If you run a small business, you do not have an hour a week for reports. You do not need one. Six numbers, looked at once a week, are enough to notice early when something tips. Here is which ones they are, why these in particular and how to work them out without software.
1. This week's revenue compared with last week
The simplest number and still the most important. It is not the amount alone that counts, but the direction. A drop of a fifth in one week can be chance; three weeks in a row is a pattern. Write the weekly revenue in one row and next to it the change from the previous week in percent.
2. Number of orders or sales
Revenue can stay the same while a lot changes underneath: fewer customers who spend more, or more customers with small amounts. The number of orders shows whether demand holds. For a trades business these are jobs, for a shop the receipts.
3. Average order value
Revenue divided by count. If it rises, you are selling larger services or have adjusted your prices. If it
falls, it is worth looking at which services are in less demand. In a spreadsheet this is a single formula:
=revenue/count.
4. Open invoices and how long they have been open
A full order book helps little if the money does not arrive. Every week, note the total of open invoices and the oldest one. If an invoice has been open for more than 30 days, that is the occasion for a friendly reminder, not only after three months.
5. Enquiries and how many of them became orders
How many enquiries came in, and how many of them did you win? With ten enquiries and two orders the rate is 20 percent. If it drops, the cause can be the price, the response time or enquiries that do not fit at all. Note the response time as well: whoever replies on the same day wins the job more often.
6. One cost item that matters to you
Not all costs every week, only the one item that fluctuates most: material, goods purchased, travel costs or advertising. That way you see early when it runs out of hand, without going through the whole bookkeeping every week.
How to work out the numbers without software
A spreadsheet with three sheets is enough:
- Bookings: one row per sale or job with date, category and amount. The export from your till or shop usually delivers this already.
- Open items: invoice number, amount, invoice date, paid yes or no.
- Weekly view: the six numbers, calculated with
SUMIFSandCOUNTIFSfrom the other sheets.
What such a workbook looks like is shown by the sample Excel report: six months of an invented bicycle workshop, all key figures as formulas.
When more is worth it
As long as you can enter the numbers in ten minutes a week, the spreadsheet is the right solution. If entering takes longer than looking at them, it is worth having the export read in automatically. That saves the manual work; it changes nothing about the six numbers.