The Scenario
You are a management consultant. You spent last week aligning with your client on their KPI framework: 40 KPIs across four business units, each with a name, description, measurement unit, and quarterly target. The definitions are in an Excel workbook. The SimpleKPI account is empty.
First data entry session: Monday. Categories, units, and KPIs all need to be in SimpleKPI by Friday EOD.
The bad version of Friday:
- Open SimpleKPI, click "Add KPI"
- Enter name, description, unit, target, save
- Repeat for KPI 2
- You are still creating KPIs when Monday's session starts because each one took 10 minutes.
The fast version is one prompt.
The Easy Way: One Prompt in SheetXAI
SheetXAI reads your definition workbook and creates every KPI in SimpleKPI in one pass, writing the new KPI IDs back into the workbook.
Open the SheetXAI sidebar and type:
Create a KPI in SimpleKPI for each row in the KPI Definitions tab using the name in column A, description in column B, unit ID in column C, and target value in column D. Write the new KPI ID back into column E.
SheetXAI creates all 40 KPIs and writes each returned KPI ID into column E. The workbook is now a definition-to-ID map ready for category assignments and first data entries.
What You Get
A fully configured SimpleKPI account with:
- 40 KPIs created — one API call per row
- Column E filled — the SimpleKPI KPI ID for each created KPI, or the error
- An ID map for follow-on work — assign categories and users using column E without navigating the SimpleKPI search UI
What If the Data Is Not Quite Ready
Client KPI definition workbooks come from workshop notes and half-finished spreadsheets. They are rarely ready to push directly.
When measurement units have not been created yet
The units in column C do not exist in SimpleKPI yet.
Read the unique unit names in column C of the KPI Definitions tab. Create each as a new SimpleKPI unit and write the returned unit ID into a lookup range. Then use those IDs to create each KPI in columns A through D. Write the new KPI ID into column E.
When descriptions are incomplete or missing
Half the KPI rows have descriptions, half are blank.
For any row in the KPI Definitions tab where column B is blank, infer a one-sentence description from the KPI name in column A and the unit in column C. Write the inferred description into column B. Then create each KPI in SimpleKPI using name, description, unit ID, and target. Write the KPI ID into column E.
When targets differ by region
Your workbook has columns D through G with targets for AMER, EMEA, APAC, and LATAM.
For each row in the KPI Definitions tab, create four KPIs in SimpleKPI — one per region — appending the region name to the KPI name in column A. Use the target from columns D, E, F, and G respectively. Write all four returned KPI IDs into columns H through K.
When you need the full setup chain: create KPIs and assign to categories immediately
Column F has the category name each KPI belongs to.
Create each KPI in SimpleKPI using name, description, unit ID, and target from columns A through D. Write the returned KPI ID into column E. Then assign each KPI to the SimpleKPI category matching the name in column F. Write "Assigned" or errors into column G.
The pattern: describe the full setup chain in one prompt.
Try It
Get the 7-day free trial of SheetXAI and open your KPI definition workbook, then ask it to build the KPI set in SimpleKPI. The SimpleKPI integration is included in every SheetXAI plan. For related workflows, see how to create a KPI category structure from Excel or the SimpleKPI in Excel overview.