Demand Management

Creating, influencing, and managing demand

What is Demand Management?

Demand Management includes all aspects of deploying your organization's value proposition to the marketplace. Market, channel, customer, and consumer activities are driven from a strategic level through market and market segment roadmaps. These guide market segment plans which are executed through detailed, time-phased sales and marketing activities.

The demand plan requires multiple inputs. Analytics, assumptions, modelling, and customer collaboration are used to generate demand forecasts that integrate with, and drive the operational plans for your organization, while also providing insights for improving sales and marketing performance.

 

Demand Plan Requires Multiple Input

 

Demand execution processes ensure that the response to actual demand is proactively managed in line with market segment plans and include demand sensing, forecast consumption monitoring, abnormal demand management, order commitment through available-to-promise, and service level definition through customer segmentation and prioritization.

How Mature is Your Organization's True Level of Maturity in Demand Management?

Before embarking on any performance improvement program, it is imperative to identify your business’s true level of maturity. The Oliver Wight Maturity Model characterizes a business as being in one of four key phases of maturity: Co-ordination, Business Process Control, Automation, or Integration. Assess your business maturity in Demand Management using our free online self-assessment tool. 

Assess Your Business Maturity

How you can benefit from Demand Management:

  • Identify gaps between the latest demand projections and the annual plan early, providing more time to close them

  • Establish clear accountability and create motivation amongst the sales and marketing teams

  • Eliminate demand forecast bias and improve demand plan accuracy to improve customer service and reduce safety stock

  • Ensure strategic and business plan revenue streams are achieved

  • Increase focus on meeting customer needs and expectations

  • Reduce chaos when orders exceed supply or are less than planned

  • Create trust in the demand plans for short, medium and long-term horizons, allowing in other business functions to use it for planning

  • Integrate volume, value and margin views underpinned by assumptions, vulnerability opportunity management and scenario planning

  • Increase sales revenue

You should consider Demand Management for your business if:

  • You are struggling to hit sales revenue and margin plans

  • It is unclear where growth will come from

  • You are wrestling with poor forecast accuracy and see over or under forecasting

  • Your people across all functions blame the forecast for problems in serving customers and high inventory

  • Ownership of sales and marketing plans is unclear

  • Lack of supply results in chaos and stress for sales, marketing and customer service teams

  • Sales and marketing blame the supply chain for not being able to fulfil demand and for losing sales and customer loyalty

  • You are feeling like you are constantly scrambling to hit the monthly sales plan

How we can help

  • Change management – monitoring and support of the implementation of change and its impact on your people

  • Transfer of our knowledge to your people so they can deploy an effective Demand Management process for your business

  • Facilitate the design of a Demand Management process to best fit your organization and its needs

  • Assessment of your Demand Management process and validation that has achieved Class A level of effectiveness – firmly embedded as the ‘way you do things’ and delivering the benefits you wanted

  • Scoping an action plan to define standards, address issues and take advantage of the opportunities identified, including resourcing, timelines and performance improvement expectations

  • A diagnostic assessment of the effectiveness of your current process, including identifying the root cause of any performance issues

  • Coaching your Demand Management process users as you introduce new ways of working

Demand Management

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Demand Management

Latest white papers & case studies

Getting the Most From Demand Management

Read a series of articles written by our Partners who gained hands-on, real-world demand management experience in industry before joining Oliver Wight.

Ausblick ins Ungewisse

Lässt sich in diesem Umfeld verlässlich vorhersagen, wie das Geschäft in zwei oder drei Jahren aussieht? Diese Prognose ist schwieriger, aber auch wichtiger denn je. Ein robuster Integrierter Unternehmensplanungsprozess (Integrated Business Planning Proce

Bedarfssegmentierung

Segmentierung meint nicht nur die Reaktion auf unterschiedliche Bedürfnisse der Verbraucher von heute. Es geht darum, langfristige Trends zu erkennen, zu wissen, was Kunden wollen, noch bevor sie es selbst wissen. Es geht darum, rechtzeitig zu agieren und

Making the Case: The ROI of Demand Management

This paper shows how to evaluate and communicate the value of improving the credibility of the demand plan. Several templates are included to help in quantifying and documenting the return on investment.

Want to Execute Your Strategy and Improve Financial Performance?

This white paper tells the story of one company that links Demand Management to strategy via its IBP process – and one company that does not. The white paper contrasts the financial performance of the two companies.

Uncertain Outlook: Managing The Sales Management Process with Vulnerabilities and Opportunities

In this environment, predicting what the business will look like in two or three years' time is more difficult but more important than ever.

The Power of Insight - Statistical forecasting as part of integrated demand management

Success in today’s consumer-driven business climate depends on meeting customer demand as efficiently and profitably as possible.

Role of Technology in Demand Management

Crum and Palmatier write about best practice solutions that will improve overall business performance for supply chain partners and all functions within a company impacted by the demand management process.

Relationships - The key to Effective Demand Planning

Poor forecasts are often symptoms of poor customer relationships. This paper deals with the role of sales account managers in developing collaborative relationships with key customers.

Realising the full potential of demand planning - Part 2

Written by Oliver Wight Partner, Rod Hozack, and the final installment of a two-part series, this paper focuses on the importance of behavior to influence change, as well as identifying the actions to take to positively impact the long-term demand plan.

Realising the Full Potential of Demand Planning - Part 1

In this two-part series, we explore how the longer-term demand plan should play a more prominent role in businesses. This first part will deal with the key elements in setting up the demand planning and forecasting process.

Forecasting & Communicating Project Demand to the Supply Organization

This paper is designed to help demand managers and planners recognize different demand streams and how to treat them, identify, categorize, and review project demand, and how to forecast and communicate demand and develop "what if" scenarios.

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Educational Public Workshops

Hands-on application workshops tailored to meet your organization's specific business objectives

Integrated Business Planning

For integrating functional plans, deploying business strategy, and driving business management

Supply Chain Management

For delivering customer value, optimal supply chain performance, and sustainable advantage

Demand Management

Creating, influencing, and managing demand

Product & Portfolio Management

For driving growth and margin through effective planning and management of your product and service portfolio

Integrated Tactical Planning

For dynamic management of product, demand, and supply plan execution

Analyze. Redefine. Transform.

For working through change and identifying key business issues and opportunities

Reset. Resilience. Results.

For focused and rapid intervention

Enterprise Business Planning

For breaking down functional silos, leveraging technology, and extending IBP benefits