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Company Analysis Report: Examples, Templates, Components

Home Blog Business Management Company Analysis Report: Examples, Templates, Components

Company analysis is a thorough assessment of a company's performance for deep understanding of its current state and future potential. It involves a thorough assessment of various aspects, including financial stability, market presence, and competitive advantage, to uncover valuable insights. These insights are crucial for investors, creditors, and business partners in making effective decisions and formulating strategies.

Company analysis report focuses on examining a company’s financial performance, shedding light on essential indicators such as revenue growth, profitability ratios, liquidity position, and efficiency metrics. By closely analyzing these financial aspects, we gain insights into the company's financial health, stability, and its ability to generate sustainable returns. Additionally, operational efficiency metrics provide valuable information on the company's effectiveness in delivering products or services to the market.

In addition to the company performance analysis report, it also includes a SWOT analysis report, which assesses the company's internal strengths and weaknesses, as well as external opportunities and threats.

What is a Company Analysis Report?

Business analysis report of a company is a comprehensive assessment of it’s performance, operations, and strategic position. The Company Analysis report gives insights into the company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats thus allowing stakeholders to make informed decisions. Writing a report on company analysis typically includes an evaluation of various components such as business opportunities, market planning, customer segmentation, territory design, marketing strategies, and more.

Business analysts play a vital role in gathering and analyzing data, identifying business requirements, and proposing solutions to improve operational efficiency and achieve business objectives. Therefore, incorporating the best Business Analyst training practices enhances the quality and accuracy of the analysis.

Components to Analyze Business Opportunities

1. market planning.

• Market Segmentation: Divide the target market into distinct groups based on characteristics such as demographics, psychographics, and behavior.
• Target Market Selection: Determine the most attractive market segments to focus on based on their size, growth potential, profitability, and alignment with the company's capabilities.
• Positioning Strategy: Define how the company wants to be perceived in the market relative to its competitors, emphasizing unique value propositions and differentiation.
• Marketing Mix: Develop strategies for product/service, pricing, distribution, and promotion to effectively reach and engage the target market.

2. Customer Segmentation

• Identify Customer Needs: Understand the needs, preferences, and pain points of different customer segments to tailor products, services, and marketing messages accordingly.
• Customer Profiling: Create detailed profiles of each customer segment, including demographics, psychographics, purchasing behavior, and motivations.
• Customer Lifetime Value: Assess the long-term value of each customer segment to prioritize resource allocation and develop customer retention strategies.

3. Territory Design

• Geographic Analysis: Evaluate geographical areas and regions to determine market potential, customer density, and logistical considerations.
• Sales Territory Allocation: Divide the market into sales territories , considering factors such as customer distribution, sales potential, and sales rep capacity.
• Resource Allocation: Determine the allocation of sales, marketing, and operational resources across different territories based on their strategic importance and potential.

4. Marketing

• Marketing Strategies: Develop strategies for branding, advertising, digital marketing, public relations, and customer relationship management to effectively reach and engage the target market.
• Campaign Evaluation: Measure the success of marketing campaigns by evaluating important metrics.
• Customer Feedback Analysis: Analyze customer feedback, reviews, and surveys to identify areas for improvement and gather insights for future marketing efforts.

Business analysts play a crucial role in understanding market dynamics, gathering and analyzing data, and translating insights into actionable strategies. KnowledgeHut best Business Analyst training offers a comprehensive curriculum that covers various aspects of market analysis, customer profiling, and marketing strategies.

How to Write a Company Analysis?

Writing a business analysis report of a company involves a structured approach to examine the company's performance, operations, and strategic position. Below are the steps:

1. Preparation

• Define the purpose and scope of the analysis.
• Collect relevant data and information about the company, its industry, competitors, and market trends.
• Identify the key stakeholders and their information needs.

2. Structure

• Executive Summary: Provide a concise overview of the report's findings and recommendations.
• Study Introduction: Introduce the company and its background, including its mission, vision, and core values.
• Methodology: Explain the research methods, data sources, and analytical tools used.
• Review of Statistics: Give a detailed analysis of each component, including market analysis, SWOT analysis, financial analysis, etc.
• Conclusion: Give a summary of the main findings and insights derived from the analysis
• References: Citations of the sources used in the report, ensuring credibility and transparency.

3. Presentation

• Use clear and concise language.
• Include visual aids such as charts, graphs, and tables to support the analysis.
• Organize the report in a logical and structured manner.
• Provide an unbiased evaluation that presents both the strengths and weaknesses of the company

Business Management training equips professionals with the necessary skills in strategic planning, organizational analysis, and decision-making. By incorporating principles and techniques learned in business management training, analysts can provide valuable insights and recommendations to drive business success.

What Should be Included in the Company Analysis Report?

 1. executive summary.

An executive summary is a condensed version of a comprehensive document or report. It provides an overview of the full report's essential points, key findings, and recommended actions. The executive summary is a valuable tool for quickly sharing the main points and significance of the report. It helps communicate the key findings and recommendations in a concise way without reading the entire report.

2. Study Introduction

The study introduction provides a concise overview of the company, its industry, and the purpose of the analysis. It summarizes the key aspects of the company, like its history, mission, and organizational structure. It also highlights its products or services and target market. Lastly, it clearly states the purpose of the analysis.

3. Methodology

The methodology section provides a concise explanation of the research methods, data sources, and analytical tools used. It outlines the approach taken to gather and analyze information. This includes describing the primary and secondary research methods employed. It also highlights the key data sources utilized, such as financial reports, industry publications, market research reports, and academic studies.

4. Review of Statistics

A review of statistics in a company analysis report is an essential aspect of evaluating the performance and financial health of a company. The review of the statistics section provides a detailed report of various aspects of the company such as market analysis, SWOT analysis, financial analysis, and more. This section gives an in-depth analysis of each aspect, with supporting data thus providing valuable insights

5. Conclusion

The conclusion of a company analysis report summarizes the key findings and insights derived from the analysis. It provides an overview of the company's performance, financial health, and overall outlook. The conclusion serves as a concise summary of the main findings and insights derived from the analysis. It highlights the major findings of the entire company analysis report. The conclusion also includes recommendations based on the analysis.

6. References

In a company analysis report, references refer to the information sources used to gather data and support the analysis and conclusions presented in the report. Including references in a company analysis report is essential for providing credibility and allowing readers to verify the sources of information and data used in the analysis.

Importance of Company Analysis Reporting

• Decision Making:  Company analysis reports provide essential information and insights that aid decision making. These reports are assessed by investors and shareholders before investing in a company. The analysis helps them evaluate the company's financial strength, growth potential, and overall performance.
• Risk Assessment: Company analysis reports assist in assessing the risks associated with a company. By evaluating factors such as financial stability, market position, industry trends, and competitive landscape, stakeholders can identify potential risks.
• Performance Evaluation : Analysis reports enable stakeholders to evaluate the company's performance against its objectives, competitors, and industry benchmarks. By reviewing key financial metrics, operational efficiency, market share, and other relevant factors, stakeholders gain insights into the company's strengths, weaknesses, and areas for improvement.
• Transparency and Accountability : Company analysis reports promote transparency and accountability. These reports contain detailed information about the company's financial position, performance, and strategies. These reports allow stakeholders to hold the company's management accountable for their actions and decisions.
• Investor Relations: For publicly traded companies, analysis reports play a crucial role in maintaining positive investor relations. These reports provide shareholders and potential investors with a comprehensive understanding of the company's financial performance, prospects, and risks. Thereby influencing investment decisions and investor confidence.
• Strategic Planning:  Company analysis reports support strategic planning by providing valuable insights into the company's internal and external environment. This information helps management identify areas for improvement, formulate business strategies, allocate resources effectively, and make informed decisions to drive the company's growth and success.
• Regulatory Compliance: Analysis reports contribute to regulatory compliance, particularly for publicly traded companies that are required to disclose financial information to regulatory bodies and stakeholders. By adhering to reporting standards and providing accurate and transparent data, companies demonstrate compliance and maintain trust with regulators and the market.

Company Analysis Report Examples

Here is a company analysis report sample PDF template

• Sample Company Analysis Report Template
• Company Investment Analysis Report Template
• Company Financial Analysis Report Template

In conclusion, a company analysis report serves as a valuable tool for stakeholders to assess a company's performance, financial health, and prospects. It helps evaluate performance, identify business opportunities, and make informed decisions. The report enables stakeholders to make informed investment decisions by providing transparent and accurate information. 

It also fosters transparency, strengthens investor relations, and supports regulatory compliance. Ultimately, the company analysis report serves as a comprehensive source of information, empowering stakeholders to understand the company's position, identify areas for improvement, and drive its growth and success. By evaluating various components such as market planning, customer segmentation, and marketing strategies, stakeholders can gain insights to drive productivity, innovation, and continuous improvement within the organization.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

• Executive summary: This is a concise overview of the entire company analysis report
• Study introduction: This section introduces the purpose and scope of the company analysis.
• Methodology: The methodology section outlines the approach and methods used to conduct the company analysis.
• Review of statistics: This section presents and analyzes relevant statistics and data related to the company's performance, financials, market position, or any other relevant metrics
• Conclusion: The conclusion section provides a summary of the main findings and insights from the analysis.
• References: This section lists the sources and references cited throughout the company analysis report

Limited data availability, biased information, complex market dynamics, and accurate forecasting of future trends.

The factors considered in company analysis include financial performance, market positioning, industry trends, management competence, competitive landscape, growth strategies, risk factors, stakeholder analysis, customer segmentation, regulatory factors, and the company's strategic initiatives.

To make informed investment decisions, evaluate partnerships, negotiate contracts, and develop strategic plans aligned with company goals.

Investors, financial analysts, potential partners, and stakeholders seeking insights into a company's viability and potential.

Mansoor Mohammed

Mansoor Mohammed is a dynamic and energetic Enterprise Agile Coach, P3M & PMO Consultant, Trainer, Mentor, and Practitioner with over 20 years of experience in Strategy Execution and Business Agility. With a background in Avionics, Financial Services, Banking, Telecommunications, Retail, and Digital, Mansoor has led global infrastructure and software development teams, launched innovative products, and enabled Organizational Change Management. As a results-driven leader, he excels in collaborating, adapting, and driving partnerships with stakeholders at all levels. With expertise in Change Management, Transformation, Lean, Agile, and Organizational Design, Mansoor is passionate about aligning strategic goals and delivering creative solutions for successful business outcomes. Connect with him to explore change, Agile Governance, implementation delivery, and the future of work.

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How to Write a Business Analysis Report [Examples and Templates]

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Business analysis reports are a lot like preparing a delicious meal.

Sometimes, the recipe is simple enough that you only need to use the basic ingredients. Other times, you will have to follow specific instructions to ensure those tasty delicacies turn out just right.

Want to make sure your business report never turns out like a chewy piece of meat? You’ve come to the right place.

Stay tuned until the end of this blog post, and we promise you won’t be hungry… for business knowledge!

What Is a Business Analysis Report?

Why is analytical reporting important, what should be included in a business analysis report, how do you write a business analysis report, business data analysis report examples and templates.

• Improve Business Reporting with Databox

A business analysis report provides information about the current situation of your company. This report is usually created by the management to help in the decision-making process and is usually used by other departments within a company.

Business analysis reports can either focus your research on the effectiveness of an existing business process or a proposed new process. Besides, an effective business analysis report should also assess the results to determine if the process changes had a positive or negative effect on the company’s goals. In fact, according to Databox’s State of business reporting , an overwhelming majority of companies said that reporting improved their performance.

Analytical reports are the bridge that connects your company to an effective, data-driven business intelligence strategy . By leveraging analytical reports , you can make informed decisions about your organization’s most critical issues. You will no longer need to rely on gut instinct or anecdotal evidence when assessing risks, threats, and opportunities. Instead, you will have access to a wealth of reliable data to inform your decisions.

Here are some essential benefits of analytical reporting:

• Improve communication and foster collaboration – The most obvious benefit of business analysis report writing is an improvement in communication between all stakeholders involved in the project. Also, analytical business reports can help you to generate more trust and foster better collaboration among your employees and colleagues. By using data analytics reporting tools , you will be able to monitor your employees’ performance on a day-to-day basis. This will allow you to hold them accountable for their actions and give them greater freedom within the business as they know that their superiors have faith in their decision-making capabilities.
• Increase productivity – Without this level of shared insight, businesses struggle to stay on top of their most important tasks and can become less efficient. An effective analytical business report provides the information needed for more efficient internal processes and helps you find more time for strategic activities such as improving your business strategy or working on long-term goals .
• Innovation – In today’s digital age, the pressure to innovate was never greater. When consumers basically have everything they want at their fingertips, stepping up to the plate with a new and improved product or service has never been more important. With an accessible dashboard in place, you will be able to create data-driven narratives for each of your business’ critical functions. For example, if you are a software company, you can use the insights gained from report analysis done with your dashboard software to tailor your product development efforts to the actual needs of your customers. By doing so, you will be able to develop products that are better tailored to specific customer groups. You can also use the same information for developing new marketing strategies and campaigns.
• Continuous business evolution – When it comes to digital businesses, data is everything. No model lasts forever, so having access to a business dashboard software that allows you to constantly keep tabs on your business’ performance will help you refine it as time goes on. If there are any glitches in your business model, or if something isn’t panning out as expected, the insight offered by a business analysis report can help you improve upon what works while scrapping what doesn’t.

A business analysis report has several components that need to be included to give a thorough description of the topic at hand. The structure and length of business analysis reports can vary depending on the needs of the project or task.

They can be broken down into different sections that include an:

• Executive summary
• Study introduction
• Methodology
• Review of statistics

Reports of this nature may also include case studies or examples in their discussion section.

A report can be written in a formal or informal tone, depending on the audience and purpose of the document. While a formal tone is best for executives , an informal tone is more appropriate for technical audiences . It is also a good idea to use something like an executive summary template to report on the results repeatedly with ease.

A good business analysis report is detailed and provides recommendations in the form of actionable steps. Here we have listed some simple steps that you need to follow to write a good business analysis report. Report writing is a major part of the business analysis process. In this section, you will learn how to write a report for your company:

Preparation

Presentation.

Obtain an overview of what you want to analyze in the business report . For example, if you are writing a business analysis report on how to improve customer service at an insurance company, you will want to look through all the customer service processes to determine where the problems lie. The more prepared you are when starting a project, the easier it will be to get results. Here is what your preparation should look like:

Set your goals

The first step in writing this document is to set your goals . What do you hope to accomplish with this paper? Do you need to assess the company’s finances? Are you looking for ways to make improvements? Or do you have outside investors who want to know if they should buy into the company? Once you know what your goal is, then you can begin setting up your project.

PRO TIP: How Well Are Your Marketing KPIs Performing?

Like most marketers and marketing managers, you want to know how well your efforts are translating into results each month. How much traffic and new contact conversions do you get? How many new contacts do you get from organic sessions? How are your email campaigns performing? How well are your landing pages converting? You might have to scramble to put all of this together in a single report, but now you can have it all at your fingertips in a single Databox dashboard.

Our Marketing Overview Dashboard includes data from Google Analytics 4 and HubSpot Marketing with key performance metrics like:

• Sessions . The number of sessions can tell you how many times people are returning to your website. Obviously, the higher the better.
• New Contacts from Sessions . How well is your campaign driving new contacts and customers?
• Marketing Performance KPIs . Tracking the number of MQLs, SQLs, New Contacts and similar will help you identify how your marketing efforts contribute to sales.
• Email Performance . Measure the success of your email campaigns from HubSpot. Keep an eye on your most important email marketing metrics such as number of sent emails, number of opened emails, open rate, email click-through rate, and more.
• Blog Posts and Landing Pages . How many people have viewed your blog recently? How well are your landing pages performing?

Now you can benefit from the experience of our Google Analytics and HubSpot Marketing experts, who have put together a plug-and-play Databox template that contains all the essential metrics for monitoring your leads. It’s simple to implement and start using as a standalone dashboard or in marketing reports, and best of all, it’s free!

You can easily set it up in just a few clicks – no coding required.

To set up the dashboard, follow these 3 simple steps:

Step 1: Get the template 

Step 2: Connect your HubSpot and Google Analytics 4 accounts with Databox. 

Step 3: Watch your dashboard populate in seconds.

Assess the Company’s Mission

It’s almost impossible to write a business analysis report without access to the company’s mission statement. Even if you don’t plan on using the mission statement as part of your business analysis summary, it can help you understand the company’s culture and goals. Mission statements are typically short and easy to read, but they may not include every area of focus that you want to include in your report.

Thus, it is important to use other sources when possible. For example, if you are writing a business analysis report for a small start-up company that is just beginning to market its product or service, review the company website or talk directly with management to learn what they believe will be most crucial in growing the company from the ground up.

Stakeholder Analysis

Who is your audience? Create the reader’s persona and tailor all information to their perspective. Create a stakeholder map that identifies all the groups, departments, functions, and individuals involved in this project (and any other projects related to this one). Your stakeholder map should include a description of each group’s role.

Review Financial Performance

Review the financing of the business and determine whether there are any potential threats to the company’s ability to meet its future financial obligations. This includes reviewing debt payments and ownership equity compared with other types of financing such as accounts receivable, cash reserves, and working capital. Determine whether there have been any changes in the funding over time, such as an increase in long-term debt or a decrease in owners’ equity.

Apart from reviewing your debt payments and ownership equity with other types of financing, wouldn’t it be great if you could compare your financial performance to companies that are exactly like yours? With Databox, this can be done in less than 3 minutes.

For example, by  joining this benchmark group , you can better understand your gross profit margin performance and see how metrics like income, gross profit, net income, net operating increase, etc compare against businesses like yours.

One piece of data that you would be able to discover is the average gross profit a month for B2B, B2C, SaaS and eCommerce. Knowing that you perform better than the median may help you evaluate your current business strategy and identify the neccessary steps towards improving it.

Instantly and Anonymously Benchmark Your Company’s Performance Against Others Just Like You

If you ever asked yourself:

• How does our marketing stack up against our competitors?
• Are our salespeople as productive as reps from similar companies?
• Are our profit margins as high as our peers?

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When you join Benchmark Groups, you will:

• Get instant, up-to-date data on how your company stacks up against similar companies based on the metrics most important to you. Explore benchmarks for dozens of metrics, built on anonymized data from thousands of companies and get a full 360° view of your company’s KPIs across sales, marketing, finance, and more.
• Understand where your business excels and where you may be falling behind so you can shift to what will make the biggest impact. Leverage industry insights to set more effective, competitive business strategies. Explore where exactly you have room for growth within your business based on objective market data.
• Keep your clients happy by using data to back up your expertise. Show your clients where you’re helping them overperform against similar companies. Use the data to show prospects where they really are… and the potential of where they could be.
• Get a valuable asset for improving yearly and quarterly planning . Get valuable insights into areas that need more work. Gain more context for strategic planning.

The best part?

• Benchmark Groups are free to access.
• The data is 100% anonymized. No other company will be able to see your performance, and you won’t be able to see the performance of individual companies either.

When it comes to showing you how your performance compares to others, here is what it might look like for the metric Average Session Duration:

And here is an example of an open group you could join:

And this is just a fraction of what you’ll get. With Databox Benchmarks, you will need only one spot to see how all of your teams stack up — marketing, sales, customer service, product development, finance, and more. 

• Choose criteria so that the Benchmark is calculated using only companies like yours
• Narrow the benchmark sample using criteria that describe your company
• Display benchmarks right on your Databox dashboards

Sounds like something you want to try out? Join a Databox Benchmark Group today!

Examine the “Four P’s”

“Four P’s” — product , price , place, and promotion . Here’s how they work:

• Product — What is the product? How does it compare with those of competitors? Is it in a position to gain market share?
• Price — What is the price of the product? Is it what customers perceive as a good value?
• Place — Where will the product be sold? Will existing distribution channels suffice or should new channels be considered?
• Promotion — Are there marketing communications efforts already in place or needed to support the product launch or existing products?

Evaluate the Company Structure

A business analysis report examines the structure of a company, including its management, staff, departments, divisions, and supply chain. It also evaluates how well-managed the company is and how efficient its supply chain is. In order to develop a strong strategy, you need to be able to analyze your business structure.

When writing a business analysis report, it’s important to make sure you structure your work properly. You want to impress your readers with a clear and logical layout, so they will be able to see the strengths of your recommendations for improving certain areas of the business. A badly written report can completely ruin an impression, so follow these steps to ensure you get it right the first time.

A typical business analysis report is formatted as a cover page , an executive summary , information sections, and a summary .

