Conduct a self-assessment to identify areas of your business that need to be improved, set priorities and stimulate your thought about what you are really doing. Take time to think about and answer each of these questions, its an investment in your future. When completed use this assessment to meet with your business advisor to priortize discussions and brainstormsing ides for improvements.
Part One - Measuring Marketing and Sales Results
How Much Growth Do You Want?
1. What is your objective for increasing sales volume in the next 12 months?
2. What is your objective for increasing net profit in the next 12 months?
3. Given your firm’s capabilities as well as customer and market conditions, how likely are you to reach the sales and profit objectives given above?
How Good Are Current Sales, Profits and Cash Flow?
4. What have been your firm’s total sales for the last three years?
(Sales refer to dollar revenues actually received by your firm in each fiscal year.)
Last FY 2 Years ago 3 Years ago
Net Sales _______ _________ ________
Net Income _______ _________ ________
5. Gross Profitability (sales minus total cost of goods) during the past three years has been...
___Increasing ____Flat ____Decreasing
6. Do you consider your current cash flow to be?
___Excellent ____Good ____Fair ____Awful
7. Does your balance sheet show a trend? Last FY? 2 Years ago? 3 Years ago?
- Total Current Assets
- Total Fixed Assets
- Total Current Liabilities
- Total Long Term Liabilities
- Net Worth
- Borrow from the bank?
- Must finance through profits?
- Can’t make investments at this time?
Part Two - Measuring Marketing and Sales Results
9. Do you maintain current information on profitability, unit sales, and dollar sales for each of the following?
Customers: ___Yes ___No
Products/Services: ___Yes ___No
Individual models: ___ Yes ___No
Individual jobs: ___ Yes ___No
10. Which of the following cost data is used in developing prices or quotations?
Material Costs: ___Yes ___No
Labor Costs: ___Yes ___No
Overhead Costs: ___Yes ___No
No cost data is used ____
11. Do you routinely compare-estimated costs to actual costs after each job or sale?
___Yes ___No
12. What is the frequency of preparing financial statements?
__Monthly, __Quarterly, __Semi-annually, __Annually, __None
13. How are expenses broken out on your income statement? (Check all that apply)
____Only total expenses are reported
____Production/cost of goods sold are broken out as a separate line item
____Selling costs are broken out as a separate line item
____General/administrative are broken out as a separate line item
____Other (Please describe )
14. Does your firm produce
____To inventory _____ Est. % of company sales revenue?
____To order _____ Est. % of company sales revenue?
Part Three - Internal Sales/Customer Information
15. Do you have a system for tracking the reasons you lose orders?
____Yes ____No ____Don’t know
16. Do you use lost order/customer information to change your sales or marketing strategies?
____Yes ____No ____ Don’t know
Most Valuable Customers (MVCs) are the small percentage of customers in most firms that account for the majority of sales or profits.
17. Do you know what % of your customer base accounts for 80% of your sales?.
____Yes ____No ____Don’t know18. Does your single largest customer account for more then 30% of the sales?
____Yes ____No ____Don’t know
19. Are the high volume, MVC customers profitable?
____Yes ____No ____Don’t know
20. Can you identify The Best Customer Profiles to sell to?
____Yes ____No ____Don’t know
21. Can you identify the worst customer Profiles that you need to replace?
____Yes ____No ____Don’t know
Part Four – Competitor and Market Information
22. Can you list all major direct competitors for each major product, model, or service?
23. How do your most important products or services compare to your strongest competitor?
Name of competitor _________________________
____Better ____The same ____Don’t know
24. Do you know how your customers would rate your products or services against specific competitors?
____Yes ____No
25. How do your products compete with the direct competitor products in price –model by model?
____Higher price ____Same price ____ Lower price
Market Analysis 26. Do you described your customer groups in terms of industries or market niches?
27. Can you describe the market niches in terms of SIC Codes?
____Yes ____No
28. Do you know how many prospects are in each market niche?
____Yes ____No
29. Are these markets growing, stagnant or declining?
__ Growing __Stagnant __Declining __Don’t know
30. To achieve your growth commitments is it possible to increase share of your current markets?
____Yes ____No
31. If your markets are stagnant or declining will you have to find new markets to grow?
Part Five - Marketing Strategies and Function32. Do you have a current written business plan that includes a sales forecast and budget?
