Did you know that close to 9 out of 10 spreadsheets contain errors? Several studies have gone on to show how most spreadsheets are filled with errors. Unfortunately, most of these errors are never called out and continue to be copy-pasted into other spreadsheets.
These issues just get even more exacerbated when the data is being brought in from disparate sources, multiplying in number until you're forced to spend several hours pinpointing each error and correcting it.
But why are we discussing spreadsheets here?
Most companies still depend on outdated methods of manual commission tracking, filling out scores of spreadsheets, and connecting them to one another.
This can lead to embarrassing and costly mistakes, often causing companies millions of dollars in losses. There have also been instances where enterprises have had to face litigation due to faulty commissioning.
But the biggest issue of all is that inaccurate commission and incentive numbers can demoralize the sales team. Inaccurate paychecks are not just unfair but downright demotivating. Your sales team is the engine of your company, driving profits. It's critical to your growth plans that the sales team continues to perform optimally.
Here are some more reasons why you need to let go of manual commission tracking.
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Manually tracking commissions in spreadsheets isn't scalable
Spreadsheets are commonly used across offices for several data purposes. It's easy to learn, manipulate, and visualize tons of data with very little effort. But all the benefits dry up once the number of spreadsheets starts to expand. When your commission strategy becomes increasingly complex to serve the needs of your ever-growing sales team, tracking all the numbers manually becomes hard. You're either left with thousands of sheets to collate and study or end up with untraceable, accumulating errors.
Tracking commissions manually isn't an effective scalable strategy. Enterprises need to search for more effective solutions such as adopting commission tracking software.
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It's nearly impossible to make changes without running into errors
There are two primary ways of manually tracking commissions via spreadsheets. And both are fraught with difficulties.
1. When working with a bulk spreadsheet that contains details of the entire sales team in one place, it becomes exceedingly hard to modify the formulas for one single sales rep. Additionally, accounting for overrides and exceptions spread across multiple months requires creating brand new spreadsheets for each month. The more sheets you handle and the more copy-pasting that you do simply ramps up the chances of having several unnecessary errors.
2. The second way is to create individual spreadsheets for each sales rep. And this is an absolute nightmare. There's no easy way to make changes across the whole team at once or add rolling commissions across the hierarchy of the team. Even if you try to modify each spreadsheet, you'll only end up with thousands of tabs that can't even be tracked.
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There's no transparency in the numbers
The data stored in spreadsheets cannot be traced back to their source. Neither can one track the changes that have been made and when.
This reduces transparency by a lot and leaves your sales team in the dark. With a spreadsheet, all your sales team gets at the end of the month is a check with their payment. They have no way to understand how that number was calculated. Even if you could share their statement with them, you'll have to spend hours just explaining all the calculations.
Instead of wasting so many man-hours chasing numbers and filling out cells, it's better to invest in an affordable commission tracking software that can track numbers accurately, is easily adaptable, and provides a layer of transparency to the commission payments.