Microsoft Excel's “user defined functions” can perform many specialized tasks related to address and location information, such as checking the validity of email addresses, importing demographic information, even calculating driving time and driving distance. User-defined functions, also called UDFs (user-defined functions), perform complex calculations or tasks and are used in cell formulas, like standard Excel SUM or AVERAGE functions. In this article, we will explain how to use custom functions to determine which zip code in the list is closest to the target location.
Identifying the nearest zip code or address has many applications. For example, the list of potential customers may be matched with the nearest stores, or the list of delivery addresses may be correlated with the nearest distribution centers. These types of analyzes require geocode coordinates (latitude and longitude) to calculate the straight-line distance “between the gates”. After these distance calculations have been completed for all possible combinations of zip codes, the one with the shortest distance is selected.
How can this be done on an Excel sheet? A custom function can automatically capture latitude and longitude data from a local database, and then perform distance calculations based on this data. Since all this is happening completely in the background, there is no need to study the new application or even leave the familiar Excel environment. For example, let's say we have a list of addresses of stores in the range from A1 to A10. We can find the store closest to the customer in zip 08034 by entering a custom function in the worksheet cell as follows: “= CustomFunction (A1: A10, 08034)”. The result returned to the worksheet will be the nearest repository in the specified range A1: A10.
We can apply the same custom function to several customer addresses listed in column B. If the first customer's zip code is in cell B1 of the worksheet, the formula in cell C1 will be = CustomFunction (A1: A10, B1). Then we can simply copy and paste this formula throughout the rest of the list to find the nearest store for each customer.
This is a good example of how custom Excel functions can automate various tasks and calculations without having to learn a new application or even leave the familiar Excel environment. From validating address information to finding the closest zip code at a target location, user-defined functions can be valuable tools for analyzing address and location information.
