It had a different illustration there, and I’ve changed it to the hockey stick here in honor of so many sales forecast charts that looked like hockey sticks). Start with a sales forecast. This means that you start with unit and price details and build up to sales from specific, concrete assumptions. love it. MORE >>

pop up the sales forecast, pop up the profitability, and that generates a great projected valuation. Projected investor returns depend on a future valuation, which depends on the sales forecast or income forecast or both. This is usually a waste of time, energy, and space. And it doesn’t. MORE >>

"Forecasting is difficult, especially if it's about the future." Forecasting start-up revenue is not easy. write with a few thoughts on how best to handle the need to present financial forecasts vs. the uncertainty inherent in any model. In general, two forecasting methods exist. Forecast errors compound across time. MORE >>

Specifically what is often not in the DNA of founders are sales skills. The result is a lack of knowledge of the process and of sales people themselves. I had never had any sales training so everything we did for the first couple of years was instinctual. boil it down to this: sales people are sales people. MORE >>

My prior post provides a model for how to forecast revenue over the life of an operating plan. Another classic start-up conundrum is how to forecast revenue for this quarter. Professional sales management forecasting techniques can help eliminate emotion and excitement ("We had such a good meeting, I know they are going to buy!") MORE >>