When conducting demand planning, you need to strike the balance between having sufficient stock levels to meet customer demands without having surplus. This means leveraging the right tools and data to build your demand plan from the outset. Striking that balance means finding the right features for the job. What should you look for in a platform to help you build your demand plan? What are the key features of demand planning?
Demand planning capabilities you should consider include:
Scenario Planning
Scenario planning is the strategic method businesses use to make flexible long-term plans. It makes assumptions on how the future will unfold and how your business environment will change over time based on that future. By using future scenario planning, you can identify a specific set of uncertainties or different realities and how they may affect the future of your business.
Analytics
Analytics requires a strong dedication to gathering data as well as data management. Leveraging a strong analytic model allows you to understand your buying cycles, create predictions and easily pull up information. What’s more, you become proactive rather than reactive to changes in your business environment and are better able to pivot with disruptions.
Algorithms and Autonomous Planning
Algorithms are a clearly defined set of instructions. In demand planning, it’s crucial that you’re all working with the same data sets and metrics when making your plans. If your sales team is working off a different metric, you’ll run into issues in production when your demand plan doesn’t register these potential sales. Autonomous planning requires timely data input (i.e. ongoing data input) so that flexibility is worked into the schematic’s algorithms. It cashes in on windfalls while helping you navigate leaner periods.
Event Management
Understanding how events will affect your supply chain is fundamental in demand planning. Manage new product development, promotions, price fluctuations and demand simply with intelligent event planning tools.
Real-time Planning
Real-time planning is the process of gathering your data without time delays. This makes analyzing and planning a real time decision process so activities can be communicated without delay. A demand planning platform should always run with real time planning so you can pivot with unexpected disruptions easily.
By considering key features when selecting demand planning software, you’ll be able to improve your business accuracy, save time, and ensure better revenue figures. Effective demand planning solutions should assist supply chain managers with their role and also unify your business from the get go.
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