A business needs to study a range of performance indicators to stay healthy. Consolidation reports are growing in popularity since they help businesses operate more efficiently.

The Right Time to Consolidate for a Business

There's always a turning point for a businesses to purge their current financial practices in order to move forward. This is especially the case when a parent business has several subsidiaries. So the right time to consolidate is when:

• The business wants to study their performance from a streamlined report.

• It wants to convince stakeholders of its investment potential.

• There's a need to fine tune a budgeting strategy.

• The business is launching a new acquisition strategy.

• The business is preparing for an external audit or IPO.

Financial Close

Financial close is defined as the time when all project and financing contracts have been signed and all of their stated requirements have been accomplished. Funds can be released to launch a project once this happens. The biggest challenge facing corporate reporting organizations is handling rapidly changing reporting requirements and meeting the demand to deliver this information in a faster turnaround time! Consolidation narrows the time and cost gap of financial close and reporting cycles.

Benefits of Consolidation

The main goal of any business is to see how certain decisions will impact its overall function. When a business decides to consolidate, they can experience many benefits in the short and long term. For example, a parent business may notice that one of its subsidiary company's needs to improve its sales performance. A consolidation report will either influence the parent business to improve its subsidiary's operations or terminate their relationship. Other benefits of consolidation include:

• Real-time data of business gains, losses,and present and future spending in a simplified manner.

• Clear presentation of top-level activity and bottom line encourages potential for investors and stockholders to invest in a business.

• Valuable insights to improve lagging performance rates.

• More time spent for strategic planning.

• Consolidation helps operation managers interpret reports faster.

Reading a stack of reports is time-consuming and wastes resources. It's also makes assessing the level of financial success more difficult among various subsidiaries. Arranging business reports that places a focus on key elements minimizes confusion and engages the reader.

Readers know exactly what to look for and can keep track of data when white space, color coding, bullets, charts, and graphs are used. Charts and graphs are very helpful at tying together time periods, percentages, as well as like or opposite values.

Hurdles of Consolidation

Consolidating financial functions requires more than just tallying up figures. It can become more complex when a business expands globally or when it has to compile information from several ERP or GL systems. Financial reports that reflect converted currency transactions is another big hurdle to clear. A business can easily become overwhelmed analyzing operations in multiple regions, multiple countries, and multiple departments. There are a range of issues that might need to be addressed such as:

• Minority ownership

• Uncontrolled interest

• Multi-GAAP reporting

• Intercompany reconciliations

• Internal management reporting

• External board reporting

• Regulatory filings and reporting

Financial Consolidation Reporting Using Cloud Software

A number of businesses have benefited from automation and control cloud applications. Three key things can be accomplished using cloud software applications

• It manages and streamlines the complex process of financial close, financial consolidation, and financial reporting.

• It creates minimal effort and less paperwork when assessing a parent company’s financial health.

• It removes transactions made between subsidiaries and the parent company to give a more concise insight of business performance.

Successful organizations are highly dependent on timely and accurate reporting to its stakeholders and regulatory agencies. They must always consider how their financial health will be impacted by the delivery of financial, non-financial and regulatory information on a daily, monthly, and yearly basis. Consolidation is a useful reference tool that enhances communication. Readers of consolidated reports can translate key data faster and thus be more accountable when executing future budget plans and explaining their results.

The current business world focuses mostly on making profits. Indeed, a survey shows that any running business without average profit can strive not for long. Knowing that profit is one of the fundamental factors in any business, here are two questions for you: how can you tell your business is generating profit or achieving its set target? What is revenue recognition? Well, revenue is one of the scales used to measure whether you have achieved your business goal or not. Revenue mainly energies the accomplishment of most businesses, as it is a means of creating profits and increasing fairness. For this purpose, managing proper revenue recognition is paramount.

Revenue recognition in various cases can be simple. Consider a producer that vends a non-warranty merchandise to a client. In this case, revenue recognition process ends when all four of the common revenue recognition measures are in place. For example, the value determined, the assemblage is apparent, there is convincing proof of an arrangement, and delivery has happened.

