Accessing your Search and Click data inside Google Sheets via JSON

Support > Advanced Topics > Accessing your Search and Click data inside Google Sheets via JSON

JSON is a standard protocol for sending data between applications and it can be used to access your store locator's Search and Click data inside a Google Sheets automatically. This allows you to automate the process of analysing your store locator performance and generate your own custom business analytics.


In this tutorial, we will show you how to import JSON data into a Google Sheet using a free, open source script available on Github.


Adding the free ImportJSON Script to your Google Sheet


1. Open a Google Sheet

Open a new or existing Google Sheet.

  • Tip: You can go to sheets.new in your browser if you want to create a new Google Sheet

2. Open Script Editor

In your Google sheet, in the menu at the top, click Extensions > Apps Script

3. In the script editor, remove the placeholder content

If there is any placeholder code typed into the script editor, you can remove it.

4. Copy and paste an open-source script

Go to: https://gist.github.com/paulgambill/cacd19da95a1421d3164

Copy all of the code for “import_json_appsscript.js” and paste the code into the script editor of your Google Sheet.

This is a free, open-source script someone created to import JSON into a Google Sheet.

Copy the import json script

Paste the import json script

There’s also other free importjson scripts available online if you do a search for them.

5. Save and name the script

After you copy and paste all of the script into the script editor, click the save button and name your project.

Click the save buttonClick the save button

Name your projectName your project

You can name the project anything you want, but naming it something like “ImportJSON” will make it easy to remember.

6. Go back to your Google Sheet

After saving your project in the script editor, you can now close the script editor tab in your browser and go back to your Google Sheet.

Now, in any cell of your Google Sheet, start typing “=import” (without the quotation marks) and you will see “ImportJSON” pop-up as an option. This is the script you saved in the script editor.

Click on the “ImportJSON” option.

Import JSON formulaImport JSON formula


7. Add the JSON API URL for your Search data

After opening your Import JSON formula, you’ll need to add your JSON API URL. Here is an example of the URL:


https://www.storelocatorwidgets.com/admin/reports?type=searches&uid=YOUR_UID_HERE&startstamp=1648785600&endstamp=1651031999&format=json


You will need to enter the following values:


type

Can be either searches for search records of clicks for click records.


uid

This is your unique store locator account uid. You can find this here: https://www.storelocatorwidgets.com/admin/Details under 'Store Locator API key'.


startstamp & endstamp

This is the UNIX timestamp of the start time and end time of the data that you want to retrieve. You can convert Google Sheet dates to UNIX timestamps using this function:

=INT((A1-("1/1/1970"-"1/1/1900"+2))*86400).


format

Set this to JSON to retrieve data in the JSON format (required for this tutorial).


Here's an example of the overall function call:


=ImportJSON("https://www.storelocatorwidgets.com/admin/reports?type=searches&uid=YOU_UID_HERE&startstamp=1648785600&endstamp=1651031999&format=json")


Once this is done, you should see JSON data being pulled automatically into your Google Sheet as shown below: