Welcome to Sales Forecast Pro v3.1 !! Implement "bottoms up" forecast reporting solutions within multi-level organizations. Submitted forecasts automatically identify organization members and their selling opportunities. View your forecast data as sorted tabular lists, as stacked bar chart or pie chart displays and as printed reports. Features and Benefits include: * Standard and custom time horizons and filters for viewing your sales opportunities. ... 1, 2, 3, 6, 9 and All Months (cumulative) ... current, next, 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th Months (individually) and ... date range, status, opportunity and product filters. * Tabular reports of sales opportunities in your chosen horizon. ... Sort by Opportunity, Status, Product, Close Date, Amount and Prob. % * Stacked Bar Chart or Pie Chart views of sales opportunity summaries. ... View Owner, Product or Status values by Month for currently displayed horizon. * User defined sales environment values are automatically maintained. ... Products, Sales Cycle Status Values, and Success Probability Percentages. * Sales organizational "roll ups" and "drill downs" for management visibility. ... Implement "bottoms up" sales forecast reporting solutions. * History database for easy storage of "Booked" and/or "Lost" opportunities. ... Move items to and from history for sales reviews and history reporting. Product Outline ... As a Sales Representative you can ... . Create and maintian your database of sales opportunity records . Description of sales opportunity . Product being proposed . Unit Quantity of the Product being proposed . Total value (your currency) of the opportunity . Status of opportunity (within your sales cycle) . Date when you expect to receive the order . Probability that you will win the business . Import your forecast records from an ASCII (CSV) file . View your sales opportunity records . Within standard time horizons (1, 2, 3, 6, 9 and all months) . Using your own custom report filters . Sorted by Description, Status, Product, Close Date, Value or Probability . Charted as stacked bars by Product or by Status . As printed reports . Submit your forecast to your manager . Using a standard diskette . Via your network . Export your forecast records to an ASCII (CSV) file As a First Level Sales Manager you can ... . Receive forecasts from your Sales Representatives . Using standard diskettes . Via your network . View your composite forecast and/or that of individual Sales Representatives . Within standard time horizons (1, 2, 3, 6, 9 and all months) . Using your own custom report filters . Sorted by Description, Status, Product, Close Date, Value or Probability . Charted as stacked bars by Sales Representative, by Product or by Status . As printed reports . Tailor your forecast for submission to your manager . Modify/Delete any of the existing sales opportunity records . Add sales opportunities records for any of your Sales Representatives . Roll in your house accounts forecast (if applicable) . Submit your forecast to your manager . Using a standard diskette . Via your network . Export your forecast records to an ASCII (CSV) file As a Higher Level Sales Manager you can ... . Receive forecasts from lower level Sales Managers . Using standard diskettes . Via your network . View your composite forecast and/or that of individual Sales Managers . Within standard time horizons (1, 2, 3, 6, 9 and all months) . Using your own custom report filters . Sorted by Description, Status, Product, Close Date, Value or Probability . Charted as stacked bars by Sales Manager, by Product or by Status . As printed reports . Drill down into the organization and view sales opportunities at all lower levels . Tailor your forecast for submission to your manager . Modify/Delete any of the existing sales opportunity records . Add sales opportunities records for any of your Sales Representatives . Roll in your house accounts forecast (if applicable) . Submit your forecast to your manager . Using a standard diskette . Via your network . Export your forecast records to an ASCII (CSV) file Business Sceniro and the iSBiSTER sample data ... The first time Sales Forecat Pro executes, it will ask you if you want to load the iSBiSTER sample data ... we suggest that you do this and use it to gain full insight into the product before starting your own database. The iSBiSTER sample data represents a top down view of forecasted sales opportunities at the highest level in the sales organization. To help you maximize your use of the sample data we must first review the business sceniro of the company depicted by the sample data. The company has a multi-level, outside sales organization selling various products across the United States. The organization should be viewed as follows ... . Sales Representatives (SR) own the individual selling opportunities. . SR's report to District Sales Managers (DM). . DM's report to Area Sales Managers (AM). . AM's report to Region Sales Managers (RM). . RM's report to a Company Sales Manager (C0). Now let's review how the sample data was generated ... . Each SR installed Sales Forecast Pro on their PC and created their individual database of sales opportunity records. At the creation of the databases, each SR identified themselves by organization code and by name. This identification is stored as a property of each database. . Each SR then used Sales Forecast Pro submit their forecast to their DM. . Each DM installed Sales Forecast Pro on their PC and created their individual database to hold sales opportunity records received from their SR's. At the creation of the databases, each DM identified themselves by organization code and by district name. . Each DM then used Sales Forecast Pro to received the forecast from their SR's and build the composite forecast for their district. . Each DM then used Sales Forecast Pro to submit their forecast to their AM. Each AM installed Sales Forecast Pro on their PC and created their individual database to hold sales opportunity