• A cover page contains the title and author of the report, the date, a contact person, and reference numbers.
• The information section is backed up by data from the work you’ve done to support your findings, including charts and tables. Also, includes all the information that will help you make decisions about your project. Experience has shown that the use of reputable study materials, such as  StuDocu  and others, might serve you as a great assistant in your findings and project tasks.
• A summary is a short overview of the main points that you’ve made in the report. It should be written so someone who hasn’t read your entire document can understand exactly what you’re saying. Use it to highlight your main recommendations for how to change your project or organization in order to achieve its goals.
• The last section of a business analysis report is a short list of references that include any websites or documents that you used in your research. Be sure to note if you created or modified any of these documents — it’s important to give credit where credit is due.

The Process of Investigation

Explain the problem – Clearly identify the issue and determine who is affected by it. You should include a detailed description of the problem you are analyzing, as well as an in-depth analysis of its components and effects. If you’re analyzing a small issue on a local scale, make sure that your report reflects this scale. That way, if someone else reads your work who had no idea about its context or scope, they would still be able to understand it.

Explain research methods – There are two ways to do this. Firstly, you can list the methods you’ve used in the report to determine your actions’ success and failure. Secondly, you should add one or two new methods to try instead. Always tell readers how you came up with your answer or what data you used for your report. If you simply tell them that the company needs to improve customer service training then they won’t know what kind of data led you to that conclusion. Also, if there were several ways of addressing a problem, discuss each one and why it might not work or why it may not be appropriate for the company at this time.

Analyze data – Analyzing data is an integral part of any business decision, whether it’s related to the costs of manufacturing a product or predicting consumer behavior. Business analysis reports typically focus on one aspect of an organization and break down that aspect into several parts — all of which must be analyzed in order to come to a conclusion about the original topic.

The Outcome of Each Investigation Stage

The recommendations and actions will usually follow from the business objectives not being met. For example, if one of your goals was to decrease costs then your recommendations would include optimization strategies for cost reduction . If you have more than one suggestion you should make a list of the pros and cons of each one. You can make several recommendations in one report if they are related. In addition, make sure that every recommendation has supporting arguments to back them up.

Report Summary

Every business analysis report should start with a summary. It’s the first thing people see and it needs to capture their attention and interest. The report summary can be created in two ways, depending on the nature of the report:

• If the report is a brief one, that simply gives a summary of the findings, then it can be created as part of the executive summary.
• But if it’s a long report, it could be too wordy to summarise. In this case, you can create a more detailed overview that covers all the main aspects of the project from both an internal and external point of view.

Everything comes down to this section. A presentation is designed to inform, persuade and influence decision-makers to take the next action steps.

Sometimes a slide or two can make them change their mind or open new horizons. These days, digital dashboards are becoming increasingly popular when it comes to presenting data in business reports. Dashboards combine different visualizations into one place, allowing users to get an overview of the information they need at a glance rather than searching through a bunch of documents or spreadsheets trying.

Databox offers dynamic and accessible digital dashboards that will help you to convert raw data into a meaningful story. And the best part is that you can do it with a ‘blink of an eye’ even if you don’t have any coding or designs skills. There is also an option of individual report customization so that you can tailor any dashboard to your own needs.

Pre-made dashboard templates can be extremely useful when creating your own business analysis report. While examples serve as inspiration, templates allow you to create reports quickly and easily without having to spend time (and money) developing the underlying data models.

Databox dashboard templates come with some of the most common pre-built metrics and KPIs different types of businesses track across different departments. In order to create powerful business insights within minutes, all you need to do is download any of our free templates and connect your data source — the metrics will populate automatically.

Business Report Examples and Templates

Databox business dashboard examples are simple and powerful tools for tracking your business KPIs and performance. These dashboards can be used by executive teams and managers as well as by senior management, marketing, sales, customer support, IT, accounting, and other departments. If you are new to this kind of reporting, you may not know how to set up a dashboard or what metrics should be displayed on it. This is where a premade template for business dashboards comes in handy.

For example, this Google Ads Report Template is designed to give you a simple way to keep track of your campaigns’ performance over time, and it’s a great resource for anyone who uses Google’s advertising platform, regardless of whether they’re an SMB, an SME or an enterprise.

KPI Report Examples and Templates

KPIs are the foundation of any business analysis, and they can come in a multitude of forms. While we’ve defined KPIs as metrics or measurements that allow you to assess the effectiveness of a given process, department, or team, there are a number of ways to evaluate your KPIs. Through the use of color-coding, user-friendly graphs and charts, and an intuitive layout, your KPIs should be easy for anyone to understand. A good way to do this is by having a dedicated business analyst on your team who can take on the task of gathering data, analyzing it, and presenting it in a way that will drive actionable insights. However, if you don’t have a dedicated analyst or don’t want to spend money on one, you can still create KPI reporting dashboards using free KPI Databox templates and examples .

For example, this Sales Overview template is a great resource for managers who want to get an overview of their sales team’s performance and KPIs. It’s perfect for getting started with business analysis, as it is relatively easy to understand and put together.

Performance Report Examples and Templates

All businesses, regardless of size or industry, need to know how well they are performing in order to make the best decisions for their company and improve overall ROI. A performance dashboard is a strategic tool used to track key metrics across different departments and provide insight into the health of a business. Databox has a collection of 50+ Performance Dashboard Examples and Templates which are available for free download.

For example, if your business is investing a lot into customer support, we recommend tracking your customer service performance with this Helpscout Mailbox Dashboard which will give you insights into conversations, your team’s productivity, customer happiness score, and more.

Executive Report Examples and Templates

An executive dashboard is a visual representation of the current state of a business. The main purpose of an executive dashboard is to enable business leaders to quickly identify opportunities, identify areas for improvement, pinpoint issues, and make data-informed decisions for driving sales growth, new product launches, and overall business growth. When an executive dashboard is fully developed, as one of these 50+ Databox Free Executive Examples and Templates , it offers a single view of the most important metrics for a business at a glance.

For example, you probably have more than one set of financial data tracked using an executive dashboard software : invoices, revenue reports (for accounting), income statements, to mention a few. If you want to view all this data in one convenient place, or even create a custom report that gives you a better picture of your business’s financial health, this Stripe Dashboard Template is a perfect solution for you.

Metrics Report Examples and Templates

Choosing the right metrics for your business dashboard can be crucial to helping you meet your business objectives, evaluate your performance, and get insights into how your business is operating. Metrics dashboards are used by senior management to measure the performance of their company on a day-to-day basis. They are also used by mid-level managers to determine how their teams are performing against individual goals and objectives. Databox provides 50+ Free Metrics Dashboard Examples and Templates that you can use to create your company’s own dashboards. Each is unique and will depend on your business needs.

For example, if you are looking for ways to track the performance of your DevOps team, and get the latest updates on projects quickly – from commits, and repository status, to top contributors to your software development projects, this GitHub Overview Dashboard is for you.

Small Business Report Examples and Templates

A lot of small business owners don’t realize how important it is to have a proper dashboard in place until they actually use one. A dashboard can help you track and compare different metrics, benchmark your performance against industry averages, evaluate the effectiveness of your marketing and sales strategies, track financials, and much more. So if you’re looking for a tool to help you measure and manage your small business’ performance, try some of these 50+ Free Small Business Dashboard Examples and Templates .

For example, this Quickbooks Dashboard template can help you get a clear understanding of your business’s financial performance, ultimately allowing you to make better-informed decisions that will drive growth and profitability.

Agency Report Examples and Templates

Agency dashboards are not a new concept. They have been around for years and are used by companies all over the world. Agency dashboards can be powerful tools for improving your marketing performance, increasing client loyalty, and landing new clients. There is no single correct way to create an agency dashboard. Everyone has their own goals and objectives, which will ultimately determine which data points you choose to include or track using a client dashboard software , but with these Databox 100+ Free Agency Dashboard Examples and Templates you have plenty of options to start with.

For example, you can use this Harvest Clients Time Report to easily see how much time your employees spend working on projects for a particular client, including billable hours and billable amount split by projects.

Better Business Reporting with Databox

Business analysis is all about finding smart ways to evaluate your organization’s performance and future potential. And that’s where Databox comes in.

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Company Analysis Report

You’ve probably heard a ton of people ask about how a particular company “looks” on paper. But what does this statement really mean?

When people talk about how a company looks on paper, they often refer to the financial aspect of the organization itself. This should answer questions in regards to the risks, strengths, and assets faced by the said company. It also provides a clear picture of where the company stands in the market it is in. But for these elements to be discovered, the company must first conduct a simple analysis to understand where it wants to go and how it could get there.

Company Analysis Report Template

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Size: A4, US

B2C Company Analysis Report Example

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BioStock Company Analysis Report Example

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BMW Company Analysis Report Example

Size: 277 KB

Definition of a Company Analysis

A company analysis is a comprehensive study done to get to know a company’s health in a number of areas. This analysis is usually written in a report for business owners, associates, and investors to refer to. There are a variety of ways to do this, depending on the specific areas a company wishes to understand, but a good analysis typically centers on the feasibility and productivity of the company, as well as a general overview of its corporate financial health.

Ultimately, a company analysis is used to illustrate the strengths and weaknesses of a company, along with the direction it is headed.

Think about it this way. It’s almost like a road trip. You can’t get to where you’re going unless you know exactly where you are. You need a map, and several directions and means of transport to get to your destination. Each method has its own share of pros and cons that you’re forced to weigh down carefully. You may also see statement analysis examples .

You would also need to consider various factors like time, money, and efficiency when making stern decisions. An outline on the internal and external factors affecting your journey will allow you to avoid the potholes and detours that may slow you down. Otherwise, you’re bound to get lost along the way, wasting a good amount of resources on a path that’s a lot farther than where you’re supposed to be. You may also like customer analysis examples .

With a company analysis, knowing where you’re starting from enables you to bring your company down a better, brighter road toward success. The general analysis will make it easier for you to determine where the company can go, as well as what it would take to get there.

What Is Included in a Company Analysis?

What’s included in a company analysis would usually depend on the primary objectives of a researcher.

An analysis may be done to look into an organization’s sales potential and accomplishments, or perhaps the information generated from the analysis would be used as an operational or investment tool. It’s also possible for the company to perform a standard SWOT analysis to refine its marketing and sales operations. A company analysis provides executives with an in-depth look into the various areas of the organization that may have been overlooked.

