How to create a measure to calculate the sum of numbers in a column using a pivot table

Question

Hi, I'm using excel to create a pivot tables from a set of customer engagement data.

One of the columns list a number of participants. This column only has numbers in it. I would like to arrange this column by year, quarter, month, and date within a pivot table by the number of participants that were engaged.

However, when I use the SUM formula to create a measure within the pivot table, I get the following error message, "This formula is invalid or incomplete: 'Calculation error in measure 'Range 1'[Number of Participants in event]: The function SUM takes an argument that evaluates to numbers or dates and cannot work with values of type String.'."

The error message is not making any sense.

Can someone help with figuring out an appropriate measure?

Answer 1

Hi @ExcelPro Sometimes ,
Based on the error message, I suggest you check the data format for the PivotTable. You can also provide the screenshots or sample data about the PivotTable here, so that I can get more accurate solutions to this problem. I’m glad to help and follow up your reply.

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Answer 2

Hi,

Ensure that the data type of the entries in the numeric column is numbers. Make this change either in your Excel table or in Power Query.

Hope this helps.