Every stock tracker on the internet tracks the same 30 stocks. Apple, Microsoft, the rest of the index. If someone wants to watch those, they have a hundred free options.
The idea is a Google Sheet that tracks a hand-picked set of stocks in one niche, with live prices, and, more importantly, your notes on why each one is worth watching. Sell access to the sheet.
This is one of the 100 business ideas in Google Sheets I published, and it's the one where Google Sheets has a built-in advantage most tools don't.
The idea
Instead of trying to track an entire industry, cherry-pick specific stocks in your niche, or stocks that people would be interested in. Describe what makes them gems, and track them only. Not the blue chip stocks everyone is already tracking.
"Niche" here means whatever you actually know. Small-cap semiconductor equipment companies. Publicly traded restaurant chains. Companies that make board games. Video game publishers outside the US. Somebody who has followed one of those corners for years knows things that don't show up in a screener.
The list includes information such as the name of the stock, ticker symbol, current price, historical price data, and analyst ratings. Google Sheets can pull the price and the history on its own. That's the boring part, and it's automated.
It also includes notes on market trends, company financials, and other relevant information. This is the part someone pays for. Why this company. What to watch for next quarter. What would change your mind. Which of the 15 is the one you'd point a friend to first.
Keep the list short. Ten to 25 stocks. A list of 200 is a screener, and screeners are free. A list of 15 with a paragraph on each is a point of view, and people pay for a point of view they trust.
One thing to be clear about, in the sheet and in your marketing: this is research and opinion, not personalized financial advice. Say so plainly. It protects you and it sets the right expectation.
How to build it in Google Sheets
Tabs
- Gems: one row per stock. Company, Ticker, Sector, Current Price, 52-Week High, 52-Week Low, Market Cap, P/E, Why It's a Gem, What to Watch, Date Added, Price When Added.
- History: a small block per ticker with closing prices for the last year, pulled automatically.
- Dashboard: the list sorted by performance since you added it, with a sparkline per row.
- Updates: a dated log of your notes, newest at the top. This is what subscribers open first.
Features to use
-
GOOGLEFINANCE for live prices and fundamentals. One formula per cell, no API key, no scraping:
=GOOGLEFINANCE(B2, "price"). -
GOOGLEFINANCE with a date range on the History tab to pull a year of closing prices:
=GOOGLEFINANCE(B2, "close", TODAY()-365, TODAY(), "WEEKLY"). - SPARKLINE on the Dashboard pointing at each ticker's history block, so the year's shape is visible in one cell.
- SORT on the Dashboard by percent change since Price When Added, so your best calls float to the top and your worst ones are honest about it.
- Conditional formatting on the change column, green above zero and red below.
- Protected ranges on the formula cells so a subscriber's stray keystroke doesn't break the live data.
GOOGLEFINANCE data is delayed and doesn't cover every ticker, especially smaller or foreign ones. Check every ticker on your list before you sell, and note any that don't pull.
Who pays for it, and how to sell it
The buyer is a retail investor who follows your niche and wants a second set of eyes from someone who knows it better. They're paying for the curation and the notes, and for the fact that the prices in the sheet update themselves.
This is a subscription. The notes are the product, and notes have a date on them. Charge monthly or yearly, and write an update at least twice a month. A one-time version on Gumroad can work as a starter list that brings people into the subscription.
Sell it through OnlySheets, which takes payment and shares the live sheet with each subscriber automatically. You keep one master sheet, update it, and everyone sees it.
The service angle is a newsletter that goes with the sheet. The sheet is the data, the email is the story, and the two together justify a higher price than either alone.
For the first ten subscribers, publish your reasoning on one stock in public, with the date and the price when you wrote it. Do it every week for a couple of months. People who follow the niche will notice you're keeping score, and keeping score in public is the thing that earns trust in this market.
Related ideas from the list
- Create your own Index Fund, the same GOOGLEFINANCE mechanic, turned into a basket instead of a watchlist.
- Upcoming IPO Listings, a curated list for the same investor, focused on what's about to trade.
- VC Investor Model, a calculation-heavy sheet for people who think about companies the same way.
Want the other 99? This is one idea from my list of 100 business ideas you can build in Google Sheets. Get all 100 business ideas as a free Google Sheet.
And if you want to learn how to package and sell spreadsheets, my course Selling Spreadsheets walks through exactly that.