Regardless of its purpose, here are a few things that must be investigated in an established analysis:

1. Financial Status

This is the part where you’re required to dig into some of your most important financial records, such as your balance sheets , income statements , cash flow statements , and shareholders equity statements. This offers you a good picture of how money comes in and out of your reach. These documents are typically compiled for a three-to-five-year period to complete the analysis report.

2. Workflow and Efficiencies

See how your company has been performing over a given time period by looking into the different factors that may affect it, including employee sick time and productivity.

3. External Factors

These are the threats that might be affecting the company’s market performance. Some of the most common threats include the current status of the economy and the number of competitors serving the same audience.

On the other end of the spectrum, a company’s external factors may also refer to the opportunities it has to expand its reach and increase sales. It’s important to consider factors like market and economic trends to find out how the company may prosper in a fast-changing industry You may also see sales analysis examples .

4. Internal Factors

This refers to all the items that a company has control over. Everything from financial funding to investment opportunities are considered, along with the physical resources used by the company.

Keep in mind that your employees, administrative management, marketing campaigns and their allocated budget, and even the software programs used by various departments within the organization can greatly influence where the company currently stands. You may also like market analysis examples .

The Purpose of a Company Analysis

The report produced from a company analysis can be useful in more ways than one. This is often presented to investors or financial organizations hoping to provide the company with its much needed cash flow.

Conducting a company analysis is also a great way to take note of where a company stands before it enters a new phase in its journey. Some companies might even want to diversify its investments or create new portfolios for its own growth and development in the marketplace. You may also check out literary analysis examples .

By understanding its current financial commitments along with a forecast of where it’s headed, the company can make better and more informed decisions. After all, you’ll never how your company is truly performing until you take a good look at its present status. You might be interested in industry analysis examples .

Construction Company Analysis Report Example

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Formal Company Analysis Report Example

Fundamental Company Analysis Report Example

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Professional Company Analysis Report Example

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General Types of Company Analysis

A company analysis offers several different perspectives on how an organization runs. Listed below are some of the most common examples of an organizational analysis , each of which is designed to examine how a certain area is performing and how it may affect the company’s overall operations.

1. Company Financial Analysis

In spite of what anyone says, the whole existence of a business revolves around the money. This is why it’s important for company leaders to know where the business stands from a financial point of view to prevent potential disasters coming down the pipes. The analysis should give the company a clear glimpse of the money coming in, the money going out, and the money on hand. You may also like needs analysis examples .

2. Company SWOT Analysis

A detailed SWOT analysis is done to study the internal and external factors (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) affecting a company’s operations. This includes the organization’s finances, debts, properties, staff, competitors, and the like. This can help the company identify the different areas that need to be addressed accordingly, especially in terms of cutbacks, investments, and potential projects.

3. Company Performance Analysis

Performance indicators may vary depending on the nature of a business, but this generally offers company leaders a good look into which departments are meeting targets, who possesses budget surpluses (if any), and where possible shortfalls are happening. This can help indicate where operations need to be modified using productivity and cost assistance, as well as how profit may be balanced effectively. You may also check out operational analysis examples .

4. Company Productivity Analysis

A productivity analysis report is made to see how a business is getting the most out of its staff. One example for this would be McDonald’s bold move in 2017 to replace cashiers with interactive ordering kiosks.

Besides taking an advanced approach to speed up the business process through the use of technology, this also allowed the company to refocus its staff on quality control and order processing. By replacing manual procedures with automation, the company’s productivity may lead to significant increases in profitability. You might be interested in requirements analysis examples .

In the advent of technology and various software programs utilized in the field of business, several technical and outsourcing solutions prove to be the best options for a company to thrive in a competitive market.

Toyota Motor Corporation Company Analysis Report Example

Cleantech Invest Company Analysis Report Example

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Comparable Company Analysis Report Example

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How to Perform an Effective Company Analysis

There are two ways to start an analysis, either with the use of a template or a special type of software. Noting down your analysis ensures that all company areas are addressed accordingly.

To develop a credible analysis, here are a few guidelines to remember:

1. Determine the type of analysis best suitable for your company.

Select a kind of analysis that best suits your company. This would depend on the scope of the basic analysis and the budget allotted to perform it. For instance, most business intelligence systems come with a hefty price tag, which makes them impractical for businesses that haven’t been operating for too long.

Companies with sophisticated technology integrated into their daily processes often cover larger areas compared to those who apply manual methods—and for obvious reasons.

Simply put, it is necessary for a large corporation to use a fancy business intelligence software to conduct an accurate and efficient analysis on their company. A simple business such as a hair salon or convenience store, on the other hand, may not require a lavish software system to obtain an effective company analysis. You may also see financial analysis examples .

2. Study different analysis methods.

It’s impossible to perform a successful company analysis with little or no knowledge on what to expect from it. Generally, a thorough evaluation of your company should answer what is being done right or wrong based on a specified time period. You may also like regression analysis examples .

Keep in mind that there are different analysis methods designed for financials, marketing, human resources, and others. You can’t do a human resources analysis if you’re a solo entrepreneur, simply because there aren’t any employees to evaluate in the first place. That being said, be sure to understand the different analysis methods before you begin with the first step of the desired process.

3. Choose a method and implement it.

Once you have done your research, you can now implement the selected method. Here, you need to make sure to cover the internal and external factors that impact the business. If you’re doing a company analysis through a software application, percentages and diagrams will be shown to highlight the areas that require improvement. You might be interested in feasibility analysis examples .

But if you’re using a template to complete the analysis, you need to think critically about the competitive circumstances affecting the entire business. Take note that the manual approach does require you to work carefully to ensure that every vital aspect of the business is covered as planned. You may also see fault tree analysis examples .

4. Use statistics to prove your claims.

One of the best ways to generate a reliable analysis is to use statistics to support your findings. Quantitative data can offer an incredible amount of help in solidifying your analysis report. This is usually achieved through direct contact with your target audience. You may also like financial health analysis examples .

Say for example, count the number of people who enter your store but leave without buying anything. You can find out the reason for such behavior by using a survey questionnaire . You can then use this feedback to gain a deeper understanding about what runs through the minds of an average consumer. There are many ways to process and present this data, but it’s best to stick with graphs and tables for a more accurate visual illustration.

5. Evaluate results and make the necessary adjustments.

Review the results from your analysis. Look for weaknesses or areas that require improvement and take the necessary actions to correct them. You can use this analysis to conclude issues and problems present within the organization, and identify possible solutions to address them. You may also check out process analysis examples .

Given how an analysis provides a snapshot of the company during a particular time, it’s important to pay attention to the entire process to figure out the best method for enhancing the company internally and externally.

A company analysis refers to the fundamental assessment of an organization in which company leaders are tasked to analyze the overall profile, security, profitability, goals, and values of a company.

Knowing where the company is starting from and what it’s got to work with in order to accomplish its goals and objectives will contribute greatly to the entity’s growth. Because of this, it’s important for managers and analysts to conduct a thorough analysis on the company’s internal and external components. So if you find yourself in need of a company analysis, make sure to refer to our guidelines and templates for successful evaluation.

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How to Write a Business Analysis Report

So your boss (or client) has asked you to do a full review of a business area before presenting your findings and recommendations?

You’ve completed your investigation and now need to present your findings and recommendations to your stakeholders.

If that sounds like you, then this is the post for you.

Because today I’m telling you everything you need to know about writing your Business Analysis report.

Including how to CHANGE your presentation or documentation structure depending on your stakeholders.

Giving you ideas on how to present your recommendations so they ALWAYS get accepted.

Start with the end in mind – What are you trying to say in your BA Report?

This is KEY.

A strong Business Analyst will be thinking about their solution recommendations from the very beginning and right throughout any project.

And if your investigation is conducted thoroughly, it won’t be difficult to form an opinion on the best way for the business to move forward effectively.

If you’ve studied business you will know this already, but it’s true for BA’s as well.

So here’s what I would do:

When I get allocated a project, I tend to set up my final presentation meetings at the start of the project.

The benefit:

• I have a clear deadline, which increases my productivity.
• I am able to secure the diaries of extremely busy people – especially managers
• Sometimes I am able to get a whole team into one session because the manager is able to prepare.

By starting with the end in mind, you will have a clear idea of what you want to get out of the presentation.

Sometimes I even go to the extremes of writing down my recommendations FIRST and working backwards from there.

Who are you writing your Business Analysis Report for?

If you’re at the start of the project you need to do your stakeholder analysis.

If you’re presenting and haven’t done one yet – DO IT NOW

Use my article Stakeholder Mapping Tool – How to engage 15 business areas  so you can be sure you’ve done it right.

Why should you do one of these?

The main reason is because it will help you identify who are the powerful people that you need to convince

Who are the most project interested people that you need to convince of your findings.

The general rule of thumb:

Powerful people are usually high up and don’t need to hear about the detail of the current issues. No! They want to hear what they need to do to make the company better. So in this situation make sure your focus is mainly on the recommendations and NOT the problems.

Less powerful people that are interested tend to be the team members that your future changes will impact.

SO… in this scenario, they probably want to see if you agree with what they think or know is the problem. Most of the time the problems will have come from those SMEs during the investigation.

So it’s a great opportunity to make them feel listened to by spending a bit more time going through and discussing their problems.

Whether it’s a document or a presentation

You need to bear these people in mind and present your business analysis report in the right way depending who you are presenting to.

HOW will you deliver your business analysis report?

If you’re at the start of the project. Now is a good time to decide how you will present your findings and recommendations to your stakeholders.

Usually one of the below

• In a document
• A Presentation
• Both documentat and presentation

Build up your recommendations throughout the presentations

Have you heard the saying?

• Tell them what you’re going to say
• Then tell them what you said.

That’s the 3 step process to a high impact presentation. And it’s exactly what you should be doing with your findings and recommendations.

How to structure your report

The structure of your report could be the ultimate reason as to why the people you need to convince will take your recommendations.

So here’s the key areas to consider

1.      The intro

Start with a bang.

Explain the background of the project.

For a document report:

You may wish to use BOSCARD (read my BOSCARD article if your response to that is – WHAT?). That’s where you’re terms of reference from the beginning of the project will come in

Make sure you keep it short and sweet. Ask yourself ‘Would I continue reading if I read this intro?”

For a presentation

DON’T use BOSCARD in its entirety.

DO NOT go over more than one page.

Don’t write down in detail on the presentation.