____Yes ____No ____Don’t know
33. Briefly describe your five most important product lines or services in order of their annual sales volume, and enter their approximate percentage of total company sales.
A. _________________________________________ ____ %
B. _________________________________________ ____%
C. _________________________________________ ____%
D. _________________________________________ ____%
E. _________________________________________ ____%
34. What is your target gross profit margin for each of the above product lines or services
(Fill in first column below)
35. Does the product line fall short, meet, or exceed this target?
(Please use the same letters as listed above.)
Target Margin Short Meets Exceeds
A. ___________ ______ ____ _____
B. ___________ ______ ____ _____
C. ___________ ______ ____ _____
D. ___________ ______ ____ _____
E. ___________ ______ ____ _____
36. Does each product line have an advantage over known competitive products or are they simply a “me too” products? (Please describe any specific advantages your products have.)
New Product Development
37. How many new products or services have you introduced in the past four years?
38. Does your company plan to develop new products or services to achieve the growth commitments in questions 1 and 2?
39. If “Yes”, how many?
40. Do you have a system to evaluate the total projected costs of the new product or service?
41. Do you have a system to evaluate the sales potential (future sales year by year) of the new product or service?
Pricing
42. Who establishes prices in your company?
43. What method do you use, generally, to determine prices? (Check only one)
___Actual cost + desired margin
___Standard cost + desired margin
___Estimated cost + desired margin
___Meet competitive prices
___Whatever the customer will pay
44. Are you having any difficulty establishing and/or maintaining your prices?
___Yes ____No
45. In general, are your prices higher, lower or about the same as your competitors’ prices for similar products?
___Our prices are generally higher
___Our prices are about the same
___Our prices are generally lower
46. What percent of your orders are discounted in order to get the sale?
Sales
Note: The following questions ask whether you use company employed sales personnel, including commissioned reps/agents/distributors, or both. The first set of questions deal with company employed sales personnel and are followed by questions about commissioned reps/agents/distributors.
47. Enter the percent of sales (or estimated percent) produced by each sales channel.
____Owners
____Company employed inside sales employees
____Company employed outside sales employees
____Commissioned reps/agents/distributors
____Other (describe)
100 % Total
Company Sales Department
48. How many sales people do you have that are they company employees? (Not outside reps) - (Allocate fractional assignments if applicable, e.g., half time assignments)
____Number of inside sales people
____Number of outside sales people
49. How would you judge the overall performance of your sales force?
____Excellent
____Satisfactory
____Unsatisfactory
50. Does the firm have enough sales people to provide sufficient face-to-face or voice-to-voice contact with the needed number of prospects and customers to produce the desired sales volume?
51. To which of the following goals/measures do you tie compensation/evaluation of sales personnel?
____Not tied to any goals/measurements
____Tied to sales volume goals
____Tied to gross margin goals
____Tied to other profit goals (Please describe)
____Does not apply
Manufacturers’ Reps, Agents, and Distributors
52. Number of Reps ___ Agents___ Distributors ___
53. How would you judge the overall performance of the rep/agent/distributor network?
___Excellent
___Satisfactory
___Unsatisfactory
___Don’t know
54. How would you judge the sales coverage (the function of contacting the needed number of prospects and customers to produce the desired sales volume) provided by reps/agents/distributors?
___Excellent
___Satisfactory
___Unsatisfactory
55. Do reps/agents/distributors perform enough sales tasks to justify their commissions in most cases?
___Yes ___No ___Don’t know
56. Would sales performance improve if you improved factory marketing support and training programs for your reps/agents/distributors?
___Yes ___No ___Don’t know
57. Which of the following advertising/promotional methods do you use?
____Trade journal advertising
____Post card packs
____Coop advertising
____New product releases
____Publicity releases
____Magazine articles
____Radio advertising
____Television advertising
____Trade shows
____Brochures
____Catalogs
____Web Site
____Promotional giveaways
____Direct mail
____Email list
____Internet Orders
____Telemarketing
____Demonstrations
____Internet advertising
____Yellow Pages
____Google Maps
58. Will these promotional methods be adequate to get a larger share of current markets?
___Yes ___No ___Don’t know
59. Will these promotional methods be adequate to find and penetrate new markets?
___Yes ___No ___Don’t know
