sales forecasting Flashcards
what is sales forecasting
art or science of predicting the future demand by anticipating what consumers are likely to do in a given set of circumstances
- feeds into decision making
what is quantitative sales forecasting
historical data to forecast future data
what’s time series analysis
using past sales record to predict future sale patterns
what’s seasonal analysis
compares trends from different seasonal periods
what’s trend analysis
finds a general tendency of sales based on long term data
- could be rising, falling or stagnant
what’s cycle analysis
tries to find relationships between sales data and the business cycle
what’s random factor analysis
tries to explain unusual or extreme sale figures
what’s qualitative sales forecasting
predicting the future demand by anticipating that consumers are likely to do in a given set of circumstances
what’s qualitative sales forecasting
when historical data isn’t available, involve use of opinions
what’s brainstorming
subjective technique for generating new useful ideas and promoting creative thinking
what’s the most effective way to brainstorm
- 6/12 people
- various departments
- different backgrounds (qualifications / experiences)
what’s the delphi method
- researching views of panel of experts
advantages of delphi method
- flexible: used in variety of situations
- structured
- leads to a better quality of responses
- can be used when needed
weakness of delphi method
- time consuming to coordinate and manage
- assumes experts are willing to come to a consensus and all their views and opinions to be altered
- ## monetary payments may lead to bias
