When creating a brand, understanding your consumers’ needs is imperative for a successful campaign. Prior to distributing goods to the public, however, businesses need to spend some time researching how their product or service can answer their consumers’ needs. A sales analysis positions a business to become a prominent force within the market because it helps them know if their marketing tactics are effective.
What Is a Sales Analysis?
Sales and marketing analytics are essential to unlocking commercially relevant insights, increasing revenue and profitability, and improving brand perception. A sales analysis report identifies the actual sales of a company over time. The report shows if sales are increasing or declining. With an analysis, actual sales may be compared to projected sales.
There are several benefits to conducting a sales analysis:
Opportunity to Expand Your Reach
A sales analysis is an opportunity to offer something unique, a niche, to the consumer who is not currently being met by other companies. Consumer surveys can also be conducted to learn about new goods or services that could have high demand in the marketplace. Understanding the demand is essential to remaining competitive. Also, unmet needs of the consumer are evaluated to see how products and services can be improved to increase customer satisfaction and profit.
An industry analysis allows business to estimate how much profit can be generated. Some questions to consider are:
- Size of the market
- How much the consumer spends
- How frequently the consumer spends
Repeat Sales
New versus repeat sales of customer groups can be determined with a sales analysis. Managers can use this information to discover if they’re retaining business. Demand forecasting, a predictive analytic, can be used to estimate the quantity of products or services a consumer will purchase.
New Consumers and Branding
Gathering information about non-customers is an opportunity to gain their loyalty as well. A sales analysis will be able to identify what non-customers think of your product. The report can define the effectiveness of an advertisement, new products, and targeting. Your brand is important – it’s how your client base identifies you. Social media, sales conventions, and review sites are sources that are used to gather data regarding your brand, and you want consumers across these platforms to easily spot you. By identifying who is not buying from you, and why, your market can potentially be expanded to include new consumers.
Business Beware
While there’s no such thing as too much information, not understanding how to sue that information can be an issue. To avoid this:
- Assess the financial cost: simply, how much money will your decision cost (or earn) the company
- Assess the culture cost: a solution to a tough decision should have minimal impacts on your overall culture
- Access the productivity cost: consider the impact of future productivity within the company
Sales analysis is one tool in your marketing kit; use it wisely and watch your client base grow.
