When companies want to measure their success or failure in a given sales territory, they often use a sales gap analysis to segregate existing business versus potential business. The gap analysis is about identifying current business, assessing new opportunities, and ultimately about being proactive in adopting strategies to close on those opportunities. As such, I decided to put together a sample sales territory gap analysis excel sheet, one that allows companies to review their business holdings within a given sales territory. This should help a company’s sales team when it holds its quarterly & semi-annual sales meetings, or when they look to put together their sales forecasts for the upcoming year.
The Importance of the Gap Analysis
This sample sales territory gap analysis excel sheet is based on identifying both the company’s existing, and potential business, within a given territory. It depicts the company’s gross profit across multiple customer accounts. The territory’s “gap” is the difference between the total gross profit available in the territory, minus the company’s existing gross profit - or minus the business the company currently has. The gap would therefore be what is left, or what is left within the territory for the company to close on.
A gap analysis is one of those simple, but extremely effective, sales tools. If you’re unfamiliar with how to perform a gap analysis, and what to read more about the approach, then please read the following post: Performing a Gap Analysis on a Sales Territory
The first portion of the sample excel sheet, entitled “Territory GAP Analysis in %”, is found in the first tab of the excel sheet (the sample sheet is down-loadable at the bottom). It summarizes the company’s existing business in this particular territory.
The company has summarized its existing business and has identified the remaining gross profit in the territory relative to the current gross profit. In this case, the company’s salesperson has 64% of the territory’s business, which corresponds to $17,500.00 gross profit. There is still $9,750.00 of gross profit remaining to be closed on in this territory. This is shown below and the $9,750.00 is essentially the “gap” of the gap analysis.
The second (Territory’s GP Pie-Chart) & third (Territory’s GAP & GP$ Remaining) tabs of the sample sheet show both the existing, and potential business, depicted in pie-charts. Of course, these could also be depicted as percentages if you wish. It's entirely up to you. However, it’s important to note that the gap analysis is much like performing a market feasibility study. It determines the overall health of the territory, the amount of business the salesperson currently has, what is remaining, and forces the salesperson to ask him, or herself, what they must do to retain their existing business, and how to close on remaining opportunities. Ultimately, the salesperson should be able to summarize the following about their territory.
- How they’ll defend current business
- How they’ll secure new business
- Threats from competitors in their territory
- Prices within their territory
- External threats from new market players
- Those customers who are likely to expand versus those who likely won’t
- Increases or decreases in volumes for the upcoming year
- General territory pressures and trends
This sample sales territory gap analysis excel sheet aims to provide companies with insight into a given sales territory. Its sole purpose is to answer the question: “How much business do we have, what remains and what are our plans to secure that remaining business”.
The gap analysis itself is very straightforward. It defines the total gross profit or revenue available in the territory within a given period. When thinking of a gap analysis, think of the volumes your customers can buy of your product within a year. In this case, what is the most they could purchase and what is the per-unit gross profit for each and every unit sold. Here is the excel sheet: Download GAP Analysis Pie-Chart
To learn about defending pricing, managing concessions and dealing with customer scare tactics, please go to: Sales Negotiation: Defend Price, Customer Scare Tactics & Managing Concessions
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