However, revenue recognition can get complicated once the above principles do not apply; which, is usually due to the kind of business that enterprises operate. For example, some of the more complicated businesses include technology, real estate, media and entertainment, construction and healthcare.

Here are several tips to consider to recognize your revenue better.

Tip 1: Apply and follow the matching policies and recognition rules.

Matching policies and recognition rules are a fundamental tip to set as your starting point. Frequently, many businesses will either spend money on manufacturing goods before selling or get paid for goods not yet delivered. This might create a problem in the absence of matching principles and recognition rules as the income statement will be affected. To avoid this error, you are advised to follow matching policies and recognition rules set for your business. By tying earnings and expenditures to the end of transactions and other cash producing errands, the income statement will summarize all that took place during the accounting process.

Also, the matching principle, together with revenue recognition, purposes to collect revenues and expenditures in the precise accounting retro. It permits an enhanced calculation of the income statement, which displays the revenues and expenses for an accounting epoch or how much was consumed to receive the period's revenue.

Tip 2: Check the shipping terms

Shipping terms come in when the customer ask for delivery of goods; but possession of merchandise delivered is not instant. In this case, two shipping term usually applies: "FOB Destination" and "FOB Shipping Point." In FOB destination the revenue is earned when the goods reach the customer while in FOB shipping point the revenue is made when the producer releases the goods to the client.

Tip 3: Follow-up

Schnurr one day stated that inspection teams should question whether there are different opinions on the business on how to devise the average revenue recognition, and if so, how an organization and the accountant decided that the firm's approach was suitable. You should follow up and ask your business team management for answers in case of any changes in revenue earned. You should ask the management whether they have different views on how to standardize revenue earned in your company. They should apply appropriate measures that will lead to a proper revenue recognition method that is friendly to your business.

Tip 4: final challenge results

Challenging doubtful results is very crucial as it can reveal many hidden mistakes in an income statement. Schnurr suggested that assessment committees question accountants on conclusions that do not seem to redirect the core business of the firm. Consequently, the accountants should be able to account for all revenue recorded in the income statement sheet. Challenging final results will lead to official revenue recognition of your business.

Tip 5: board information calculation

If a business cannot practically evaluate the sum of impending returns and has enormously high rates of returns on trades, they should recognize revenues only when the right of return terminates. Those businesses that can evaluate some impending returns and have a moderately small return frequency can recognize revenues at the point of sale but must subtract projected future returns.

Tip 6: Assess resources

You should be able to assess and evaluate resources that incurred in the production of goods and delivery of goods. Schnurr advised assessment teams to contemplate whether sufficient resources are devoted to scrutinizing the effect of the new average revenue because the significant change could alter income statement.

Salespeople are the heart and soul of nearly every enterprise. without the right salespeople, your business will not be able to grow or profit. Even the best customer service will not be helpful if there are no customers to serve. But recruiting the best salespeople can be a challenge -- after all, they are often being courted by multiple companies at once. Here are a few tips for getting the best talent into your offices.

1. Be Specific About What You Need

Salespeople are not all made equal. There are different types of sales and there are different types of product -- you want sales personnel that fit your niche. Some salespeople are used to making high volume, low cost sales. Others are used to making low volume, luxury sales. By being very specific about your job listings and needs, you'll be able to find the sales individuals that are best for your business.

2. Get Aggressive With the Interviewing

Selling is an aggressive act. Sales professionals need to be able to keep cool under fire and be able to respond accurately and eloquently to difficult questions. Be as aggressive as you can with your interview questions -- not in tone, but in specificity. Your salespeople should be able to answer your questions very thoroughly and in-depth.

3. Offer Them the Right Tools

From dialers to ergonomic equipment, making your salespeople as comfortable as possible is often one of the best ways to recruit them. Whether you are integrated with apache kafka on aws or just using emails, being organized in your processes is key to reaching sales goals.  Sales personnel are very aware of the day-to-day tasks that they need to go through, and they will be looking for anything that can make the process easier and more pleasant for themselves. The more advanced the equipment, the more productive your sales personnel will be.

4. Don't Rush to Hire

From the initial phone interview to the final in-person interview, you should always be very careful and conscientious about recruiting. Though it may be tempting to simply get a body into the office, you need to consider that it costs money to hire someone. Not only in terms of salary, but in the cost of the training that is required. It is better for you to wait a little longer to hire the right candidate than to go through an endless process of training new hires and then letting them go.

At the same time, however, you should always be looking for better talent. Keep your eyes open and don't hesitate to contact sellers that you believe would fit into your company -- you never know when you might discover the perfect match.

5. Develop a Comprehensive On-Boarding Process

Don't just throw your staff into the pit and expect them to start selling. Instead, create a three month on-boarding system that is designed to acclimate them to company culture and train them to operate alongside the requirements of your business. This will make them far more effective and will enforce consistency and unity across the board. Sales individuals should go be thoroughly analyzed for performance after this initial process to determine whether or not they are truly suitable for the sales department.

Of course, getting the best salespeople is one thing -- keeping them is another entirely. Sales professionals tend to experience very high churn, many of them lasting only months in each position. To reduce this churn, you need to be able to listen to your employees and ensure that they have the technology and support that they need to succeed. By maintaining a strong sales team, you'll be able to steadily grow your business and improve upon your bottom line.

If you notice that there has been a decline in employee sales, the problem may not be with the product or the prospects, but may instead be with your employee morale. While employees are partially motivated by a desire to earn an income, this is often not enough to maximize your company's sales. The following are lessons I learned when I was a LipSense distributor and leading those under me. These are things I am using today:

Build Trust

Cultivate trust in your sales representatives. When you notice that your sales representatives are not meeting their sales goals, you will need to have a conversation with them. but you will not be able to do this if they do not feel that they can trust you. One way to do this is to simply tell your representatives that you would like to have a trusting relationship with them and to ask them how you can achieve this.

Lead By Example

Try to lead by example. Even if you do not have a background in sales, consider the behaviors that you want to see from your sales representatives and think of ways in which you can demonstrate these behaviors. For instance, if you would like your sales representatives to be more detail-oriented in how they track sales data, find ways to be more data-driven yourself.

Find Other Ways To Motivate

Look for other ways to reward employees besides providing them with money. For instance, as a LipSense distributor, SeneGence motivated their distributors by providing a free vacation to a sales representative who has the highest number of sales or who has placed the most cold calls. These types of rewards make work more interesting and fun, which can be much more motivating for your employees. Also, for those who are focused on achievement, rewards and other motivators are a great way to help these employees feel like they are recognized.

Give Them The Right Tools

One way to improve the morale of sales representatives is by making it much easier for them perform their jobs. Providing your employees with automatic phone dialer programs will allow them to place more sales calls more quickly. This will lead to your employees to making more sales as they connect to more customers more quickly.

Understand What Motivates High-Performers

One of the difficulties of motivating sales representatives is that sales professionals are driven by different things. For example, high-performing sales professionals are usually motivated by the desire for personal achievements and may become demotivated if they experience ceilings. For instance, if you limit the number of sales calls a star representative can go on, this may cause him or her to leave for a different company.

Do Not Ignore Average Sales Representatives

For those representatives who are always lagging behind, it may simply not work to keep them on your team. But for those representatives who are in the middle, you will want to devote the most attention because they are the most likely to be able to significantly improve the profitability of your company. In most cases, the incentive you provide is not what they are looking for and you will want to use other methods to ignite the spark.

Respect Your Staff

For your most experienced sales professionals, it is important that you show them respect. Simply ask them how they would like to be managed. Experienced sales representatives will likely have a general understanding of how they like to be managed and can guide you through this process.

The great thing about sales is that it is ultimately number-driven. By crunching the numbers, you can know exactly how well your company is performing. Even motivation can be reduced to numbers when the methods you use to improve motivation make a clear, tangible difference.

It is almost impossible for a sales team to be successful if it is not tracking how it is reaching its goals. You should be able to answer questions such as "how many conversions did you have this week" or "how many cold calls did you make this week." Having adequate sales data allows for you to make modifications that will maximize the profitability of your business.

