of Excel. This content is an excellent starting point before deciding to hire a consultant.
Quick Summary:
- Phone number and email listed on their website.
- They appear to have reasonable consulting rates.
- On-demand support even for smaller jobs.
- They have a YouTube channel with lots of content for learning Excel.
10. Upwork
If you want to work with an individual freelancer instead of a company, consider using Upwork to find an Excel consultant.
With freelancers worldwide, Upwork makes it easy to post your job and get freelancers to apply. You can vet your consultant with custom messages and even settle on a fixed-price contract for your project. Funds are held in Escrow and are not released until your project is approved, giving you extra security.
Quick Summary:
- Find an individual freelancer to work with, choosing from hundreds of Excel professionals worldwide.
- Can negotiate projects to be fixed price with money being kept in Escrow until project completion.
Reasons to Hire an Excel Consultant
Each project is unique, but consider these points when deciding what Excel consulting company to use. Here are some of the most important reasons to hire an Excel consultant.
A Fresh Perspective
After staring at an Excel workbook for a long time, the answer to even a simple problem may seem impossible. However, a consultant with a fresh perspective can step in and troubleshoot the issue better. In addition, they will have tricks to simplify formulas and simplify the flow of data in your workbook.
Depending on the job, an Excel solution might not be efficient. A good consultant can recommend how to improve the overall process for your company. Process improvements could include setting up servers with a database or building online forms.
Increased Efficiency
Many times, Excel projects can become unnecessarily complex. This can be because of duplicate data, inefficient formulas, or poor formatting. A consultant who can create custom formulas in VBA, simplify the flow of information, and take advantage of conditional formatting can quickly streamline an Excel Workbook.
Reduce Errors
When an Excel workbook is poorly created, the end result can be error-prone. This can be from bad source data, incorrect formats, or sloppy formulas.
When an Excel workbook is poorly created, the result can be error-prone. This can be from lousy source data, incorrect formats, or sloppy formulas.
For example, a workbook might use SUMPRODUCT to summarize sales by month and rep. However, if the source data contains text instead of numbers, the formula could return a #VALUE error. A good consultant can quickly spot this and adjust the formula to ignore text or create a VBA solution to sanitize all source data before it is imported.
Skills an Excel Consultant Should Have
A good Excel consultant should be well-versed in programming and general data science, allowing them to solve a wide range of business problems and identify further areas of improvement that a client might not know. Below are tips on what to look for in a consultant when hiring one for your project.
Macro Development (Using VBA)
A macro is a command that can be run in Excel to automate tasks. Macros are coded in VBA. Microsoft developed VBA (Visual Basic for Applications), which is the programming language used to extend Office programs and further enchance the effectiveness of Excel.
An Excel macro consultant can automate repetitive tasks, create custom functions, send emails with a button click, and perform statistical analyses using VBA. A custom macro can be used for a wide range of projects. Below, we examples how a consultant can utilize macros written in VBA.
SQL
When it comes to managing large amounts of data, a relational database is crucial. A relational database uses SQL to access, collect, and analyze all of the data inside the database.
With strong SQL knowledge, an Excel consultant can create custom views or stored procedures to pull the source data used in a workbook. SQL knowledge will also allow a consultant to create other database solutions when Excel solutions become inefficient.
SharePoint
SharePoint is commonly used to distribute and share files across an organization. Many projects that require file uploads or downloads from SharePoint can be fully automated using VBA.
A good consultant will also be able to help create dynamic folders and dynamic permissions for these folders inside of the document library.
R Statistical
One of the most popular statistical programs is R. If your project requires more advanced statistical functions such as Bayesian regression, there are better choices than Excel, and instead, you could use a program like this.
One of the nice things about R is the variety of packages making it easy to import Excel data. An Excel expert could still be used to format the Excel file as needed for R.
Web Development
Some problems aren’t ideal for Excel. Many projects could be streamlined with a simple web interface using a SQL backend.
Consider a project where clients must fill out an Excel form and then email it back to the company, where the company combines data for reporting. A web application would eliminate the need to send files back and forth and enable the client to get real-time insights.
Reactjs is one of the most widely used JavaScript frameworks. A consultant with web development skills can help you design a whole process.
General Programming
Depending on the project, you may need VBA code to access an API. Some systems don’t allow database access, so a consultant would build a script to pull system data using an API. The API call would serve as the source data in place of something like a SQL query or external report.
If you need to send files over FTP, or even create custom HTML emails, this would also be another area of help an Excel consultant could provide if they are good general programmers.
VBA code can be condensed when the developer is well-versed in other programming languages. For example, being aware of arrays and using them over Excel ranges will save computation time. The less code in your project, the easier it will be to maintain.
Business Tools
Organizations worldwide use ERP systems like SAP and data visualization tools like Tableau. Excel consulting services that are familiar with these tools can increase the scope of the project, reducing the need for additional consultants.
Excel Project Types
Once you hire an Excel consultant, these are the types of proecjt that could easily be completed.
Dashboards
A dashboard is crucial to many Excel projects. It can summarise metrics, display charts, or have a button to run a process. An Excel consultant can help build a streamlined dashboard tailored to your business needs.
For financial-based projects, many dashboards have built-in error checking or diagnostics to ensure that figures relate to the source data.
Automated emails
Send a notification email once a process completes. You can even attach a file or a SharePoint link.
Upload files to SharePoint
Perfect for budget planning or payroll reports. The templates can be populated from a SQL or BI report to give the accountant an idea of where prior year expenses were.
Read files from SharePoint
Once the data is an array, it can be easily manipulated. For example, read all employee payroll rates in a file, loop over a set of locations, and send a payroll summary to each location with only those employees.
Convert a CSV file to an array
Some Excel projects require an external report or file. One trick to streamline projects like this is to convert the source file into an array. Once the data is in an array, it can be easily manipulated without the need to create messy formulas in a separate worksheet.
For example, an employee commission report may rely on an external weekly sales report. Inside a VBA script, a consultant could convert the weekly file into an array, loop over a set of locations, do the needed payroll calculations, and then send a summary report to each area.
Custom formulas
Instead of writing hard-to-read native Excel formuals, such as many nested IFs, custom VBA formulas could be used. These formulas would take a few inputs and lay out the logic more carefully, allowing fewer errors and easier maintenance. Comments can also be added into the VBA script, allowing for logic and notes to be stored in one place.
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