Analyzing Marketing Opportunities - Essay Example

GVA online defines market demand as the "total volume purchased in a specific geographic area by a specific customer group in a specified time period under a specified marketing program (GVA Online GVA, 2003/2004)." In the case of Qantas market demand is indicated by the total number of travelers and individuals who patronize the services that they offer, having the resources to pay for the bill charged by the company. When assessing the total demand for the company's product and services, the company takes into account only those people who can afford to pay them, excluding those who won't be able to afford those that they offer or those who don't intend to take a trip by plane.

Market demand, market potential, and sales forecast are interrelated. It is due to the fact that market demand is utilized to generate an accurate sales forecast and sales potential. As defined above, market demand is the historical demand for a good or service by customers backed by purchasing power. Sales forecasting is a very essential tool in assessing the health of a business entity. The accuracy of sales forecast can also give decision makers in the company the required information to come up with precise and useful strategies that will boost the revenue and profit of the business in the long run.

Companies that implement accurate sales forecasting processes reap benefits such as enhanced cash flow, knowledge on timing and quantity of inventory to be purchased, in-depth knowledge of customers and the products that they prefer, the ability to plan production and required capacity, an insight on the trend and pattern of sales, determination of the value of business above the value of current assets, and the ability to determine the expected return on investment (Conduct a Sales Forecast, 2000).

These benefits in turn, will help the company maximize its revenue and efficiency, minimized costs and further boost customer retention. In sales forecasting, the company come up with a sales volume which the company expects to generate in the future. Since the forecast is based on past sales of the company, it is necessary to know the dollar sales volume of the firm for the past several years. If not enough sales data have been recorded, it may be necessary to improvise (Conduct a Sales Forecast, 2000).

In the case of Qantas, sales forecasting can be done by gathering data on how the company performed during the past years. Historical data of number of passengers should be gathered according to the time-frame needed. In its other line of businesses like food service, it can utilize the historical data on dollar sales.Sales forecasting can be employed to predict the short-term and long term sales of the company. For a short-term forecast, it is usually enough to know the sales for the past few weeks or months in comparison with the corresponding period of the year before.

If sales for the past 4 weeks were 8 percent more than the corresponding 4 weeks of the preceding year, sales for the next few weeks can reasonably be expected to be 8 percent ahead of the corresponding period a year ago (Conduct a Sales Forecast, 2000). Adjustments have to be made, of course, for any known or predicted conditions