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What's Driving Your Revenue in 2013?
By John C. Butler

Revenue growth, more than any other metric, is the key driver of long term company performance. If you agree that statement then you've likely initiated the arduous task of deciding which key initiatives will drive your 2013 revenue expectations.

We all know the drill, it's time consuming, complicated, and many times contentious. Teams are digging into the numbers, rationalizing departmental contributions, allocating budgets, trying to determine how to get the most out of the limited resources.

In the current business climate, good planning not only requires an honest assessment of the gaps between stated goals, and actual results, but consensus about how you'll fill those gaps moving forward. The goal is to prioritize, agree to and translate the strategy into the critical activities that will deliver future revenue goals.

A starting point, based on more experience with this ritual than I care to admit, are outlined below which can help you get more clarity around the key questions early in the process. These should be open dialogs, (no slide decks) with someone facilitating and recording the discussion, outcomes and a written review of what was discussed. Position this in a way that minimizes departmental politics and finger pointing, yet considers real alternatives or refinements to what currently exists.

The goal is to get as much of the pertinent information, on the table, so everyone has the same picture as to where you are, and what actions are needed for future success. One would think this is a natural and common discussion that takes place every year. But I can assure you these discussions do not happen as often as they should, and they can be helpful and serve as a valuable reference point as you get deeper into your planning.

What factors have been successful in driving and/or inhibiting revenue growth?

How to better align sales and marketing to ensure your pipeline will deliver?

I hope you'll find these suggestions helpful as you plan next years revenue strategies.

John is Founder and CEO of Revenue Factors, which was formed to help senior executives grow revenue with a greater level of predictability and sustainability. He is experienced in designing revenue growth and strategy execution systems for organizations spanning start-ups to global industry leaders.

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