Using textboxes by themselves can be a good way to add extra content to a spreadsheet. Combining a text box, an icon and an arrow with some colour may make it even better.

I was recently going through a training file and saw they had effectively combined textboxes, icons and arrows to make a useful image.

In the image below you can see examples of this technique. I also added colour to the images.

Textboxes

You can press in sequence Alt N X (don’t hold the keys down) to insert a default textbox. You can re-size it as required.

Inside a text box it is like little word processor. You can format the text to your heart’s content.

If you want to link the text box to a cell you loose that formatting ability as you can only apply formats to all the text.

To link a textbox to a cell select the textbox and click in the Formula Bar and press = and use the mouse to select a cell to link to.  

Icons (arrows)

In the image above I have used icons for the icons and some of the arrows. Icons are in the Insert ribbon tab – image below.

There is a Search box in the dialog to help you find the right icon – see image below.   

Shapes

The Shapes dialog has a few other shapes that may be useful – see the image below

Grouping

Once you have added the textbox, icons and shapes you can combine them by grouping them together. This allows you to easily move them all as one. You can still edit each item individually whilst they are grouped.

Hold the Ctrl key down and select each image – see image below.

The right-click one of the selected images and choose Group and then Group – image below.

Job done the three images can now be moved as one.

You can use the Fill Colour icon to change the colour of an icon.

This structure can be an effective visual to bring users attention to specific parts of your spreadsheet.