Demand Planning can be defined as the art and science of forecasting customer demand so that the corporate supply chain can produce and deliver products and services efficiently to be at the right place, right time, and in the right quantities.

Since customer demand is extremely crucial to Demand Planning – Sales Forecasting and Key Account Planning are vital parts of the demand planning program.

When you are creating a demand planning program, it is important to first talk to the forecast customer about what should be included in the demand plan and what its features should be. Since Demand Planning is all about the customer, having a Sales Forecasting Process is an integral part of this initiative.

The demand planning process needs to be set up in a way that gives the company a clearer and more transparent view of demand. Everyone in the organization who deals with demand needs to agree on the demand plan.

• Assess the demand forecast needs of the down-stream customer
• Identify roles and responsibilities of the organization on the demand side including Sales, Marketing, Product Development and Category Management
• Map historical data, cleanse, and harmonize the data for Statistical modeling
• Recommend appropriate demand forecast models and help tune statistical models to arrive at unbiased baseline forecasts. See more details on model tuning
• Design the sub-process for Sales Forecasting including promotional planning and Event Modeling and integrate it with the CRM process in the organization. Event Modeling can be for repeatable promotional events and holiday spikes and also be used for modeling Black Swan events. See the blog entry on Black Swans
• Design consensus process and define appropriate review reports
• Define the rules for forecast reconciliation and demand consensus
• Define exception management for demand and supply volatility. Our focus is to enable you to manage the process by exception. We have data mining capabilities to dig into your process and help you develop exception management
• Define the process for identifying supply constraints and reverse feedback. Demand Management is a continuous process and thrives on constant communication, feedback, and action. We help you implement processes that are self-sustaining and continuously improving
• Define holistic metrics and processes for continuous improvement. We help you design end-to-end Value Chain Metrics, including key measurements for the demand chain. It is important to measure your entire demand chain, not just the demand planners

For additional information regarding our solutions. Please contact us here.