Put bullet points for the project reasons and why you’re standing here today.

2.      Report The approach

You need to get this bit absolutely spot on.

Because there’s a fine line between being BORING and being INFORMATIVE.

Ask yourself – “why am I telling them my approach?”

Well the reason is so that you can get them to understand how you came to your recommendations.

Don’t go to the nth degree of detail – especially if you’re presenting to highly powerful stakeholders just a simple explanation of the steps you took throughout the project.

So what did you do during the project?

Voice of the Employee? To obtain feedback from those that KNOW.

Statistical Analysis? To ensure findings are accurate and logical.

Process Mapping? To gain an understanding.

List the tools AND explain why they are beneficial.

3.      Report the outcome of each technique used

This is where you can begin to slot in your recommendations slowly in order to gauge an early response.

The outcome of each technique you used to gather information will allow you to show in a bit more detail why you are making these recommendations.

DON’T go through your process maps in minute detail.

DO pick out the important aspects of the process map. Remember this isn’t an opportunity to verify that your process knowledge is accurate. You should have already done that. It’s an opportunity to make people aware that you can spot problems within a process.

Use the 7 wastes TIMWOOD rule when reviewing your processes and use these as examples to highlight any issues.

If you undertook feedback workshops with SME’s, it’s always a good idea to explain the outcomes and ‘blue sky ideas’ from those workshops.

DON’T say WHO gave the ideas – you don’t need to.

Because you don’t know how each of your stakeholders respect each other’s ideas and if one person doesn’t respect another (trust me it happens), you may have lost them before the improvements have even begun.

Instead focus on the ‘why an idea is worth implementing’ .

4.      Summarise your findings

There’s 2 opportunities here:

The first is the ability to win round the employees who will be affected by your recommendations.

The second is make business leaders accept the recommendations by the impact of the issues you describe here in your findings.

Keep them short but solid.

And use figures! Nothing tells a better story than the impact of space, time and money. Especially to leaders.

5.      Summarise your recommendations

When writing your summary recommendations, make sure you categorise them.

A good categorisation is by People, Process and System

That way you can clearly explain whether it’s a culture issue or a technology issue.

Remember Culture issues can be very difficult to fix but if done right and fast can be a whole lot cheaper than implementing a system that may not even fix the issue.

You should have already won round your audience by this point.

So all you are trying to do is to tell them what you’ve been telling them for the last hour.

If you’re having difficulty wording your recommendations, download my Business Analyst Report for some inspiration.

6 thoughts on “ How to Write a Business Analysis Report ”

What kind of format can I use to write a business analysis report.

A Powerpoint Presentation is always a good choice of formatting.

I am struggling with my document to present my findings and recommendations especially with space time and money. Do you perhaps have a template for this?

I have lots of templates here. Hopefully one will help https://www.ba-guru.com/72-business-analysis-templates

Hi, I wonder if you can share some templates for BA report.

hello, thanks for the information shared. i would apprecaite if you send a sample or template of business analysis report

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What Are Business Reports & Why They Are Important: Examples & Templates

Table of Contents

1) What Is A Business Report?

2) Types Of Business Reports

3) Business Reports Examples & Samples

4) Why Do You Need Business Reports?

5) How To Setup A Business Report?

6) Challenges Of Business Reports

In your daily operations, you likely notice your processes and ‘activities’ constantly changing – sales trends and volume, marketing performance metrics, warehouse operational shifts, or inventory management changes, among many others.

All these little alterations in your organizational activities are impacting the global well-being of your company, your warehouse, your restaurant, or even your healthcare facility. Whether you manage a big or small company, business reports must be incorporated to establish goals, track operations, and strategy to get an in-depth view of the overall company state.

But with so much information being collected daily from every department, static business reports created manually will not give your company the fresh insights it needs to stay competitive. Businesses that want to succeed in today’s crowded market need to leverage the power of their insights in an accessible and efficient way. This is where modern business reports created with interactive data visualizations come to the rescue. 

Traditional means of reporting are tedious and time-consuming. Due to how the human brain processes information, presenting insights in charts or graphs to visualize significant amounts of complex information is more accessible and intuitive.  Thanks to modern, user-friendly online data analysis tools armed with powerful visualizations, companies can benefit from interactive reports that are accessible and understandable for everyone without needing prior technical skills.

Here, we take the time to define a business report, explore visual report examples, and look at how to create them for various needs, goals, and objectives. In the process, we will use online data visualization software to interact with and drill deeper into bits and pieces of relevant data. Let's get started.

What Is A Business Report?

A business report is a tool that helps collect and analyze historical and current data from a company’s operations, production, and more. Through various types of business reports, organizations make critical decisions to ensure growth and operational efficiency.

To understand the best uses for these reports, it’s essential to properly define them. According to authors Lesikar and Pettit, “A corporate-style report is an orderly, objective communication of factual information that serves some organizational purpose”. It organizes information for a specific business purpose. While some reports will go into a more detailed approach to analyzing the functionality and strategies of a department, other examples of business reports will be more concentrated on the bigger picture of organizational management, for example, investor relations. That’s where the magic of these kinds of reports truly shines: no matter for which company goal you need, their usage can be various and, at the same time, practical.

Traditional business reports are often static and text reach (bullet points, headings, subheadings, etc.). Classically formatted in sections such as the summary, table of contents, introduction, body, and conclusion, this report format is no longer the most efficient when it comes to extracting the needed insights to succeed in this fast-paced world. On one hand, by the time these reports have been finished, the insights included within them might not be useful anymore. On the other hand, the fact that it is mostly text and numbers makes them hard to understand, making the analysis strategy segregated and inefficient.  

The visual nature of modern business dashboards leaves all the aforementioned issues in the past. Thanks to interactive data visualizations and modern business intelligence solutions , the analysis sequence can be done fast and efficiently while empowering non-technical users to rely on digital insights for their decision-making process. 

Your Chance: Want to test professional business reporting software? Explore our 14-day free trial. Benefit from great business reports today!

Types Of Business Reports?

Before creating your business outcome reports, it is important to consider your core goals and objectives. This way, you can pick the correct type of report for each situation. Here, we present you with five common types of visual reports that you can use for different analytical purposes. 

1. Analytical reports

Analytical reports are reporting tools that use qualitative and quantitative data to analyze the performance of a business strategy or as support when a company needs to make important decisions. A modern analytical dashboard created with top reporting software can include statistics, historical data, as well as forecasts, and real-time information. Let’s look into it with a sales example. 

**click to enlarge**

This visually appealing business analysis report contains relevant sales KPIs to measure performance, such as the average revenue per unit, the customer lifetime value, acquisition costs, and some sales targets to be met. The value of this analytical report lies in the fact that you get a lot of relevant metrics in a single dashboard. The data can be filtered and explored on different time frames such as daily, weekly, monthly, or quarterly, depending on the discussion that it needs to support.   

With this kind of sample in hand, managers can quickly understand if they are meeting their targets, find improvement opportunities, get a bigger picture of their sales, and find efficient ways to proceed with new strategies.  

2. Research reports

Next in our types of business reports that we will discuss is a research report. Companies often use these kinds of reports to test the viability of a new product, study a new geographical area to sell, or understand their customer’s perception of their brand image. To generate this type of report, managers often contact market research agencies to gather all the relevant information related to the studied topic. This brand analysis dashboard is a great example.

The image above is a business report template of a brand analysis. Here, we can see the results of a survey that was conducted to understand the brand’s public perception on different topics. The value of this market research dashboard lies in its interactivity. Often, research reports are depicted in long and static PowerPoint presentations. With a modern market research dashboard like this one, all the info can be filtered upon need, and the whole presentation of results can be done on one screen. For example, if you want to know the brand awareness of a particular region or age group, you just have to click on the graphs, and the entire dashboard will be filtered based on this information. Like this, the analysis sequence is fast, interactive, and efficient. 

3. Industry reports

Following on from the research topic, our next type is an industry report. Benchmarks and targets are excellent ways to measure a company’s performance and success. But, these targets need to be based on realistic values, especially considering how crowded and competitive today’s markets are. For this purpose, companies perform industry reports. By getting a clear picture of the average industry numbers, such as the competitive landscape, industry size, economic indicators, and trends, they can plan smart strategies and create realistic targets for performance. 

Let's take this industry report by Technavio about the Global Ice Cream Market as an example. Here, we can see relevant numbers concerning the ice cream market, how COVID-19 impacted it, and what is expected to happen between the years 2020-2024. For example, the business report sample shows that the pandemic has positively impacted the ice cream market and that it grew 4.33% during 2020. The report also shows that there is increasing popularity of plant-based ice cream and that this trend is driving market growth. This is invaluable information for an ice cream company as they can invest in new products with almost certain success.

4. Progress reports

Next, we have progress reports. Unlike our other examples, this type of business report is not necessarily based on deep research or advanced analytics but rather on delivering a clear picture of the performance of a particular area or business goal. Their visual nature makes them the perfect tool to support meetings or business discussions as they provide a glance into the status of different metrics. A common use of progress reports is with KPI scorecards . Let’s look at an example. 

The image above is a business report example of a balanced scorecard. The goal here is to quickly understand the development of metrics related to 4 key business areas: financial, customers, learning and growth, and internal objectives. Each of these metrics is displayed in a current value and compared to a set target. Paired with this, the template has five colors for the performance status. This allows anyone who uses this report to quickly understand just by looking at the colors if the target is being met.

5. By business function

Getting a bigger picture of a company’s performance is a great benefit of the best business reports. But, apart from helping the company as a whole, the real value of these reports lies in the fact that they empower departments to leverage the power of data analysis for their decision-making process. Instead of the sales department, human resources, or logistics, your entire organization will be data-driven. Let’s look at it with a business report example by function on marketing.  

Created with modern marketing dashboard software , this example entirely focuses on the development of marketing campaigns.  With metrics such as the total number of impressions, clicks, acquisitions, and cost per acquisition being depicted on intuitive gauge charts, you quickly get a clear understanding of the performance of your campaigns. Through this, you can spot any inefficiencies before they become bigger issues and find improvement opportunities to ensure your marketing efforts are paying off. If you want to dig even deeper, this interactive business report can be filtered for specific campaigns so you only see related insights, making this dashboard the perfect tool to support team meetings. 

Business Report Examples And Templates

We’ve answered the question, ‘What is a business report?’ and now, it’s time to look at some real-world examples.

