Is your technology constraining your sales efforts?
An effective sales team relies on a foundation of data that can inform their priorities, strategic decisions and methods of communication. Without a robust technology stack in place, sales efforts can be unstructured, unfocused and even arbitrary.
Here at Cubewise, we can help you build a powerful sales process that incorporates data from a wide variety of sources and provides effective data analysis so you can deploy your business’s resources with precision and efficiency.
Common challenges
Disparate data sources
Sales teams must pull insights from a variety of different data sources, many of which aren’t integrated into a single view.
Lack of integration
Sales relies on different financial and non-financial data sources to coordinate efforts and measure success. These disparate data sources often exist in different systems and spreadsheets, which can be a challenge to integrate. What this means is that information is siloed and efforts to collate it wastes time and energy that could be better spent prospecting.
Noise in the data
Without a single view of key sales data, it’s difficult to cut through the noise. Sales managers spend a lot of their time trying to distinguish what’s important from what isn’t and creating generalised reports that summarise outputs from different sources. All of this takes time and energy – and is subject to human error and bias.
A single source of truth
Cubewise and IBM Planning Analytics / TM1 offer a comprehensive Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) solution that can pull data from a variety of different sources into one place, making it easier to draw key insights and enabling much more efficient analysis. This translates into better results and frees up time and resources so staff can focus on higher-level tasks.
Performance management
Incentives rely on robust performance management that can evaluate the success of each person, team and strategy.
Lack of attribution
Without the right technology at your disposal, it can be near-impossible to attribute sales accurately to the key drivers that brought them in. This can lead to enormous difficulties in evaluating success and making strategic decisions.
Veiled assumptions
Without the right data to back up performance measurement, a business can make assumptions that aren’t based in fact. This can pull a strategy off-track and hurt internal morale because incentives are not perceived to be fair. This, in turn, damages a sales team’s ability to operate efficiently.
Ultimate transparency
Cubewise and IBM Planning Analytics / TM1 can assist with developing a system that handles all sales information and provides the transparency needed to accurately provide incentives. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and other performance measures can be tracked at every level so that informed decisions can be made across the board.
Demand planning
Sales teams must be in a position to make accurate predictions about demand and consumer preferences if they are to do their job well.
Poor demand predictions
Forecasting demand is a challenging task, but it’s crucially important for operational and strategic planning. Companies must combine human inputs with predictive models to accurately evaluate where the industry is going and how the target audience’s behaviour is predicted to shift.
Unfocused strategy
Without a clear vision of where demand is for a product or service, a sales team can be stuck implementing a ‘spray and pray’ approach. This unfocused strategy is ineffective, results in wasted resources and can have a negative impact on revenue generation.
Predictive planning
Cubewise and IBM Planning Analytics / TM1 provide a highly sophisticated integrated planning platform that can be used to model demand and draw key insights that can be valuable for sales teams. The platform enables better alignment between operational, financial and sales strategies so that everyone is pulling in the same direction.
Predictive power and data analytics on tap
Modern sales teams need an advanced technology stack that can pull data from disparate sources, analyse it in line with their strategic objectives and provide the foundation for a sales strategy that will work. In addition, it needs to manage performance incentives fairly and accurately in order to fairly compensate salespeople and evaluate strategies effectively.
We can make it happen. Get in touch today and let’s transform your sales processes for the better.
Talk to us today and let’s overcome the challenge together.
When a system is unable to adapt to changing business circumstances, it can be tremendously frustrating for all who work with it. Things must go on, of course, and so users will resort to building tedious workarounds, simplifications and shortcuts that only serve to kick the can down the road.
Don’t accept that your business processes are incapable of adapting to fast-moving market changes. Contact us to find out how easy it can be to implement efficient and practical planning, reporting and forecasting workflows.
