Are you tired of wasting hours of your already busy day, week, month and quarter creating sales reports? 

And let’s not even get into how long annual reports take, right? 

Well, to be honest, it need not be that bad. Creating a sales report may seem intimidating at first, but with the right tools and a little bit of know-how, you'll be slaying your reports in no time. 

But before we dive into the how-to's, let's first define what a sales report is supposed to do.

And what it’s not. 

A sales report is NOT just endless numbers on a spreadsheet, the more elaborate-looking the better. 

You also – most likely – won’t have one report that works for all stakeholders. 

That’s because a sales report should be a map for you and your sales team -- it should help your salespeople see where they've been, where they're currently at, and where they need to go in order to hit their targets. A well-crafted sales report can help your team and other departments identify trends, highlight areas for improvement, and provide valuable insights to help drive future sales. 

Meanwhile, for your top executives, your sales report  should serve as an overview of your team’s performance. You’ll include key metrics such as total sales, sales by product or service, and sales by region. You know, so you can say things like, “Our folks in Boston sold 33% more than the guys in New York.”

So, contrary to what some might think, creating a useful sales report is much more than just stuffing random metrics or key performance indicators (KPIs) onto an excel sheet. Your sales reports are supposed to make a point. In your executive reports, you’re justifying incentives and salary hikes or a bigger team, or more resources, or more sophisticated sales tools. In the reports that the team is supposed to look at you’re giving them specific goals and milestones. 

So how do you create a truly useful sales report? 

Best practices when creating a sales report:

• Identify your needs – Before you start creating your sales report, it's important to understand exactly what you need it to accomplish. Are you trying to track your team's progress against specific goals? Are you looking to identify trends or patterns in your sales data? Do you want to increase specific sales metrics or sales KPIs? Or are you simply trying to get a better overall understanding of your team's performance? Or is this just a “the week/month/ quarter/ year that was” summary for your top executives or investors? 

By taking the time to understand your needs, you'll be able to create a sales report that is tailored to your specific goals and that will provide the insights and information you need to improve your team's performance. This will help you avoid creating a report that is too broad or too narrow. Instead, you’ll have a report that is focused, actionable, and relevant.

Knowing your goals also means that you’ll put just enough effort into the sales report as is needed. Why do heavy lifting if it isn’t actually necessary or useful? 

• Know your audience – Related to the “what?” of your sales report is the “who?” Who will be reading your sales report, and why do they need it? Will it be your executive team, who is looking for an overview of your team's performance? Will it be your team members, who are looking for specific, actionable insights? Or will it be some other group of stakeholders? 
  

You need to know this to understand which areas of the data to highlight, how to present the data, what level of explanation is needed and so on. Your executive understands your business and your jargon, but for an external stakeholder, you might need data to be at-a-glance and more generic language. 

• Start with a clear and concise executive summary – Your boss probably doesn't have time to read a detailed report on every single sale you made. Instead, focus on the bottom line and the key takeaways.

This short summary should provide a high-level overview of your team's performance, highlighting key achievements, providing action items, and areas for improvement. It should be easy to read and understand, and should be attention-grabbing. Mention your biggest news and findings here.

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• Break down your data into easy-to-digest sections – No one wants to stare at a wall of numbers. Breaking your data down into bite sized chunks will make it easier for your audience to quickly scan and understand your report.

Smaller sections could include things like tables, graphs, or charts, or simply highlighting the most important numbers and providing brief explanations for each one. 

Also, space things out. White space is not your enemy. A crammed spreadsheet tends to be off-putting. 

• Use data visualizations to help drive your points – Visuals like charts and graphs, and can be powerful tools that help your audience understand and engage with your sales report. By using visuals to supplement your text, you can quickly convey complex information and make your report more engaging and interesting.

There are many different types of visuals that you can use in your sales report, depending on the type of data you're presenting and the points you're trying to make. For example, you might use line charts to show trends over time, bar charts to compare different data sets, or pie charts to show the relative proportions of different data points.

• Include actionable insights and recommendations – A sales report isn't just about presenting data. It's about using that data to drive future success. Including actionable insights and recommendations in your sales report will help you turn your data into something more than just an interesting read – it will make your report truly useful and valuable to your audience. 
  

Now, let's take a look at various types of sales reports. These are some of the best in the biz:

1. The time-period-based sales report 

What: This type of report is focused on tracking a team's sales performance over a specific period of time. It can be a monthly sales report, weekly sales report, or daily sales report. The time period report includes detailed data and visuals that show how sales performance has changed over the chosen period.

Why: By presenting data in a timeline-based format, the report allows the reader to see how sales performance has changed over time, and to identify trends and patterns in the data. 

How? Here’s a free Microsoft Excel template.

