REAL-W: Managing Revenue in the Digital Age

The best part of the year is that brief moment when I can look back at what we have accomplished, and plan for the future. Numbers don’t lie, but if you don’t listen closely they can definitely bamboozle you. This is why I look at the numbers through a REAL-W filter.

The REAL-W filter allows me to look at all the streams of our revenue, because all streams are not created equal. When I am speaking of revenue streams I am not speaking of drop-off (dump and run) or full-service or rentals or event planning. These are all different revenue streams, but I am speaking more to the sustainability of any one stream. When we consider the 80/20 rule (80% of your revenue comes from the top 20% of your customer base), and apply that to a stream we can see.

Bearing this in mind, I look at my entire account base and consider where the greatest opportunities are for improvement. Those areas are what is REAL-W: Retention, Engagement, Acquisition, Loyalty, and Winback.

Retention is how we look at our existing client base. We can spend $1K or more to acquire an account, but what is the value of the account we add to our book of business? If we spent $1K to acquire the account, are we maximizing the potential of that account? I mentioned earlier that the top 20% of our accounts generate 80% of our annual revenue. But how many of that top 20% are actually ordering? Dig deep, I found that there was easily room to improve our revenue by X% just by getting five additional accounts.

Read the full article from Craig Cooper on catersource.com.