Excel 2007 : Compare text returned as result of formula in A1 with text typed in B1 to see if match

In column A I have several contiguous rows with similar formulas in the cells that return various text strings as the result of the formulas. In column B I have typed in a list of the text strings I expect to appear in column A as a result of the formulas in Column A. I would like to flag any discrepancies that may exist, preferably by conditional formatting that would highlight in red any cell in column A that does not match its corresponding (same row) cell in column B. The formulas I have tried to use to make the comparison will not recognize the text value RESULTS of the formulas in column A to compare with column B. The formulas all want to compare the text of the FORMULAS in column A with the text in column B, which, of course, will not match. How do I get a cell reference in a formula to read the text result of the formula in the cell being referenced instead of reading the text of the formula itself?

If I type the same word in A1, B1, and B2, and enter the formula =A1 in A2, I find that =EXACT(A1,B1) and =EXACT(A2,B2) both return TRUE. So it would appear that shg's observation is also TRUE. Except when I try using EXACT when the word in A2 is a text string returned from using HLOOKUP, and I type the same string in B2, =EXACT(A2,B2) returns FALSE. Why is this different?

I found my problem. The text string returned from the HLOOKUP formula (in cell A2) had a space after the string. I had not typed in that extra space in cell B2. When I did, I got a match. That extra space was invisible, so I missed it. Sorry to have bothered you.