The examples of business reports that we included in this article can be utilized in many different industries; the data can be customized based on the factual information of the specific department, organization, company, or enterprise. Interdepartmental communication can then effectively utilize findings, and the content can be shared with key stakeholders.

Now that we know what they are, let's go over some concrete, real-world instances of visuals you will need to include in your reports.

1. Visual financial business report example

This first example focuses on one of the most vital and data-driven departments of any company: finance. It gathers the most essential financial KPIs a manager needs to have at his fingertips to make an informed decision: gross profit margin, operational expenses ratio (OPEX), both earning before interests (EBIT) and net profit margins, and the income statement. Next to these are the revenue evolution over a year compared to its target predefined, the annual evolution of operational expenses for various internal departments as well as the evolution of the EBIT compared to its target.

The different sets of visual representations of data can clearly point out particular trends or actions that need to be taken to stay on the financial track of a company. All your financial analysis can be integrated into a single visual. When the presentation becomes interactive, clicks will provide even deeper insights into your financial KPIs and the desired outcomes to make a company healthy in its financial operations. The importance of this finance dashboard lies in the fact that every finance manager can easily track and measure the whole financial overview of a specific company while gaining insights into the most valuable KPIs and metrics. Empowering a steadfast and operation-sensitive plan is among the most important goals a company can have, and finance is right in the middle of this process.

Thanks to all this information displayed on a single dashboard, your report is greatly enhanced and backed with accurate information for you to make sound decisions. It becomes easier to implement a solid and operation-sensitive management plan.

2. Visual investor's business report layout

As mentioned earlier, holding an account of your activity, performance, and organization’s assets is important for people outside of the company to understand how it works. When these people are investors, it is all the more critical to have a clean and up-to-date report for them to know how successful is the company they invest in and for you to increase your chances of having more funds. This example provides just that: an exact overview of the most important insights and specific values in a particular time frame.

Calculating and communicating KPIs about the overall company situation is what this investors’ relationship dashboard tries to focus on. You learn about the return on equity and return on asset, the debt-equity ratio, and the working capital ratio, but also see the evolution of a share price over time. Each of these metrics is crucial for a potential shareholder, and if they are not monitored regularly and kept under control, it is easy to lose investors’ interest. Tracking them and visualizing them through a modern dashboard is a competitive advantage for your investors’ reports. You can even see on this visual a clear set of data, so you don’t have to dig through numerous amounts of spreadsheets, but clearly see the specific development over time, the percentage gained or lost, ratios, and returns on investments. Not to be limited just to these data, you can always customize and make sample business reports for your specific needs.

3. Visual management report example

The management KPIs presented below focus on the revenue and customer overview seen through a specified quarter of a year. With just a click, you can easily change your specific date range and make an overview of different months or years.

When analyzing insights on a more specific level, you can easily spot if the revenue is approaching your target value, compare it to the previous year, and see how much of the target you still need to work on. The average number of your revenue per customer compared to your targets can also identify on a more specific level how much you need to adjust your strategy based on your customers’ value. If you see your values have exceeded your goals, you can concentrate on KPIs that haven’t yet reached your target achievement. In this specific example, we have gained insights into how to present your management data, compare them, and evaluate your findings to make better decisions.

This clear overview of data can set apart the success of your management strategy since it is impossible to omit vital information. By gathering all your findings into a single CEO dashboard , the information presented is clear and specific to the management’s needs. The best part of this example report is seen through its interactivity: the more you click, the more data you can present, and the more specific conclusions you can look for.

These report templates that we have analyzed and presented in this article can be a roadmap to effectively create your own report or customize your data to tailor your needs and findings.

4. SaaS management dashboard

The next in our rundown of dynamic business report examples comes from our specialized SaaS metrics dashboard .

A SaaS company report example that packs a real informational punch, this particular report format offers a panoramic snapshot of the insights and information every ambitious software-as-a-service business needs to succeed.

With visual KPIs that include customer acquisition costs, customer lifetime value, MMR, and APRU, here, you will find everything you need to streamline your company’s initiatives at a glance. This is an essential tool for both short- and long-term evolution.

5. Sales KPI dashboard

Niche or sector aside, this most powerful of online business reports samples will empower your sales team to improve productivity while increasing revenue on a sustainable basis.

A powerful daily business activity report as well as a tool for long-term growth, our sales dashboard boasts a cohesive mix of visualizations built to boost your business's bottom line.

With centralized access to sales graphs and charts based on churn rates, revenue per sales rep, upselling & cross-selling, and more, this is a company report format that will help you push yourself ahead of the pack (and stay there). It’s a must-have tool for any modern sales team.

6. Retail store dashboard company report example

Retail is another sector that pays to utilize your data to its full advantage. Whatever branch of retail you work in, knowing how to generate a report is crucial, as is knowing which types of reports to work with.

Our interactive retail dashboard is one of our finest visual report examples, as it offers a digestible window of insight into the retail-centric unit as well as transaction-based information that can help you reduce costs while boosting your sales figures over time.

Ideal for target setting and benchmarking as well as strategy formulation, this is an unrivaled tool for any retailer navigating their activities in our fast-paced digital age. If you’re a retailer looking for steady, positive growth, squeezing every last drop of value from your retail metrics is essential—and this dashboard will get you there.

7. Customer service team dashboard

As a key aspect of any successful organizational strategy, optimizing your customer service communications across channels is essential. That’s where our customer service analytics report comes into play.  

Making your customer service efforts more efficient, effective, and responsive will not only drastically improve your consumer loyalty rates but also set you apart from your competitors.

One of the best ways to achieve a mean, lean, well-oiled consumer-facing machine is by giving your customer service representatives the tools to perform to the best of their abilities at all times. Armed with a balanced mix of KPIs to track and enhance service performance, this most powerful of business report samples will help you drive down response times while improving your first call resolution rates. It’s a combination that will result in ongoing growth and success.

8. Employee performance dashboard

In addition to your customers, your employees are the beating heart of your organization. Our employee dashboard will give you the power to track the ongoing value and productivity of your internal talent.

An ideal formal business report example for any modern HR department, this telling dashboard will give you deep insight into how your employees perform and behave over specific timeframes.

Here, you can examine trends in absenteeism rates, track overtime hours by age group, monitor your training costs, and explore peaks and troughs in productivity across the entire workforce. This melting pot of at-a-glance information will empower you to provide training exactly where it’s needed and get to the heart of any issue that’s affecting productivity or engagement levels. 

Working with this business report format example consistently will ultimately ensure you get the very best return on investment (ROI) from your internal talent.

9. Marketing KPI dashboard

Without a solid multichannel marketing strategy, it’s unlikely that you’ll ever see a consistently healthy ROI from your promotional efforts. Shooting in the dark regarding marketing will also see you fall behind the competition. Enter our marketing dashboard .

This business report format template brimming with insight, lets you set accurate performance benchmarks while uncovering a wealth of insight from one intuitive dashboard.

To optimize your promotional campaigns and activities, talking to specific audience segments and using the right touchpoints at precisely the right time is essential. Without a targeted approach, all you’re doing is throwing your time and money away.

This effective company report example offers a balanced overview of your campaigns’ performance by offering the tools to dig deep into vital metrics like cost per acquisition (CPA), customer lifetime value (CLTV), and ROI.

This perfect storm of metrics will show you where your communications or campaigns are failing to drive engagement and where they’re yielding positive results. Armed with this critical information, you can optimize all of your efforts to make the biggest possible impact across channels. An essential report design for any modern organization looking to scale swiftly and consistently.

10. Warehouse KPI dashboard

Being a warehouse manager or decision-maker is a high-pressure job where every decision counts. To keep your fulfillment activities and initiatives fluid, functional, and primed for organizational growth, sweating your data correctly is a must.

Our warehouse KPI dashboard is a business report sample that aids both real-time decision-making and longer-term strategic planning.

With a powerful selection of logistics-based KPIs, this highly visual business report structure features metrics based on on-time shipment rates, a breakdown of warehouse costs, the number of shipments made over a specified timeframe, and a perfect order rate.

By making this kind of business reports formats a core part of your daily operations, you can eliminate unnecessary costs or activities while boosting overall productivity and significantly improving the success, as well as accuracy, of your warehouse operations. It is an invaluable tool that will help consistently deliver on your fulfillment promises, improving your brand reputation in the process.

11. Cybersecurity dashboard

In our hyper-connected digital age, failing to invest in adequate cybersecurity solutions is the same as leaving your front door wide open when you’re on holiday.

To avoid the devastating impact of organizational cyber attacks or informational breaches,  our cyber security IT dashboard will ensure your company is fortified from every angle. This most vital of business report examples will help you fend off any prospective acts of cybercrime while monitoring for any attacks or abnormalities in real-time.

Here, you can keep on top of your cybersecurity rating, track your phishing test success rates, understand how long it takes you to identify an attack (and improve your responsivity), look at how often you backup your company's sensitive information, and discover the most common intrusion rates related to your company from a cohesive space. It’s an essential analysis tool designed to keep your company safe, secure, and happy.

12. CEO dashboard

The CEO is the highest leadership position in an organization. As such, they need to get a complete overview of the entire operations and performance to ensure everything is running smoothly and on track to meet expected goals. Our next example is a scorecard report tracking relevant metrics related to finances, marketing, customer service, and human resources. 

What makes this template so valuable for the CEO is the fact that it offers a long-term view with benchmarks for quarterly and annual performance. This way, leadership can evaluate the development of the different strategies and spot any inefficiencies at a glance by looking at the green or red colors depicted on each KPI. Plus, each section of the scorecard offers a detailed breakdown of additional information to help dive deeper into the reasons behind a specific result. 

For instance, we can see that there is an increase in the total expenses in the current quarter. However, when taking a deeper look at the yearly breakdown, we can see that the operating expenses ratio has been decreasing for the past three months. Therefore, the quarterly increase is nothing to worry about.

13. Manufacturing production dashboard 

As a production company, you must ensure every aspect of the process is efficiently carried out at its maximum capacity. This means, ensuring machines are working properly, the right amounts of products are being produced, and the least amount are being returned by customers. Our next template aims to help with that task by offering a 360-degree view into a company’s production processes.

With insights into production volume vs. quantity ordered, top 5 machines by production volume, and return items by reason, the manufacturing manager can spot inefficiencies and identify trends to optimize production and ensure the highest possible ROI. 

