The Annual Sales Report

2008-07-08 15:13:22

( Insurance )



Benefits of an Annual Sales Report

If you have a large sales force, you need to prepare an annual sales report at the end of your company's fiscal year. The annual sales report contains summaries of all your yearly sales activities by sales area, department or individual salesperson.

The annual sales report should be presented to all members of your sales force and your company for a number of reasons. First, you need to keep your organization informed about its performance in selling products or services, and its level of profitability. Second, the annual sales report will serve as the main basis for making important business decisions such as whether to expand, downsize or diversify. Third, the annual sales report can be utilized to prepare the other financial statements of the company, such as the income statement and the balance sheet. Finally, the annual sales report can serve as a tool for motivating your sales force to continue improving their sales efforts.

Basic Parts of the Annual Sales Report

The annual sales report contains yearly sales statistics in both summarized and detailed charts. The entire annual sales figure is usually presented at the start of the report. Then it is broken down into different categories and sub-sections.

Sales figures may be presented by sales area or territory, especially if your company has sales operations in various parts of the country. You can either show sales figures by region or specific state.

The annual sales report should show monthly and semi annual sales figures. This type of presentation will enable you to see any seasonality of demand and to identify specific time periods where sales or promotion efforts are most needed.

Another important part of your annual sales report is the sales record by individual salesperson. This record will show you who among your sales force are most competent and who are not. It gives you the basis for giving rewards and bonuses to your best performers, and remedial training for the rest.

Tips for Preparing Annual Sales Reports

Your company's annual sales reports should not just be limited to tables showing many figures. In addition, you can use bar graphs and pie charts to illustrate sales figures. This will enable easier reading and interpretation of the sales data.

Color and size also matter if you are presenting the data during a meeting. You can present the data in slide shows and enhance them with animation and sound to make them more interesting.

Presenting individual sales performance may be a touchy issue, if there are wide disparities between salespeople. To be more discreet, you can just specific the top-performing ones and show the rest as a sum. This will avoid embarrassment and yet be able to acknowledge the top sales people accordingly.


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