Last updated on Tuesday, September 10, 2019
Financial projections play an essential role in the success of any business, regardless of size. Revenue projections, sales projections, burn rate, and cash flow data can all be used to gain a clear view of current and projected business health and performance.
Revenue projections are particularly useful for business owners who are:
As with any financial planning, your revenue projection is only as accurate as the tools you use and the data you enter. There is a wide range of revenue projection templates and tools available to you, as well as software that can automate your revenue projection processes.
Before we dive into revenue projection templates and software, let’s recap what revenue projections are and why you need them in your business.
Revenue projections differ from sales forecasting. Sales forecasting refers to the projected sales of specific products or services over a period of time. Figures may be based on the cost of goods sold and gross profit, but do not necessarily take into account a business’ operating expenses.
Businesses may use sales forecasting to predict their company’s monthly sales and expected growth rate. Business owners or sales managers may use sales forecast templates to help the sales team set realistic goals and make adjustments if it looks like monthly sales goals won’t be met.
Revenue projections refer to the actual revenue a business expects to bring over a period of time. It is a function of financial statements, historical data, operating expenses, and profit margins.
Businesses may use revenue forecasts to predict future resourcing, identify revenue gaps, and report on the business’ financial health to stakeholders and investors.
Both sales forecasts and revenue projections are valuable to your business. But the value of each depends on how accurate, timely, and complete your data is. There is no room for guesstimating in these processes. It’s often hard for sales teams to be objective about the likelihood of deals in the sales funnel closing within a specific period of time. But even the smallest inaccuracy can easily skew cash flow projections and create challenges for your business down the road.
To maximize the value of your CRM sales data and generate accurate revenue projections, you need a foundational understanding of financial ratios and other contributing concepts. Review the concepts below and identify how you currently track and evaluate these metrics.
Review historical data and income statements, including accounts receivable, to calculate the difference between operating expenses and total revenue (plus direct costs) to see your gross margin.
Subtract your total operating expenses from total revenue to determine your operating profit margin.
The number of people in your company can directly affect your profit margins and revenue projection. Are you running a lean organization? Do you need to scale up to manage more clients and sales?
Using historical data and market research, determine the number of potential customers in your target market.
What is the potential growth of your target market? Can you expand this market? Will the market grow naturally?
What percentage of your target market can you convert into leads and customers?
How many sales can you expect to make in a given time period?
What is the unit price for each sale?
Many businesses use Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets spreadsheets for revenue projections. These methods are widely used across industries, but they may not be the most efficient or accurate. And they’re only as accurate as the templates used and the data entered.
Let’s take a look at the pros and cons of using spreadsheets for revenue projection.
Pros
Cons
If you’re looking to manually manage revenue projections using spreadsheets, explore these free revenue projection templates for PowerPoint, Excel, and Google Sheets.
Even with a robust revenue projection template, spreadsheets may not provide all the features and functionality you need for accurate revenue projection and sales forecasting.
Instead of relying solely on spreadsheets, consider leveraging a cloud-based SaaS solution that integrates directly with your CRM system.
revVana is a Salesforce-native application that automates the revenue projection process using historical data, sales pipelines, and sales projections. You can analyze revenue realization, compare expected sales forecasts against actual revenue, track progress to sales quotes, and evaluate corporate budgets — all in real time.
With revVana, sales managers, accounting teams, business owners, and CFOs can replace judgment-driven projections with accurate forecasts based on historical data, balance sheets, and cash flow statements. When your forecasting tools integrate with Salesforce, you can be assured of more accurate, real-time actionable insights to enable seamless business growth.
If you’re ready to move from manual, error-prone spreadsheets to an automated, accurate solution, request a demo of revVana.
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