For example, looking at the top machines by production can help you spot the ones that might need some maintenance and plan that maintenance time without affecting production. On the other hand, analyzing the returned items by reason can also help improve customer experience and satisfaction. If you see a large amount of returns due to a broken product, it means you need to improve the quality of your materials or the packaging when they are sent to the customer to keep it safer. 

14. IT project management dashboard

Completing a project successfully relies heavily on the team being connected to keep tasks moving at the expected speed. The issue is that it often involves multiple meetings that end up taking a lot of time that could be implemented actually completing the tasks. Our next sample aims to tackle that issue by providing a real-time overview of project development metrics.

At the top of the report, we see a breakdown of the different stages of the project with a development percentage and a projected launch date. This is great information to have as it can inform the team about the status of the entire project and any external stakeholders as well.

We then get insights into the project budget, overdue tasks, upcoming deadlines, and employee workload. This is invaluable information that can help optimize any bottlenecks and increase overall efficiency. For instance, we can see that Georg and Nancy are 10+ days overdue with their tasks which is not good for the project. However, a deeper look shows us that these two employees are the ones with the biggest workload, which means they might need some help from other team members to speed up their tasks.

15. HR diversity dashboard 

Diversity in the workplace has become a big priority for organizations and prospective talents. Each year, more and more businesses realize the value of having employees from different backgrounds and cultures as a way to boost their strategies and overall growth. That being said, to be considered a diverse company, you need to ensure your workforce feels comfortable and that the same opportunities are being given to all. Enters our last business report template.

The template above offers a view into different diversity management metrics from recruitment to talent management. Through this insightful report, HR managers can test the success of their diversity strategies and spot any areas of improvement to ensure the highest level of employee satisfaction. The template is highly interactive and offers insights into diversity by gender, ethnicity, and disabilities.

Analyzing the content of the report, we can see that black employees are the ones with the highest voluntary turnover rate. This is something that needs to be looked into to find the reasons why these employees are not feeling comfortable at the company. On the other hand, we can see that the organization is 1% above the 2% industry standard for hiring employees with disabilities. This is a great indicator, and it can translate into a low 7% of voluntary leaves by these workers.

Now that we’ve looked at report samples, let’s consider the clear-cut business-boosting benefits of these essential analytical tools. These perks will make your company stronger, more fluent, and more efficient on a sustainable basis.

Why Do You Need Business Reports?

These reports also enable data collection by documenting the progress you make. Through them, you have the means to compare different periods and activity, growth, etc. You can better see which products or services are more successful than others, which marketing campaign outperforms which other, and which markets or segments require more attention. Collecting all this data is indispensable – and by doing so, you build a paper trail of your past (or, namely, a data trail). They let people outside the company (like banks or investors) know about your activity and performance and enable stakeholders to understand your organization’s tangible and intangible assets.

• Risk assessment & opportunity: With a business report, you can increase the understanding of risks and opportunities within your company . Sample reports accentuate the link between financial and non-financial performance: they streamline processes, reduce costs, and improve overall cohesion in an informed, commercially ‘safe’ way.
• Trends & connections: Business report samples can help you compare your performance to other internal units or companies in the same sector. On a more specific level, a report template can help you dig thoroughly into operational metrics and details and discover correlations that would be otherwise overlooked. In today’s hyper-connected digital age, gaining a deeper insight into your data will empower you to formulate strategies that will accelerate key areas of your business growth through trend identification. This fact alone highlights the importance of a business analysis report.
• Business intelligence (BI): If used correctly, the best BI tools will answer a vital question: ‘Will I survive on the market?’ By creating a business report of a company built to improve your BI activities and answer essential organizational questions, you will gain the ability to tackle deeper specific insights that can bring operational value and control the overall expenditures. By knowing how to set up such a report with specific samples and templates, you can provide building blocks to establish a successful business intelligence strategy.
• Buy-in: While there are many different types of business reports for a company, they all have one common trait: gathering data and tracking the business activities related to something specific. By working with the right reports, users can perform in-depth visual analyses of many key areas or functions and provide informed recommendations that will ultimately improve efficiency and encourage innovation. Regardless of how good or beneficial an idea might be , getting buy-in from senior executives or external partners is often a major roadblock to progress. However, a good report template presents a level of depth and presentation that is both factual and convincing and will encourage buy-in from the people with the power to sign off on new strategies, initiatives, or ideas.
• Operational efficiency: The more factual the report is, the clearer the data. When your data is well organized and crystal clear, it’s possible to interpret your business activities cost-effectively, reducing the time required to analyze findings while saving countless working hours sifting through metrics for actionable insights. A good template presents an in-depth analysis where the writers show how they have interpreted their findings. For example, a marketing report can reduce the time needed to analyze a specific campaign, while an HR report can provide insights into the recruiting process and evaluate, for example, why the cost per hire increased?
• Specificity: When you create a business information report, you are giving yourself a key opportunity to address specific issues that are often used when decisions need to be made. As author Alan Thomson says, “A company report conveys information to assist in business decision-making. [It] is the medium in which to present this information.” They have several purposes: some record information to plan for the future, some record past information to understand a situation, and others present a solution to a pressing problem. Some executive dashboards are for daily usage, while a monthly business report template will help you pinpoint your activities on a more gradual, incremental basis.  They are all essential to commercial success, as they bring clarity to complex analysis. As mentioned earlier, the clearer the data, the more cost-effective results will be, so keeping in mind the exact data to incorporate into this kind of report should be essential in deciding what kind of report to generate. You can find multiple key performance indicator examples in different industries, which should be considered when creating that kind of report. You can also generate an interdepartmental report or between businesses to compare industry values and see how your company stands in the market.
• Accuracy & consistency: In The Age of Information, data is a vast landscape, and if you want to use it to your advantage, aiming for consistency and accuracy is key. If your data is off or presents hit-and-miss findings, it could cost your company in the long run.  Working with an online dashboard tool to produce your reports is an incredible advantage for the ease of use, the time saved, and, most importantly, the accuracy of the information you will use. As you work with real-time data, everything on your report will be up-to-date, and the decisions you will take will be backed with the latest info. Business report examples are significantly helpful when you need to explore your data and perform data analyses to extract actionable insights. They will deliver an important added value to your report thanks to the visualization of your findings, bringing more clarity and comprehension to the analyses, which is their primary purpose.
• Engagement: As intuitive, digestible, and visual tools, business-centric reporting tools are easier to understand and tell a story that is far more likely to resonate with your audience.  While exploring your data, with deeper insights generated with just a few clicks, the report doesn’t have to be dull, boring, and lost in hundreds of pages or spreadsheets of data. If you create a report that is clean and customized, you will bring more value than by printing or searching through a spreadsheet. Achieving a design like this is simple with the right KPI dashboard software . Imagine yourself in a meeting with 200 pages of analysis from the last 5 years of business management. One participant asks you a specific question regarding your operational costs dating 3 years back. And you’re sitting there, trying to find that specific piece of information that can make or break your business meeting. With business dashboards , you cannot go wrong. All the information you need is generated with a click, within a click.
• Benchmarking: If you know how to set up a business-centric report with efficiency, you will gain the ability to set defined, accurate benchmarks. By frequently setting targets based on your most important organizational goals and working with visual reporting tools, you will keep your organization flowing while catalyzing your overall growth and productivity levels.
• Communication: One of the best uses of these tools is improving internal collaboration and communication. By gaining 24/7 access to your most essential business data while enhancing the way you analyze and present it, you will empower everyone in the business with better access to information, which, in turn, will enhance internal communication and collaboration.
• Innovation: The intuitive nature of these reports makes them the most efficient way to steer a progressive analytical strategy. As such, it’s easier (and quicker) to uncover hidden insights, spot trends, and hone in on critical information. It’s this speed, ease, and accuracy that frees creativity and improves innovation across the organization, accelerating growth as a result.

These reports can also be of many different types, but they all have one common trait: gathering data and tracking the organizational activities related to something specific. From there, their author(s) will often perform an analysis and provide recommendations to the organizations.

How To Generate A Business Report

The primary importance of a corporate-centric report lies in gaining confidence and clarity. Before starting to create it, it’s vital to establish the goals and the audience. Knowing who you want to direct it to is key in its elaboration, from the tone, vocabulary/jargon you choose to the data you will focus on. A report to external stakeholders, to the CEOs, or to the technical engineers’ team will be drastically different from one another.

Likewise, the scope varies according to the objective of the report. State beforehand the needs and goals to direct you on the right path. It should be impartial and objective, with a planned presentation or dashboard reporting tool , which enables an interactive flow of data and immediate access to every piece of information needed to generate clear findings.

To help you write your daily, weekly, or monthly business-centric report template with confidence, let’s go over some essential steps and tips you should focus on:

1. Consider your audience

First of all, if you want to understand how to do a business report the right way, you have to think of your audience from the outset. Your reporting efforts must make sense and offer direct value to the end viewer or user - otherwise, they’ll be meaningless. That said, it’s critical that you take the time to consider who will use the reporting tool most and which information or features will add the most value, helping improve the organization in the process. Take the time to understand your audience, and your reporting tools will not only meet expectations but exceed them - one well-placed visualization at a time.

2. Determine and state the purpose

As we stated in the previous paragraph, defining the needs of your audience is vital to reporting success. As we said, a report usually assists in decision-making and addresses certain issues. You can state them at the beginning of the report. The more clear and specific the goal, the better the content will be. You won’t lose time adjusting information when you present your purpose in a clear and well-defined manner.

3. Use a mix of real-time and historical data

Another key component of this report is making sure you’re free of any informational blind spots. So many companies work with one form of metric, stunting their organizational progress in the process. To drill down deep into detailed pockets of information and gain a panoramic view of specific trends or patterns, working with a balanced mix of historical and real-time data is key. Doing so will empower you to capitalize on potential strengths while learning from historical weaknesses. This balanced approach will also give you the tools to develop strategies that return the best possible ROI while making powerful decisions under pressure.

4. Set actionable targets and goals

Once you’ve curated your informational sources and defined your audience, you should set actionable goals. Setting the right benchmarks will help you track your ongoing success with pinpoint accuracy while defining goals or targets will give you the insight you need to work with the right KPIs while ensuring your company is moving in the right direction. Taking the time to set actionable goals and targets that align with your organizational strategy will ensure your reports offer a consistently healthy ROI.

