Sales controlling: definition, tasks & key figures

What is sales controlling?

Sales controlling is the targeted control, monitoring and evaluation of the sales strategy. As part of the operational management system, sales controlling ensures that sales targets are achieved.

Sales controlling is used to increase sales and efficiency in sales and to ensure that corporate goals are achieved. This includes, among other things, the analysis of sales figures, costs and earnings as well as the monitoring of customer loyalty measures and marketing activities. The goal of sales controlling is to make decisions based on reliable and up-to-date data in order to increase the company’s competitiveness.

Sales Controlling Tasks

Sales controlling tasks comprise a variety of activities aimed at monitoring and optimizing the success and efficiency of sales processes within a company.

These duties include analyzing sales figures, identifying revenue and sales trends, monitoring sales metrics, and implementing actions to improve sales strategies and practices.

By continuously analyzing data and KPIs, sales controlling enables the fine-tuning of pricing, product mix, and customer service, allowing a company to strengthen its competitive position and promote sustainable growth.

With the help of data mining, companies can make their sales controlling tasks more effective by extracting and using hidden information from large amounts of data to make informed decisions regarding sales strategies and tactics.

In the context of sales controlling, portfolio analysis is a valuable tool for evaluating the performance and profitability of various products or services offered by a company. By using portfolio analysis methods, companies can optimize their sales controlling by adjusting resource allocation and sales strategies to the positioning of the products or services in the portfolio.

Tasks in Sales: Sales Controlling & Sales Management

An overview of the central sales controlling tasks:

• Monitoring and analysis of sales figures, revenue targets and earnings
• Monitoring of costs in sales, e.g. travel expenses, commission costs
• Monitoring of customer loyalty measures, such as customer satisfaction.
• Analysis of sales markets and competition
• Monitoring and analysis of marketing activities, such as campaigns, advertising measures
• Preparation of forecasts and sales plans
• Support in the preparation of budgets and forecasts
• Preparation of reports and presentations for the management
• Monitor sales performance and success against goals and benchmarks.

Strategic and operational sales controlling

Within sales controlling, two decisive aspects can be distinguished: strategic sales controlling and operational sales controlling. Strategic sales controlling focuses on the long-term design and orientation of sales activities, whereas operational sales controlling focuses on day-to-day operations and the implementation of sales strategies and plans.

Strategic sales controlling

Strategic sales controlling has the task of ensuring the long-term orientation of sales and ensuring that corporate goals are achieved in the sales area. It supports management in the development and implementation of sales strategies and sales planning and helps to minimize risks and increase competitiveness.

An important component of strategic sales controlling is the analysis of the market and competitive situation. Among other things, this involves examining industry trends, customer needs and the activities of competitors. The sales strategy and targets are determined on the basis of these analyses.

Strategic sales controlling includes sales planning and budgeting. This involves analyzing and planning planned sales, costs and earnings in the sales area. Based on this sales planning, the necessary resources are provided and the implementation of the strategy is monitored.

Strategic sales controlling also has the task of monitoring and evaluating target achievement in the sales area and making adjustments where necessary

Operational sales controlling

Operational sales controlling comprises the daily activities in the sales area and the implementation of sales planning. Its task is to ensure the implementation of sales planning and to monitor the achievement of sales targets.

Operational sales controlling involves monitoring and analyzing sales figures, costs and earnings. Here, the actual sales figures are compared with the planned sales figures and deviations are analyzed. Based on these analyses, appropriate measures are taken to achieve the sales and earnings targets.

Another important component of operational sales controlling is the monitoring of customer loyalty measures and marketing activities. This involves monitoring customer retention and marketing activities and reviewing them for effectiveness. Based on these analyses, appropriate measures are taken to increase customer loyalty and optimize marketing activities.

In contrast to strategic controlling, which focuses on the long-term orientation of sales, operational sales controlling is mainly concerned with the day-to-day implementation of the sales strategy and monitoring the achievement of sales targets. Both areas work closely together to ensure that the company’s sales targets are achieved.