records received from their DM's. At the creation of the databases, each AM identified themselves by organization code and by area name. . Each AM then used Sales Forecast Pro to received the forecast from their DM's and build the composite forecast for their area. . Each AM then used Sales Forecast Pro to submit their forecast to their RM. Each RM installed Sales Forecast Pro on their PC and created their individual database to hold sales opportunity records received from their AM's. At the creation of the databases, each RM identified themselves by organization code and by region name. . Each RM then used Sales Forecast Pro to received the forecast from their AM's and build the composite forecast for their region. . Each RM then used Sales Forecast Pro to submit their forecast to the CO. Your perspective of the sample data is that of the CO. You have installed Sales Forecast Pro on your PC and have received the forecast from each of your RM's. Notice the tabs across the bottom of Sales Forecast Pro's main screen. The left most tab identifies you as "Company". the tabs to the right identify each of your sales regions. While the "Company" tab is selected the forecast records displayed represent the composite forecast for both of the regions. Clicking on one of the region tabs instructs Sales Forecast Pro to filter the records to show just those from the selected region. As the Company manager you can instruct Sales Forecast Pro to produce stacked bar chart displays showing the value of the forecast with each bar representing one of your regions. You may also ask for the bars to represent the individual products being forecasted or the various sales cycle status values used by your company. To make it even more interesting, you can double click on one of the region tabs and thus instruct Sales Forecast Pro to move down into the organization so that your perspective is that of the selected region manager. Now the left most tab identifies you as the sales manager for the selected region and the tabs to the right identify each of your sales areas. As a region manager you can instruct Sales Forecast Pro to produce stacked bar chart displays showing the value of the forecast with each bar representing one of your areas. You can also ask for the bars to represent the individual products being forecasted or the various sales cycle status values used by your region. This process of doubling clicking on a tab and moving down into the organization can be repeated until you become one of the first level managers and the tabs to the right represent the individual SR's. Doubling clicking on the left most tab (at each of the organizational levels) instructs Sales Forecast Pro to move up one level in the organization. Thus Sales Forecast Pro allows you to move vertically within the organization to provide insight into forecasted sales at any desired level. More info ...... Sales Forecast Pro allows you to create and maintain forecast records so that you can produce forecast summaries in various formats. You can view your forecasted opportunitites in sorted tabular summaries, in stacked bar chart or pie chart formats and on printed reports. Sales opportunity records store ... The opportunity description, The opportunity's sales cycle status, The product being forecasted, The planned closure date for the opportunity, The dollar amount for the opportunity, and The success probability percentage for the opportunity. Each record can be classified as a "Report To Management" item or a "Private" item. These classifications allow you to filter the content of your forecast summaries. Time horizons also allow you to filter the content of your forecast summaries. Standard horizons of 1, 2, 3, 6, 9 and all months allow you to filter your summaries for various views into the future. Individual month horizons of current, next, 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th months are also available. Combining the time horizons with the record classifications provides robust filtering combinations. You can also define custom reports combining record classifications with a date range, a list of opportunities, products, and/or status values to be used as filters. You can also filter based on amount and probability percentage. These reports can be saved and re-used. You and your manager can combine your usage of Sales Forecast Pro by taking advantage of its Export/Import features. You can easily pass your forecast to your manager electronically. Your manager can then combine your forecast with the forecast of other sales professionals to produce a consolidated forecast for the entire group. Sales Forecast Pro provides multi-level organization identification so that the selling opportunities can be reported at the various levels within your sales organization. ................................................................ Installing Sales Forecast Pro. Sales Forecast Pro is a Microsoft Windows application and thus should be installed from either the program manager or file manager. Simply placed the Sales Forecast Pro diskette into the appropriate drive and type [drive]:\INSTALL.EXE from the Run command under the File Menu. Follow the directions on the screen and Sales Forecast Pro will install itself and build your program manager ICONS for you. The first time Sales Forecat Pro executes, it will ask you if you want to load the iSBiSTER sample data ... we suggest that you do this and use it to gain full insight into the product before starting your own database. ................................................................ What's new in Sales Forecast Pro v3.1 above and beyond v3.0. * Added pie charts * Added individual months horizons * Added on screen subtotal display * Added detailed data on bar/pie charts to show amounts and % for selected month * Added ability for user to input and/or modify the 'Created Date' for forecast records * Added ASCII Import of forecast records * Added ASCII Export of forecast records (optional header record) and (optional SR ID)