5. Define your reporting frequency

Another key component of successful organizational reporting is deciding how often you will analyze your metrics and information. Depending on the function or the goals you’re looking to achieve, you should decide whether your dashboard will serve as a daily, weekly, monthly, or quarterly reporting tool. Setting the right frequency will ensure your analytical strategy is fully streamlined while connecting you with the insights that count most at exactly the right time. The best modern reporting tools also offer automated functionality, helping to monitor insights and offer alerts without human intervention - the best way to save time while ensuring you never miss a critical piece of information again.

6. Gather and organize the information

Now that the purpose and scope are clearly defined, you can start gathering the data in any form that can address the issue. Thanks to that information, you will carry out data analysis to understand what lies beneath and to extract valuable insights. These findings need to be balanced and justifiable – what significance they have to the report's purpose. Identifying key performance indicators for a specific company, organizing, comparing, and evaluating them on the needed level, can be one of the most important parts of creating this kind of report. An example of a business report that shows how to extract and define your analysis can be found above in the article, where we presented our visuals.

7. Present your findings

Explain how you uncovered them and how you interpreted them that way. Answer the original issue by detailing the action to take to overcome it and provide recommendations leading to a better decision-making process. A best practice to present the insights you have drawn out is using dashboards that communicate data visually in a very efficient way. A dashboard software like datapine can precisely answer that need while helping you with data exploration at the same time, which is a crucial part. When you click on a specific part of the dashboard, you can easily access your data in a more in-depth approach.

Comparing your findings is also one of the features you can use if you are asking yourself what has changed in relation to a specific period. When you assess these datasets in just a few clicks on your monitor, the whole reporting process and measurement of your strategy can be done in minutes, not days. Evaluating findings in today’s digital world has become one of the main focuses of businesses wanting to stay competitive in the market. The faster you can do that, the more information you gain, and the more successful your actions will become.

8. Align your visualizations

Expanding on presenting your findings, it’s also important to get your design elements right when considering how to write a business report. As a rule of thumb, your most essential at-a-glance insights should be at the top of your dashboard, and you should aim to be as clean, concise, and minimal as possible with your presentation to avoid cluttering or confusion. To improve your visual storytelling and bring every key element of your report together cohesively, getting your dashboard design just right is vital. Our essential guide to data visualization methods will help to steer your efforts in the right direction.

9. Proofread your reports

When you’re looking at a polished example of a business report, you’ll notice that every element of design and content is immaculate and makes complete logical sense. That said, to get the best returns for your analytical efforts, proofreading your reports is vital. Work through your report with a fine-toothed comb and ask trusted colleagues in your organization to do the same. Once you’ve carefully proofread your entire report, you can collectively tighten up any sloppy design elements, typos, misleading copy, and bad visual placements. Doing so is vital because it will make your examples of business reports slick, actionable, accurate, and built for success.

10. Be responsive

While modern reporting dashboards are dynamic and interactive in equal measure, it’s important that you also remain robust and responsive when writing a business-based report. What does this mean, exactly? It means that in the digital age, the landscape is always changing. As such, if you want to get the most from your reports or dashboards, you must commit to editing and updating them according to the changes around you. In an informational context, what is relevant today may be redundant tomorrow, so to remain powerful and relevant, your reports must always be optimized for success. When you write a business-style report, you should understand that, to some extent, you will need to rewrite it repeatedly. Remember, commit to regularly assessing your reports, and success will be yours for the taking.

You can easily find a sample of a business report on the Internet, but not all of them fit your needs. Make sure, at any moment, that the report you want to create is accurate, objective, and complete. It should be well-written, in a way that holds the reader’s attention and meets their expectations, with a clear structure.

Common Challenges Of Business Reports

As we just learned from the previous section, generating a successful report requires carefully following some steps and considerations. This often comes with challenges and limitations that users face during the generation and analysis process. To help you be aware of those challenges and how to overcome them efficiently, we will list some of the most common ones below. 

• Data quality 

All the time and effort dedicated to the reporting process will be for nothing if you are not working with high-quality information. Believe it or not, according to recent reports , 41% of companies cite inconsistent data across technologies as their biggest challenge. With only 16% labeling the data they are using as “very good”. 

This presents a huge challenge as the consequences of poor data quality can be quite expensive since organizations are basing their most important strategic decisions on unreliable insights.  

To prevent this issue from affecting you, it is essential to invest time and money in implementing a thoughtful data quality management plan to ensure your information is constantly checked under specified guidelines. Putting extra attention to the cleaning and constant manipulation of the information is also a huge aspect of the process. 

• Lack of data literacy 

Another big challenge that businesses face when implementing reporting practices is the level of literacy of their employees. As mentioned earlier in the post, the success of the entire process relies heavily on the entire workforce being involved in it and collaborating with each other. The issue is that generating a report and analyzing the data can be very intimidating for non-technical employees who often don’t have the necessary skills or confidence to integrate data-driven activities into their daily work. 

That is why carrying out a careful analysis of the literacy level across your workforce can help you understand the actual situation and offer training instances to anyone who needs it. Paired with that, investing in self-service BI tools that allow any user, regardless of their technical knowledge, to generate a business report with just a few clicks is a great way to approach this challenge. 

• Long generation processes 

It is not a secret that manually generating a business report can take a lot of time and effort. In fact, in some cases, when a report is finally completed, the information in it might not be entirely valuable anymore. Luckily, this challenge has been tackled a long time ago thanks to the power of automation. 

Modern online reporting tools offer users the possibility to automatically generate a report in a matter of seconds, eliminating any form of manual work. All they need to do is connect their data sources, select the KPIs they want to display, and enjoy a visually appealing and fully functional report in just a few clicks. This enables organizations to focus on the important part, which is extracting powerful insights to inform their strategies. 

• Static vs. interactive business reports 

Traditionally, these reports generated with tools such as Excel or PowerPoint have been static and full of text and complex numbers. Making it impossible to extract deeper conclusions from them or act on fresh insights. This is not to say that they are completely unuseful, but their historical and static perspective makes them less effective, especially considering how agile decision-making can represent a huge competitive advantage for organizations today.  

To help you make the most out of your data-driven efforts and tackle this common limitation,  we recommend you invest in tools that offer dynamic reports. BI reporting tools , such as datapine, give you the ability to generate interactive real-time reports, like the ones we saw earlier, which can be easily filtered to explore different periods or lower levels of data. This will give you the power to extract deeper and fresh insights to boost your strategies and growth. 

• Ensuring data security and privacy 

In the digital age we live in, we need to be fully aware of the risks of using online tools to manage our business’s operations. Studies have shown an increasing trend in cyberattacks and data breaches that has left decision-makers concerned about how they manage their sensitive data. One of these attacks can significantly impact an organization’s reputation but also incur considerable costs that can be hard to come back from. According to recent research, these types of breaches cost businesses an average of $4.35 million in 2022. 

All of this makes security and privacy a big challenge for businesses of all sizes. Especially regarding their report-related activities, as they contain sensitive information about the company and its clients. Luckily, modern SaaS BI tools offer high levels of security to help you keep your data secure at all times, from the moment it is generated to the time it is shared with different stakeholders. Therefore, it is important to consider this topic before investing in such a tool. 

Key Takeaways Professional Business Reports  

"Once we know something, we find it hard to imagine what it was like not to know it." - Chip & Dan Heath , Authors of Made to Stick, Switch.

We live in a data-driven world, and as a business, it’s up to you to move with the times. If you ignore the power of smart data analytics, you are only stunting your own commercial progress.

We’ve explored many shining business reports examples, and one thing is abundantly clear: if you embrace the power of digital reporting, your company will be bigger, better, and exponentially more informed. The more confident and informed you are as a business, the better you will be able to respond to constant change. In today’s digital world, it doesn’t matter what sector you work in. If you’re rigid in your approach to data, you will get left behind. Digital reporting dashboards are the only way forward.

So, you now know what business reports are, how to structure and write them , and how they can benefit your business. Committing to the right reporting and information delivery can have a significant impact on your organization and orientate its strategy better. For more ideas about business reporting in a more specific, function-related way, you can dig deeper into some of our popular articles on sales reports and marketing reports !

Don’t miss out on that opportunity and start now with datapine’s online reporting software , and benefit from a free 14-day trial ! You won’t regret it.

Getting an Overview of the Core Terms in Margin Analysis

After completing this lesson, you will be able to:

• Get an Overview of the Core Terms in Margin Analysis

Overview of the Core Terms in Margin Analysis

https://learning.sap.com/learning-journeys/outline-cost-management-and-profitability-analysis-in-sap-s-4hana/outlining-profitability-analysis_b5b7efbb-55ea-4ff5-bc70-15d39d8a14eb

Introduction to Margin Analysis

The following video provides an overview of Margin Analysis.

Master Data

Master data in margin analysis include profitability characteristics and functional areas. Functional areas break down corporate expenditure into different functions, in line with the requirements of cost of sales accounting.

These functions can include:

• Production.
• Administration.
• Sales and Distribution.
• Research and Development.

For primary postings, the functional area is derived according to fixed rules and included in the journal entries. For secondary postings, the functional area and partner functional area are derived from the sender and receiver account assignments to reflect the flow of costs from sender to receiver.

Profitability Characteristics

Profitability characteristics represent the criteria used to analyze operating results and the sales and profit plan. Multiple profitability characteristics are combined to form profitability segments. The combination of characteristic values determines the profitability segment for which the gross margin structure can be displayed. A profitability segment corresponds to a market segment.

For example, the combination of the characteristic values North (Sales region), Electronics (Product group) and Wholesale (Customer group) determine a profitability segment for which the gross margin structure can be displayed.

True vs Attributed Account Assignments

Each activity relevant to Margin Analysis in the SAP system, such as billing, creates line items. G/L line items can carry true or attributed account assignments to profitability segments.

• Goods issue item or billing document item in a sell-from-stock scenario.
• Manual FI posting to profitability segment.
• Primary Costs or Revenue.
• Secondary Costs.
• Balance Sheet Accounts with a statistical cost element assigned.

The derivation of attributed profitability segments is based on the true account assignment object of the G/L line item. This object can be of the following types:

• Cost Center.
• Sales Order.
• Production Order (only for Engineer-to-Order process.)
• Maintenance Order.
• Service Document (service order or service contract.)

After the profitability characteristics are derived, the resulting data is mapped to the G/L line item according to specific mapping rules. An attributed profitability segment is derived to fulfill the requirement of filling as many characteristics in the item as possible to enable the maximum drilldown analysis capability.

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