Business growth is a key goal for many to succeed in today’s increasingly competitive and complex business environment. According to a new report by the Capgemini Research Institute, nearly 60 percent of organizations expect to see revenue growth in the next 12–18 months but supply chain bottlenecks and trade/ logistical disruptions are perceived to be the biggest risk to growth in the next 12–18 months.  

During times of economic uncertainty, businesses throughout the supply chain need to look to technology to drive growth and create added economic value at speed. Regardless of where your business sits within the supply chain, you probably deal with rebates. They’re a fundamental part of business for many manufacturers, distributors and retailers. And if growing your business is at the top of your agenda this year, you’ll want to stop thinking about rebates as a necessity and start thinking about them as a strategy. Let’s dive into the topic and see how a rebate management solution can help you reach your business growth goals in years to come.

Make Faster Decisions with Confidence

To attain business growth, you need to have a strategy in place that is driven by clear, comprehensive and timely rebate data and figures. Building a strategic plan for growth based on real facts and figures will give you a solid foundation to work from and instil confidence that the direction you are taking your company is the right one.

Your business can use this data to spot challenges, identify opportunities, and make effective and informed decisions at all times. Having this kind of data is critical when dealing with rebates, but most businesses find the complex calculations of rebates limits data accessibility. Rebate management software solves that problem.

Without a rebate management solution, stakeholders must either wait until the numbers come in at the end of the month or quarter to make decisions or make decisions based on data that is weeks or months old.

Drive Efficiency  

Many businesses see administering rebates as little more than a way to increase their workload. After all, the more complex the rebate, the more time-consuming administration necessarily becomes. But automation can change everything.

With automation, there is no more manual checking, double checking and manually cross-referencing the numbers on an Excel spreadsheet where a potential error could end up losing your company millions of dollars. By using a rebate management solution, your business can automate processes freeing up pricing, finance, purchasing teams to increase productivity in other areas and drive business growth.

Find Additional Rebate Revenue

For many businesses, calculating how much you owe or are owed in rebates is a time-consuming process. Even if your business somehow manages all your rebates in one spreadsheet, sometimes the time to calculate rebates owed is astronomical because the file is so bloated with data. This can also lead to rebates being missed, and subsequently revenue can be lost.

A good rebate management solution solves all of this and increases efficiencies by allowing your employees to issue and receive rebates faster without sacrificing accuracy. Consequently, this will also speed up month-end processes in the long term and aid business growth.  

Accurate Rebate Calculations

Many companies struggle with accuracy in their data. When they finally calculate how much they owe a trading partner in rebates and bring that number to their partner, their partner may dispute it, forcing everyone back to ground zero to rerun the numbers and check trading terms. No one wants delayed payouts and friction between them and their trading partners.  

As rebates grow more complex, you need a piece of software that helps you compile all your deals and run your rebate calculations accurately. Plus, a good rebate management solution will allow you to securely share deal data with your partners — which means no disputes when month end comes around.

Real-time Visibility  

For any business, information and data are one of your most valuable assets and are essential for business growth. By utilizing a rebate management solution, your rebate programs are updated in real-time so that the entire rebate team has access to a single, accurate version of the truth using intuitive reporting and analytics. The ability to monitor and measure your rebate programs in real time provides the ability to react quickly and negotiate more profitable incentives to drive business growth.

Allows for Stronger Trading Partner Collaboration

When you communicate transparently with your trading partners, you’re being honest about your growth goals so that you can both align around those goals. However, when stuck behind spreadsheets and long email chains effective collaboration isn’t possible and agreements can be misunderstood causing disputes further down the line.

Housing your deal terms within the confines of your rebate management solution means that you and your trading partner are always on the same page. Everyone is clear on what products are part of the agreement and what the rebated rate for each product is. You’ll never have to search your inbox for terms again.

With built in collaboration features, you and your trading partners can come together and be transparent about your rebate strategy. This creates more trust between you and your trading partners, something that’s sorely lacking in the present supply chain.  

Internal Alignment

A lot of businesses adopt the silo approach, where each department operates very independently. However, the issue with this type of attitude can cause duplications of the same data, stored in various locations, which would highly likely cause chaos and disconnect amongst various functions as well as the wider business.

By having a robust rebate management solution, users across various departments are not only able to immediately access and rely on the same up to date information but they can collaborate internally, creating a clearer decision-making process. Moreover, it reduces the misunderstandings and communication gaps that can be very costly for organizations and put a strain on business growth.

Three Steps to Business Growth In 2023

Step 1

Take control of your rebates, gain efficiency and claim missing rebates so you stop leaving money on the table by:

• Taking control of any internal silos
• Modelling existing agreements on one platform
• Importing all your necessary data

This results in:

• Rebates precisely calculated
• Missing rebates claimed
• Accurate accruals generated
• Higher revenue

Step 2

Trade smarter with your trading partners, driving the right behaviors and conversations to unlock your potential by:

• Understanding which incentive type is right for your business  
• Analyzing and refining your rebate programs
• Choosing the most effective rebate strategy

This results in:

• Streamlined collaboration
• More profitable partnerships
• Quicker and more favorable negotiations

Step 3

Attain business growth with true execution of joint business plans through:

• Measuring deal performance
• Automated approval deal workflow
• Rolling out a collaboration platform to your trading partners

This results in:  

• Behaviors aligned to goals
• Increased loyalty and trust
• Transparent audit trail

The Solution to Business Growth? Enable  

As you can see, there are endless ways rebate management software fuels business growth. There is no doubt that over time, your inadequate software systems and manual processes will begin to hinder the business growth you are trying to achieve. The single source of truth that a rebate management solution gives you lets you build a solid foundation for your business to flourish in 2023.