1. Automate Your Sales Processes

One of the best ways to track sales metrics is to handle sales transactions using an automated system that forces you to enter in critical data. It is easy to forget to track important details by simply keeping a spreadsheet. It is impossible to forget when you are forced to enter data in order to complete a sale.

The best automated sales processes handle much of the work for you. For instance, if there is a stage in which customers must be sent an email, this can be done automatically. Reports can be generated and sent to appropriate managers so they can receive feedback on their performance. Automated sales software can also ensure that clients are efficiently moved through the sales pipeline. For instance, prospects can become frustrated if they are repeatedly contacted with the same sales pitch when they have already agreed to purchase the product or service.

2. Use Mobile Apps

Track sales data using mobile apps. Oftentimes, you are given access to sales information while you are not at your computer. Tracking sales data from a mobile app will allow you to always add sales data even when your sales team is on a sales call. When tracking sales data, begin by tracking three key metrics. For example, if you are carrying out cold calls, you should track the number of cold calls you are performing, the number of appointments you are having and the number of closed sales. After you have gotten used to tracking three metrics, begin adding additional metrics that you feel will help you shape your sales process.

3. Trace Emails

Track customers with an email tracer. It can be difficult to remember where a particular email is from. A tracer program can identify an email's IP address, which will allow you to remember where a particular email was from and connect it to a customer or a sale. Setting up an email marketing drip campaign will help you to generate more lead and do so more efficiently. Keep your emails organized by placing them in appropriate folders.

4. Track Time

Time tracking software is critical for measuring metrics such as how long it takes for a sales representative to finish a cold call. Time tracking software must be easy to use so it won't interfere with your workflow and so it can quickly begin tracking time when necessary. Using a simple stopwatch on your phone can also help when you do not have access to more complex software and need to track something on the fly.

5. Generate Visualizations

It is difficult to understand abstract numbers and much easier to understand charts and graphs. Pie charts, line graphs, bar graphs and any other form of visualization can give you a quick, overall picture of how well your business is performing. Fortunately, many sales software programs come with visualization tools built-in. Great visualizations are clear about what they represent and it is easy to see the changes in data that are being tracked.

At the end of the day, assess what information you have tracked to determine whether you are forgetting anything. Make an effort each day to improve your data collection efforts. Once you have acquired sufficient data, it is important to weed through the information to identify areas where you can improve. Not only should you focus on revenue generated, but other metrics such as the speed at which you perform cold calls. With enough data, you will significantly boost your sales and lower expenses.

Business is one of the most dynamic career areas to get involved with. There are always new concepts like market automation coming out and changing the current paradigm. Marketing automation is the notion that you can and will leverage the power of your computing systems in order to set your website and other online properties up to automatically respond or analyze a marketing promotion or a sales contact.

Here are some ways that automation is changing the future of selling:

Marketing and sales people are always going to be important to most companies. At the same time, marketing research people that work with computer systems are growing in importance because whether you have a service or a line of products, you are likely in a position where your customers are going to rely on your online offerings in order to get the information that they need to develop an opinion and make a purchase.

Because of this, shaping their experience and creating material that converts understanding into sales is something that strengthens the role that analysts play in the sales process. Email marketing is a great opportunity to reach your customers. Specifically email marketing drip campaigns are great ways to help customers advance through the sales funnel. It is therefore quite important to get the right staff in place when you start making changes to online automation so that you can ensure that your customers will be properly motivated.

Think AI:

Not all marketing and sales processes utilize artificial intelligence online in order to enhance the user experience for a lower price. Yet when that opportunity exists and it is seamless to the customer, it can make a difference in the price that you pay for maintenance. On the other hand, when you implement process shaping with an element of AI, it is important to avoid unnecessary style faux pas. Customers that are online are normally savvy regarding processes that are heavily automated. They will likely know if you have content that seems canned or insincere. So whether you are providing free insurance quotes or selling cars, using AI can help you leverage the power of an quality online presence.

One reason that AI will eventually become important is that it snaps in well to online presentation systems and can be incorporated into every part of the online process for less money that it would take to automate on a grand scale without it. Car dealers have big opportunity to use data they get from their customers to try and sale more effectively.  Another major reason that it will start to be favored in the future is that if it is done well in terms of its implementation, it will allow technicians to create more sophisticated environments, increasing your sales.

