Illustrator - Variable Data - not working?

[#1]

Is the Variable Data feature working for anyone else? I have a list of names ~23 that all need to be inputted and swapped out on an image.

For the last two weeks, I've used the following method and now it is no longer working. Can anyone assist?

Method used:

1. Create a list of names in GSheet > Export as CSV
2. Open illustrator file, select text that will have the Variable Data applied to
3. Clicked "Make Dynamic Text"
4. Clicked More options > Load Variable Library and selected my CSV file
5. Variable data comes through with "X" amount of "Data Sets"
6. When navigating through each "Data Set" the text does not update to match the CSV file. It does absolutely nothing because the"Data Sets" are coming in "Blank"

My best guess is something is happening to the reading of the CSV file when importing. I can't figure out why all my Data Sets are blank. Even files that worked for me last week is now no longer working.

I've attached my CSV file in case anyone is interested. The "," doesn't impact anything as last 2 weeks I have used files with a "," after the name.

[#2]

Is the Variable Data feature working for anyone else? I have a list of names ~23 that all need to be inputted and swapped out on an image.

For the last two weeks, I've used the following method and now it is no longer working. Can anyone assist?

Method used:

1. Create a list of names in GSheet > Export as CSV
2. Open illustrator file, select text that will have the Variable Data applied to
3. Clicked "Make Dynamic Text"
4. Clicked More options > Load Variable Library and selected my CSV file
5. Variable data comes through with "X" amount of "Data Sets"
6. When navigating through each "Data Set" the text does not update to match the CSV file. It does absolutely nothing because the"Data Sets" are coming in "Blank"

My best guess is something is happening to the reading of the CSV file when importing. I can't figure out why all my Data Sets are blank. Even files that worked for me last week is now no longer working.

I've attached my CSV file in case anyone is interested. The "," doesn't impact anything as last 2 weeks I have used files with a "," after the name.

[#3 · Accepted solution]

Solved:
The issue and step I was missing was having the first row in the excel sheet data to match the "Variable1" tag in illustrator

[#4]

When you get real deep into Illustrator variable data, you may want to check out the VariableImporter script - although at this time it's not working on Mac Ai2021 due to some Adobe bug 🙄