5 Tips For Successful Sales Forecasting

Sales Forecast - a core function that many B2B business model companies will use when choosing to use a CRM system, help business managers to determine the contracting trend of the enterprise in the coming period of time through sales forecast. Below are 5 key points to successfully realize accurate forecasting:

1. Data Collection: Collect all sales related data, including historical sales data, customer data, market data, etc. Ensure the accuracy and completeness of the data. Guide sales to use the CRM system correctly by entering into the CRM system the business opportunities they are following up, the products, models, quantities, prices, etc. that these business opportunities customers are concerned about.

2. Data Organization: By establishing a reasonable sales stage, these business opportunities are assigned to the stage, and define which stage of the business opportunities into the Pipeline, which stage is to determine the signing of the order as well as which stage should be ignored into the forecast total, in order to follow up the analysis and forecast.

3. Data Analysis: Use the CRM system's analytical tools such as Sales Forecast Kanban and Sales Loophole to statistically analyze and mine the data. Explore factors related to sales forecasting, such as sales cycles, customer behavior, market trends, etc.

4. Model building: Based on the analysis results, choose a suitable forecasting model, such as regression analysis, time series analysis, etc. Train the model based on historical data and perform model evaluation and validation. Use the trained model to forecast future sales. Compare the forecast results with actual sales to assess the accuracy and reliability of the model.

5. Monitoring and Adjustment: Weekly sales meetings are held to regularly monitor the accuracy of sales forecasts and the difference between actual sales, and adjust and optimize the model and strategy according to the changing situation to continuously improve the accuracy of forecasts.

Importantly, CRM system is only an auxiliary tool, effective sales forecasting requires a combination of industry knowledge and experience, as well as in-depth understanding of the market and customers. CloudCC's team of experts can provide your organization with industry best business practices while building CRM tools, so that even if you and your team don't have experience in this area, you will be able to complete the forecasting modeling without any problems.