Profitability and growth go hand-in-hand when it comes to success in business, and they can dictate many key business decisions. Growing as a business is all well and good, but not doing so profitably can lead you into long-term trouble. In our experience, many companies are constrained by an inability to achieve long-term profitable growth due to their outdated processes. For those managing hundreds of rebate deals this is the norm.

In a recent CFO survey from Deloitte, CFOs have rated growth as their top priority, with expectations for an increase in hiring and investment at their highest levels in almost seven years. An overwhelming majority will be investing in digital technology to accelerate their business over the next three years, delivering gains in productivity and business performance.

Here are 5 steps to achieving profitable growth this year with better rebate management.

Step 1: Gain full control and visibility

Many organizations struggle to manage their rebates and B2B deals simply because they can’t monitor them easily due to data being locked in spreadsheets or disparate systems and being extremely complex. The whole rebate management process can involve many suppliers and various parties and steps.

In order to attain profitable growth, it's completely necessary to have full control and visibility over your rebates and B2B deals so you know what to calculate, accrue, and allocate. Without it, your organization could be overspending, continually being overcharged or discrepancies could arise.

Step 2: Form collaborative partnerships

A lot of organizations adopt the silo approach when it comes to their trading partners and even internally departments tend to operate very independently. However, the issue with this type of attitude is that it can cause disputes and goals around profitable growth aren't always aligned, meaning valuable information around your deals is often not shared.

Even a lack of collaboration internally means duplication of the same data, stored in various locations, which would highly likely cause chaos and disconnect amongst departmental functions as well as the wider business.

By having a robust rebate management system, you can bring everyone together on one platform. Trading partners and users across various departments are not only able to immediately access and rely on the same up to date information but are working in sync and in line with the business goals to accelerate profitable growth.

Step 3: Make data-driven decisions

According to a report published by McKinsey Global Institute, data-driven organizations are 23 times more likely to acquire customers, 6 times as likely to retain customers and 19 times as likely to be profitable.

Before you make any decisions about your rebates and B2B deals you need to have access to the relevant data to draw conclusions from and be able to easily analyze it. Not every decision is right but with accurate data in your hands you can understand what’s working and what isn’t. Streamlined rebate management processes and cloud-software can put you on the right path to profitable growth.

Step 4: Eliminate spreadsheets

As a growing business, you don’t want to waste time relying on a single unwieldy spreadsheet, or just as badly relying on tens (if not hundreds) of inconsistent spreadsheets holding all your important data which delays getting the right insight to make business-critical decisions. This can frustrate staff as a great deal of their time can be wasted searching through inaccurate data which can hinder profitable growth.

At its heart, cloud-based rebate management software does away with spreadsheets and provides an easy-to-use interface with far more detail through consolidated real-time data and insights about your rebates. This means you can automatically react to changes to your deals and obtain profitable growth easier and faster than ever before.

Step 5: Embrace automation

When rebates are managed effectively as opposed to leaking revenue, they can unlock profitable growth opportunities for your organization. To make this possible, an automated rebate management system is vital. According to a report by IBM and the National Retail Foundation, supply chain executives say automation has the potential to increase revenue by 10 percent every year.

The use of tools for monitoring and managing your rebates and B2B deals have become an important differentiating factor between leading and average performing organizations. If you want to attain profitable growth implementing a rebate management system is key and Enable is only one click away from helping you to achieve this and more.