View your Business with a New Lens

How to Gain Valuable Business Insights through Technology:

Do you know how your business is doing at the end of each day? Maybe you don’t know until the end of each week or each month. Most business leaders only have access to business data at the end of each month. What if you could see a status each day, each hour, or at an interval at your choosing? How would this impact your ability to make better decisions? Only you can answer that but it is certainly worth considering. In evaluating your existing technology to run your company, do you use one system to run your entire business? If so, congratulations! Not many business leaders can say that. In fact, most businesses rely on 2 or more systems to run their business. This means that the data from each must be looked at separately or at the very least compiled manually to be viewed. This is typically in the form of spreadsheets that are passed around and are out of date as soon as they are sent. In this post, we will briefly introduce technology as a means to view your business with a different lens.

Save Valuable Time through Modern Technology Solutions:

Wouldn’t it be great if you could make the most of your investment in the system (or systems) that is currently in use at your organization? Think about how much time is spent each week, each month, each year by one or more people in your organization to compile data from your system(s) to then organize it to be viewed and analyzed. Why not use that valuable time in other areas to help grow your business.

How valuable would it be to have dashboards that pull and compile all this data automatically for you? Data can be collected from one system or from various disconnected systems and pulled into one dashboard for you to view at any moment you of your choosing. This would allow you to see how all areas of your business are performing at a glance. You could then make adjustments as quickly as needed to improve any given area. This would certainly lead to improved revenue and profits. After all, that is why you are in business.

Real-Time Information Dashboards:

Technology is now available to access key areas of your business with data sources you choose to provide insightful company insights. This information is quick to access and relevant to spot trends, get data when you need it, and promote better organizational decisions. Areas of your business that you can view in near-realtime include but are certainly not limited to:

Revenue by period. This can be viewed by customers, product lines, etc.
Gross and net income by period. This can be viewed by customers, products, etc.
Cash on hand,
Aged Account Receivable/Payable work in very much the same way. The user can have a high-level view of Payables or Receivables, or they can get very granular with just a few clicks. These reports allow one to filter on age buckets, customer name or both. It will display the invoices that make up the bucket and the age of each invoice. This allows you to understand exactly where accounts stand with a minimum of time invested.
Top 10 Customers report allows the user to see the current top customers based on sales but also allows historical data to compare year over year. Users can see what their top customers are spending and what they are purchasing. The report also gives insight into the profit margins for each of the top customers.
Top Selling Items report allows the user to see what their top 10 product sales are based on sales dollars, quantity, profitability, and purchaser. The user can look at product sales as a whole or down to a specific year or group of years.
Top Vendors report allows the user to see their top vendors at a high-level overview and broken down into a granular level. The user can view on specific year-month or quarter if they desire. The pie chart allows users to look at all top 10 vendors or click on one specific vendor to have a look at the products they purchase and the detailed information concerning those products.
The sky is the limit. Come up with your own ideas of what you would like to see!

These dashboards are typically also available on a mobile device to be viewed from anywhere you are in the world. Some examples are below: