While light years ahead of Excel spreadsheets, and so a major step in the right direction, securing a trade promotion management solution is really just the beginning. Great you have one. Now you need to make sure everyone is properly trained on it so they maximize its usefulness. Then you need to conduct diagnostics to track proper compliance, meaning that the users are putting in all their volume and deals by retailer by promoted group. Too often the users take a short cut and leave out data they don’t think is necessary. This leaves major data holes making proper tracking and reporting down the road impossible, which could lead to disastrous over or under spending. Continue reading