Create a killer sales forecast in six steps Although a sales forecast isn't a crystal ball that will tell you the exact future of your business, it certainly is close enough. Here's how to make one.

A forecast can help keep you grounded and make you less tempted toward distraction.

Learn how to create a cash flow forecast and why it’s essential for managing your business finances, planning ahead and staying in control.

Financial forecasting allows you to measure the progress of your new business by benchmarking performance against anticipated sales and costs.

Companies use a sales forecast to create other important company documents such as departmental and individual sales goals, budgets for all departments and growth forecasts for investors.

Staying on forecast requires an active financial manager, who not only monitors what has happened, but projects what is going to happen—or fail to happen—in the immediate future.

Forecast in Excel is a useful feature that helps you create a forecast based on historical time-based series data analysis. It has some newly built capabilities.

Forecasts involve researching multiple variables to support what or why something may happen. The longer the period a forecast attempts to predict is, the more uncertain it will be.