Excel-COUNTIF

Question

I have a table with three columns. Column C contains the formulas. Right now, I'm putting in the formulas by hand. I need a modified version of the same formula that I can drag-down and uses the correct ranges.

|      Column A           |     Column B        |        Column C
|-------------------------|---------------------|-----------------------------
| abiding_jj citizen_nn   |    (abiding1)       |    1[=COUNTIF(B$1:B$1,B1)]
| (BLANK ROW)             |                     | 
| abrupt_jj end_nn        |    (abrupt2)        |    2[=COUNTIF(B$3:B$7,B3)]
| abrupt_jj end_nn        |    (abrupt1)        |    3[=COUNTIF(B$3:B$7,B4)]
| abrupt_jj end_nn        |    (abrupt1)        |    3[=COUNTIF(B$3:B$7,B5)]
| abrupt_jj end_nn        |    (abrupt1)        |    3[=COUNTIF(B$3:B$7,B6)]
| abrupt_jj end_nn        |    (abrupt2)        |    2[=COUNTIF(B$3:B$7,B7)]
| (BLANK ROW)             |                     |
| abrupt_jj halt_nn       |    (abrupt1)        |    3[=COUNTIF(B$9:B$12,B9)]
| abrupt_jj halt_nn       |    (abrupt3)        |    1[=COUNTIF(B$9:B$12,B10)]
| abrupt_jj halt_nn       |    (abrupt1)        |    3[=COUNTIF(B$9:B$12,B11)]
| abrupt_jj halt_nn       |    (abrupt1)        |    3[=COUNTIF(B$9:B$12,B12)]

Answer 1

If I understand correctly, you want to treat observations that are separated by a blank row as different "groups". This could be solved by adding an extra column that creates "group" numbers that you can then use in a countifs formula.

An example with the "groups" in column A:

Column A contains 1 in A1, to mark the first group, and a formula in subsequent rows: =IF(ISBLANK(B#),A#+1,A#) (as shown in the snapshot, with # being the previous row).

It's not very elegant but it seems to do what you want.