Almost every tool used in your business should be used to help increase profits. Whether you are in the business of selling goods or services, in the end what you need is a sale. The best way to increase these sales is by being strategic, and you can’t be strategic unless you have a plan—and that plan needs to be researched and tested to be tried and true. In the corporate world that means numbers!
The Importance of Managing Data
Many successful businesses can attribute their profitable gains due to a thorough and well-thought out research plan that involved analyzing data and strategically using it to target the audience who they believed would be interested in their products and/or services. When you’re dealing with numbers, especially when calculating statistics, data can and will pile up quickly, and you need to be able to manage it well in order to produce the output you’re looking for.
Doesn’t Matter if Your Business is Small or Large
Using a general ledger might have worked for the mom and pop shops, but thanks to eCommerce, even the smallest businesses can reach as many customers as a huge corporation. Now, whether you’re running a one-man operation or a corporation, it is imperative that you keep your numbers in order. The best way to do this is by using Microsoft Excel. While many business owners may have already familiarized themselves with Microsoft Excel, chances are that they are not using it to it’s full potential.
About Microsoft Excel
Microsoft Excel is considered one of the most helpful software tools in the business industry. Excel can account for keeping better track of your debits and credits, but it’s so much more than that. Based on the wants and needs of your business operation, you can design Excel to calculate and produce whatever type of numbers you need.
For example, if you’re interested in increasing your business, you need to advertise. Whether you decide to advertise on television, radio, newspaper, or even better—the Internet, you need to have a target audience. Of course, you can always assume who your audience is, but if you plan on spending thousands of dollars to reach potential customers, it’s important that you approach this in a strategic matter. This can be done through Excel.
The Magic of Microsoft Excel
With Excel, you can organize a spreadsheet to calculate a sales trend. By gathering the right information, your spreadsheet has the potential to automatically provide valuable information like which demographic is most likely to want a certain type of service or buy a certain type of product. Demographics can be compartmentalized by location, gender, income level, and age. This type of information can be easily extracted by existing customers—especially if you’re running an eCommerce operation, you can provide a questionnaire for them to fill out in exchange for 10% off their next purchase or service…or not!
Targeting the Right Audience
In order to increase your business, you need to let people know that your company exists, but it won’t make a bit of difference if you’re targeting people who can’t benefit. For instance, if you’re selling wholesale marble tiles, targeting information to teenagers isn’t going to provide you with much feedback. However, if you target retailers, architects, designers, builders, and developers ranging from the ages of 25 and up, you might very well get some inquires.
Being able to analyze valuable data is critical for executing a good marketing campaign. Having a reliable software system that you can customize to provide the data you need is the only way that you’ll be able to achieve a strategic marketing campaign to help grow your business. If you are interested in learning exactly how this can work for your company, contact the professionals at ExcelHelp.com for a free consultation today. Call 1-800-682-0882.