Measurement is King:

20th century marketing and sales people relied a lot upon feedback that they were able to elicit through personal surveys, polls, and research. Today, because customers do most of their product research online, it is possible to completely measure and analyze their behavior, a marketing feature for companies which was once considered to be the holy grail of market research. Clients who visit multiple websites that are part of your forest of information for any product that you are marketing online, can also be tracked and analyzed so that their decision-making process is understood by their actions. Quite a change from having to ask online.

Another area of measurement that is important for the future of sales is the development of ROI for your market campaigns and data. Return on investment whether you are a car dealer or lipsense distributor should always drive the actions you take. ROI allows you to manage your system using common sense profitability factors. In business, if you decide to add email tracking as a process to your marketing department, measuring the costs of your current process and then comparing them to the costs of the process that you are about to bring in and use for tracking email will allow you find out how efficient your vendors are- and how well your company is serving your clients.

Automation is a very important part of the future of selling. By understanding and implementing it when it is relevant to your team, it can save your firm time and money.

When looking to grow and expand a business, one of the best things you can do is expand your sales team. With a larger sales team, your company will be in better position to get more customers and increase revenue. In order to expand your sales team, it will be important to do a number of things. It will be very important to network with sales professionals, ask for recommendations, post online ads and work with recruiters. You will also benefit by hiring managers to recruit and hire more salespeople. By doing these things, you will be in great position to get the most qualified sales professionals for your company.

Network with Professionals

The first thing you can do when looking to expand your sales team is to network with sales professionals. In this situation, you will often go to professional conventions, seminars and business networking events. You can also attend job fairs where you can meet up with sales professionals. At networking events, you will have the opportunity to talk to a number of salespeople and tell them about the opportunities at your company. Business owners will also have the ability to review the salesperson’s qualifications and track record as well. Lastly, you can rely on people in your professional network who know of top salespeople as well.

Ask for Recommendations

Another way to expand your sales team is to ask for recommendations. In this process, you will talk to vendors and professional acquaintances and tell them about your job openings for salespeople. You will then ask them if they know of anyone who is looking for a job in sales. In many cases, your professional acquaintances will know salespeople and then have them recommended to your company. By asking for recommendations, you can take advantage of a highly effective way to increase your sales team.

Post Ads

When looking to expand your sales team, one of the things you can do is post online ads. This is the process of posting a sales job opening on the various job websites. With this method, you will likely get a number of applicants and resumes to evaluate. Don’t be afraid to run an email drip campaign to current subscribers. There is a good possibility that you will have current email subscribers who are qualified to work for you. You will have numerous people to consider and therefore increase your chances of finding the most qualified sales professionals. If you are looking to efficiently get numerous sales professionals to evaluate and add to your team, then posting ads online is a great way to accomplish this goal.

Work with Recruiters

Businesses that are looking to expand their sales team will benefit by working with a recruiter. A company will have the opportunity to work with an organization that actively looks for qualified sales professionals. They will interview and evaluate the sales professionals and then recommend them to your company. Using recruiters can be a very effective way to find and hire a number of sales professionals for your company. Therefore, using a recruiter can be one of the best sources to use when you are looking to expand your team of sales professionals.

Hire Managers

Companies that want to expand their sales team will also want to hire managers to recruit more salespeople. A company will benefit by hiring a sales manager who can evaluate and hire the right sales professionals for the company. With a sales manager, you will not only get the best salespeople for your organization but also someone who can coach and mentor the sales team as well. They will also be able to set goals and make sure that they are achieved. Therefore, hiring a sales manager can help you get the salespeople you need to expand your business.

Monitor Their Progress

Once you build and expand your sales team, it will be important to monitor their progress and make sure that they consistently meet quotas. One of the most effective ways to track the performance of your sales team is to use a power dialer. This will enable you to see how your sales team is generating leads as well as whether or not they are converting prospects into customers. With an expanded sales team that performs well, your company will likely prosper.