Highlight Important Items in Google Sheets With Slack Emoji
Important items in Sheets get buried in plain text. This automation lets you add a star or heart reaction to a Slack message and Notis highlights the corresponding cell in Sheets with color, making priorities visually obvious.
Trigger
Message Reaction Added
Triggered when a reaction is added to a message in Slack. Supports optional filtering by channel and emoji name.
Action
Format cell
Applies text and background cell formatting to a specified range in a google sheets worksheet.
Why this helps
Neurodivergent founders miss visually organizing data (highlighting, coloring) because manual formatting is tedious, leading to all items looking equally important.
- Visual emphasis without manual formatting
- One emoji adds visual weight
- Important items stand out at a glance
- Reduce cognitive load of scanning sheets
- Faster decision-making with visual cues
Setup
Build it in a few focused steps.
- 1Connect Slack and Google Sheets to Notis.
- 2Create a new automation with 'Message Reaction Added' as the trigger.
- 3Set to watch for star or heart emoji (⭐ or ❤️).
- 4Write your prompt: 'When a star or heart emoji is added to a message in my task channels, find that item in my tracking sheet and highlight its row with yellow background or make the text bold to show it's prioritized.'
- 5Test by reacting to a task with ⭐ and checking Sheets for the formatting change.
Questions about this workflow
Can I use different emojis for different colors or formatting?
Yes. Use 🔴 for red highlight, 🟡 for yellow, ⭐ for bold, etc. Each emoji can trigger a different formatting rule.
What if the item text doesn't match exactly between Slack and Sheets?
In your prompt, ask Notis to match approximately ('if message contains the first 20 characters of a cell value') rather than requiring an exact match.
Can I remove highlighting if an emoji is removed?
Yes. Set up a second automation that watches for emoji removal and removes the highlighting from that row.
When this happens · Trigger
Do this · Action
Supported Triggers and Actions
Notis builds workflows that link Slack to Google Sheets. A trigger fires from one place; an action lands in another.
Slack triggers
Google Sheets actions
New Channel Created Trigger
Triggered when a new channel is created in Slack.
Add Sheet to Spreadsheet
Adds a new sheet (worksheet) to a spreadsheet. use this tool to create a new tab within an existing google sheet, optionally specifying its title, index, size, and other properties.
Channel Message Received
Triggered when a message is posted in a Slack channel (public, private, or multi-party IM). Does NOT match direct messages.
Aggregate Column Data
Searches for rows where a specific column matches a value and performs mathematical operations on data from another column.
Direct Message Received
Triggered when a new direct message (DM) is sent to a user in Slack. Catches all DMs across all DM channels.
Append Dimension
Tool to append new rows or columns to a sheet, increasing its size. use when you need to add empty rows or columns to an existing sheet.
Message Reaction Added
Triggered when a reaction is added to a message in Slack. Supports optional filtering by channel and emoji name.
Batch get spreadsheet
Retrieves data from specified cell ranges in a google spreadsheet; ensure the spreadsheet has at least one worksheet and any explicitly referenced sheet names in ranges exist.
Message Reaction Removed
Triggered when a reaction is removed from a message in Slack. Supports optional filtering by channel and emoji name.
Batch update spreadsheet
Updates a specified range in a google sheet with given values, or appends them as new rows if `first cell location` is omitted; ensure the target sheet exists and the spreadsheet contains at least one worksheet.
Reaction Added Trigger
DEPRECATED: use `SLACK_MESSAGE_REACTION_ADDED` instead. Triggered when a reaction is added to a message in Slack.
Batch Update Values by Data Filter
Tool to update values in ranges matching data filters. use when you need to update specific data in a google sheet based on criteria rather than fixed cell ranges.
Reaction Removed Trigger
DEPRECATED: use `SLACK_MESSAGE_REACTION_REMOVED` instead. Triggered when a reaction is removed from a message.
Clear Basic Filter
Tool to clear the basic filter from a sheet. use when you need to remove an existing basic filter from a specific sheet within a google spreadsheet.
New Bot Message Received Trigger
DEPRECATED: use `SLACK_CHANNEL_MESSAGE_RECEIVED` with `is_bot_message=true` instead. Triggered when a new bot message is posted to a Slack channel.
Clear spreadsheet values
Clears cell content (preserving formatting and notes) from a specified a1 notation range in a google spreadsheet; the range must correspond to an existing sheet and cells.
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When this happens · Trigger
Do this · Action
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