Important key figures in sales controlling

In sales controlling, there are a variety of key performance indicators (KPIs) that can be used to measure and monitor performance in the sales area. Some examples of KPIs in sales controlling are:

• Sales: This is one of the most important sales metrics and an important indicator of success in the sales area. Sales provide information on how many products or services have been sold and how high the company’s revenues are.
• Sales: Sales tell how many products or services were sold.
• Customer retention rate: This indicator shows how well the company is able to retain customers.
• Customer acquisition rate: The customer acquisition rate shows how successful the company is in acquiring new customers.
• Average selling price: This indicator tells how high the average selling price per product or service is.
• Cost per sale: This indicator shows how high the cost per product or service sold is.
• Sales per salesperson: Sales per salesperson indicates how many units a salesperson has sold on average per period. This can be calculated per day, week, month or quarter and can be used to measure and compare vendor performance. Higher sales per salesperson metric indicates higher salesperson productivity.
• Return on investment (ROI) in sales: Return on investment (ROI) is also one of the most important financial and sales ratios, indicating how much profit or loss an investment has generated. It is calculated by dividing the profit or loss made on the investment by the original investment amount. ROI can also be expressed as a percentage by multiplying the profit or loss by the original investment amount and multiplying the result by 100. An ROI of 100% means that the investment has doubled the original investment amount, while an ROI of -100% means that the investment has completely lost the original investment amount.
• Lead-to-sale ratio: This indicator tells how successful the company is in converting potential customers (leads) into actual customers (sales).

There are many other KPIs that can be used in sales controlling, depending on the company’s goals and what aspects of sales it most wants to monitor. It is important to select the right KPIs and monitor them regularly to ensure that sales targets are met.

Instruments of sales controlling

One of the most important elements in sales controlling is the measurement and monitoring of performance in the sales area. There are a variety of tools and methods that can be used for this purpose. In this section, some examples are presented to give an insight into the many possibilities that exist in sales controlling. From dashboards that provide a quick overview of key metrics to forecasting methods that enable future developments to be predicted. Get a deeper insight into the world of sales controlling and learn how these tools and methods can help make the company more successful.

Instruments at a glance

Reporting

Reports provide a more detailed look at metrics and can be generated at different intervals (e.g., monthly, quarterly, annual reports).

Budget planning

A budget plan indicates what sales and costs are planned for a specific period. This makes it possible to compare actual results with planned results and to take countermeasures if necessary.

Forecasting

Forecasting methods make it possible to predict future developments and estimate the effects of decisions on future results.

More here.

Break-Even Analysis

Break-even analysis can be used to determine the point at which a product or service breaks even.

Customer analysis

Using methods such as RFM (Recency, Frequency, Monetary) analysis, customers can be segmented according to their buying behavior and it is possible to identify which customer groups are most important.

Gap Analysis

The gap analysis is a tool that allows to identify the gap between the current and the desired state in sales. This can be done, for example, in terms of sales, market share or customer satisfaction. By identifying these gaps, targeted actions can be taken to achieve the desired state.

Benchmarking

Benchmarking is a method of comparing oneself with other companies in the same or similar market environment. The goal is to compare one’s own sales performance with that of competitors in order to identify best practices and learn from other companies.

Customer Value Management

Customer Value Management deals with the benefits that a customer derives from a business relationship. It’s about understanding customers’ needs and wants in order to develop offerings that maximize those benefits.

Key Account Management

Key account management focuses on maintaining and developing key customer relationships. This is about understanding and responding to the needs of key customers in order to build long-term and successful business relationships.

Sales Controlling Software

In order to significantly support controlling and sales planning, the use of software solutions plays a decisive role. A recommendable software for sales controlling is Corporate Planner.

Corporate Planner is a software that enables the creation of business plans, budget and forecast forecasts, as well as the monitoring of the implementation of measures. Corporate Planner enables companies to more effectively pursue their strategic sales goals by automatically performing data analysis and sales planning.

Another highlight of Corporate Planner is the ability to summarize data on dashboards and reports, providing a quick overview of key sales metrics. The software is also capable of integrating data from multiple sources to perform a comprehensive analysis of business performance.

Corporate Planner provides the ability to share the results of the analysis with other departments in the company to enable better collaboration and decision making. This enables companies to continuously improve their sales strategy and tactics and adapt to changing market conditions.

Overall, Corporate Planner is an excellent choice for companies that want to achieve their strategic sales goals and improve their sales controlling performance. It offers extensive functionality and enables companies to plan, monitor and optimize their sales activities to achieve their business goals.

Summary sales controlling

In conclusion, sales controlling is an important component of corporate management that helps to measure, analyze and control sales performance. It enables the company to adapt its sales strategy and sales planning to current market conditions, thus maximizing sales and profits.