title: Using COUNTIFS in Google Sheets with a possible blank criteria
body: <p>Ok so I'm sure there is a way to do this, I am just not sure how to do it. Say I have 3 columns. Column A contains a "A" or "B", column B contains "1" or "2" and column C contains "!" or "?". I have separate cells in which I use to filter what I am looking for. I want to find each time a certain instance when all 3 character that I pick show up. D1 is where I choose "A" or "B", D2 is where I choose "1" or "2" and D3 is where I choose "!" or "?". I have a formula to find where if I choose say A, 1, !, it counts how many times all three of those appear in the same row. Now I want to leave one of the Cells blank (say D1) and only calculate how many times "1" and "!" appear together and not worry about "A" or "B" in the first column. Is there any way to do this? My current equation is just a long COUNTIFS equation that checks row A against cell D1, row B against D2 and row C against D3. Is there any way to use this equation but ignore one of the conditions if a cell is blank?</p>
  
  <p>Sorry for the rambling and poor formatting. I hope this makes sense!</p>