Smarter Dropdowns

Centrally control Smartsheet dropdown lists in multiple sheets across entire folders & even workspaces.

Save hours of admin time and prevent data inconsistencies.

  • Run from sheets and reports
  • Target whole folders and workspaces
  • Update text and contact list columns
  • Centralised management

Smarter Dropdown List Manager by SBP: An Open Demo
Check out our Smarter Dropdowns demo video

Core benefits

Time saved

Automatically send lists of data from sheet and report columns to dropdown lists in nominated sheets. No need for manual updates.

Scalability

Set your scope to individual sheets, all sheets in a folder or even an entire workspace to keep dropdowns updated across your enterprise.

Consistency

Maintains data uniformity by ensuring all your key dropdown lists are updated from one central source.

Example use cases

You have over 200 project sheets and need to add a new Project Manager to the list

You won’t want to do this one manually! Use a list of Project Managers as a data source and set Smarter Dropdowns to update the “Assigned to” column across the entire Projects workspace.

You want to select a product name in a form, but the list of products keeps changing.

Use Smarter Dropdowns to keep the list of products up to date by using the list of names from the Products sheet as a data source.

You need to select only a supplier with up to date insurance

Use a Smartsheet report to create a filtered list of suppliers with up to date insurance. Use this report as the data source for Smarter Dropdowns to send a current list of suppliers to required sheets.

What do our clients think about Smarter Dropdowns?

  • Slam Dunk!

“We are loving the Smarter Dropdown List Manager…that one is a slam dunk and huge help to us. With all the sheets and workspaces, it is great for us to be able to use this to ensure we have consistent dropdown options across sheets. This helps ensure we have consistency and helps with reporting, etc

It is without a doubt a great feature for Smartsheet users. The more I think about it the more I wonder how other serious users of Smartsheet are managing without it.”
Steve Campbell, Jr. California Gold

  • Very Happy

“David was great. He made time to answer our questions and also took the time to make sure the product we purchased was working correctly. Very happy.”
Jonathan Barto - Parry Homes

  • Now information flows seamlessly...

“We purchased the Smarter Dropdown List Manager and it has fixed one of the biggest deficiencies in Smartsheet. Since the first day I started using Smartsheet, I wanted something that would allow a dropdown list to be managed from another source. This tool does exactly that. It is clean, easily setup and has been very reliable. Now information flows seamlessly from our employee list to many other sheets where we use employee names in dropdowns. It eliminates many additional steps we used to have to do when changes to our employee list occurred.

I have many other use cases queued up to take advantage of this capability. It has opened the door to enable many more smarter business processes!”
Russell Anderson Northern Transformer

  • It cuts out a ton of manual maintenance

“Everyone was a pleasure to work with. Knowledgeable people helping you to improve how you utilize Smartsheet. The smarter dropdown menu is a great tool if you utilize Smartsheet across several departments and need to control data input by end users. It cuts out a ton of manual maintenance.”
Adam Patnode Cornerstone Automation Systems

Frequently Asked Questions

  • Doesn't Smartsheet offer dropdown management already?
    Yes, but… Smartsheet’s new Linked Dropdown Columns feature is great for basic use but has a number of key limitations. It has to be configured in every sheet and can’t pull data from reports.

  • Do I have to configure every new sheet individually?
    Not at all! Set your destination to a Folder or Workspace and ANY sheet created or moved there will start to receive your updates and you won’t even have to change the configuration.

  • Where does the list of values come from?
    Smarter Dropdowns pulls data from columns in Sheets or Reports. This can be a dedicated source sheet or from existing data anywhere in your Smartsheet environment.

  • My source data has duplicate values, will they be removed?
    Yes indeed! Smarter Dropdowns will remove duplicate values and blank cells to give you a properly formatted list of options.

  • Can I specify the list order?
    Absolutely! The default order is alpha-numerical, so your source data can be in any order and Smarter Dropdowns makes sure your dropdown lists are sorted. You can also choose to KEEP the source order, so if you need to keep your lists in a familiar order, Smarter Dropdowns can do this too.

  • How often will it run?
    The Smarter Dropdown app will run every 10 minutes or so to make sure your dropdown lists are always up to date. If you need to push an update more urgently, Smarter Dropdowns has some handy Run Now options too.

How does Smarter Dropdowns make Smartsheet even Smarter?

Smartsheet has recently added dropdown management to its core product. Here’s how Smarter Dropdowns could be better for you:

  • Smarter Dropdowns => Pulls source data from sheets AND reports so makes use of filtering

  • Smartsheet => Can only pull data from sheets so No filtering

  • Smarter Dropdowns => Can update all sheets in a workspace with a single configuration

  • Smartsheet => configured in EVERY SINGLE sheet

  • Smarter Dropdowns => Yes! Easily update sheets, folders or workspaces

  • Smartsheet => You'd have to edit EVERY sheet to add the automation