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2. The conversion rate sales report

What: This report focuses on the most important metric in sales – conversion rate. The conversion rate is a metric that shows the percentage of leads or prospects that are converted into customers. The conversion rate sales report includes detailed data and visuals that show your team's conversion rate over a specific period of time, and provides insights and recommendations for how the team can improve their conversion rate. 

Why: The conversion rate report provides insights into which marketing channels, products, or team members are driving the most conversions, and offers recommendations for improving conversion rates moving forward. This report is a valuable tool for identifying areas for optimization and driving future sales success.

How: Here’s a free Microsoft Excel template.

3. The sales activity sales report 

What: This report focuses on sales activities such as the number of calls made, the number of meetings held, and the number of emails sent. It includes detailed data and visuals that show your team's sales activity over a specific period of time, and provides insights and recommendations for how your team can improve their sales activity. It can be used to gain a better understanding of how your salespeople are spending their time, and to identify opportunities for improvement. 

Why: Useful for tracking the effectiveness of different sales tactics, identifying areas for improvement, and providing valuable insights for driving future sales success.

How: Here’s a free Microsoft Excel template.

4. The sales forecast sales report

What: While all the reports we have looked at so far focus on your sales team's performance over a period of time, a  sales forecast report is future-facing. It makes projections based on past sales data and other relevant factors.You can use it to set goals, and benchmarks and to to make data-driven decisions about how to allocate resources and efforts. 

Why: This report is invaluable for planning and budgeting, as well as for identifying potential risks and opportunities.

How: Here’s a free Microsoft Excel template.

5. The sales calls sales report

What: Very much like the sales activity report, but even more specific, this report focuses on the sales calls made by your team, including details such as the number of calls made, the duration of each call, and the outcome of each call. It includes detailed data and visuals that show your team's sales calls over a specific period of time, and provides insights and recommendations for how your sales reps can improve their sales call performance. Doing this manually can be tedious, but reports around call volume can be automated with conversation intelligence tools like Wingman. 

Why: It can be used to gain a better understanding of your sales calls, to track the effectiveness of different tactics, and to identify opportunities for improvement.

How: Here’s a free Microsoft Excel template if you intend to do this manually. 

6. The sales pipeline sales report

What: As the name suggests, this report includes detailed data and visuals that show the current status of each lead or prospect in the sales pipeline. The sales pipeline report provides insights and recommendations for various stages of the sales pipeline.

Why: By presenting detailed data and actionable recommendations concisely, the sales pipeline report will help you track your team's progress and drive real, measurable improvements in their performance.

Additionally, this report will help you identify which stages of the sales pipeline are a breeze for your team and which ones are challenging – thereby allowing you to target specific areas for improvement and optimize the sales process.

How: Here’s a free Microsoft Excel template. 

7. The overall sales analytics sales report

What: The sales analytics or sales metrics report uses data and analytics to gain insights into your team's sales performance. It includes detailed data and visuals that show the key metrics and trends in your team's sales data, and provides insights and recommendations for how your salespeople can use this data to improve their performance

Why: The sales analytics report is a valuable tool for gaining a better understanding of your team's sales performance and for making data-driven decisions about how to allocate resources and efforts.

How? Put together data for various metrics like customer acquisition cost, win rate, average deal size in separate tabs on an Excel sheet. Grab data from your CRM and use formulas to automate calculations. 

You can also browse a more in-depth guide to creating the perfect sales activity report here.

So, there you have it – some best practices and templates for creating various types of sales reports. Remember, it may seem intimidating at first, but with the right tools and a little bit of know-how, you'll be on your way to meeting (and exceeding!) your sales goals in no time.

Create killer reports with Wingman

By providing real-time insights and recommendations, Wingman empowers sales and marketing teams to have more effective conversations and drive better outcomes. With Wingman, you can optimize your sales team’s performance,  increase conversions, reduce churn, improve customer satisfaction, and ultimately drive more success.

Support for the whole team: 

Wingman is a conversation intelligence tool for sales teams. It provides real-time, contextual cues to your reps on sales calls and gives you actionable sales reports to keep track of your team's performance. 

On top of this functionality, Wingman gives sales managers the ability to monitor their team’s progress through at-risk deal alerts and call success metrics. You can also use pre/post-call actions to set up game tapes and battle cards to provide real-time coaching your sales reps. 

Streamlined sales ops: Wingman’s call recordings, summaries and transcripts make team reviews easier for you. Plus, it integrates with other business platforms like CRM systems so that you get all your customer interaction data centralized and easy to access. 

Wingman presents sales data in at-a-glance dashboards so that you can quickly identify trends, highlight areas for improvement, and take actionable steps towards reaching their goals. 

Wingman is here for you – through every step of the sales process. And as for sales reporting, it's a breeze with Wingman’s platform’s powerful metrics and insights.  Get a demo now and see for yourself what it's like to have Wingman on your team.