If you’re prepping for a quarterly business review and need a sales report that actually helps drive decisions (not just fill slides), you’re in the right place. This guide is for sales leaders, ops folks, or anyone who has to make sense of the numbers and present them to a room full of skeptics. We’ll walk through generating detailed sales reports in Gan — no fluff, just what works, what to skip, and how to avoid common headaches.
Why Gan for Sales Reporting?
Let’s get this out of the way: Gan isn’t magic, but it is a solid tool if you want visibility without a week of spreadsheet wrangling. Gan pulls together your sales data, lets you slice it by just about anything, and spits out reports that don’t require a decoder ring. If your company already uses Gan for sales tracking, you’re halfway there.
But Gan’s reporting tools have their quirks and limits. You won’t get Tableau-level custom viz, but for most quarterly reviews, you don’t need that. The goal: show what’s working, what’s not, and where to focus next quarter.
Step 1: Decide What Actually Matters
Before you open Gan, slow down. What does your team (and your execs) really need to see?
- Focus on decisions, not data dumps. What problems are you trying to solve? Where do you need clarity?
- Common QBR metrics: Closed deals, pipeline by stage, win rates, average deal size, top reps, lost reason analysis, sales by segment/region/product.
- Skip the vanity metrics. No one cares about number of calls logged or how many emails got sent (unless you’re managing SDRs).
Pro tip: Ask last quarter’s audience what was missing or what was overkill. Build that feedback in now—saves headaches later.
Step 2: Prep Your Data in Gan
Now you’re clear on what to show, time to make sure Gan’s data lines up. Garbage in, garbage out.
- Check sales stages and fields. Are reps actually updating deals in Gan? If not, your pipeline reports will be fiction.
- Standardize lost reasons and custom fields. You’ll thank yourself later when you’re not cleaning up typos like “prce” vs. “price.”
- Run a quick pipeline audit. Filter for deals with missing close dates or weird values. Fix the junk before you report on it.
What doesn’t work: Assuming Gan “just knows” what you want. If your team is sloppy with data entry, your report will show it.
Step 3: Build the Core Sales Report
Here’s where you actually use Gan’s reporting features. The steps can vary if your company’s Gan setup is heavily customized, but the basics hold true.
1. Go to the Reports Section
- Find the “Reports” or “Analytics” tab from Gan’s main menu.
- If you’ve never built a report here, start with Gan’s built-in templates (like “Quarterly Sales Summary”).
- For most teams, you’ll be able to clone and tweak an existing template, rather than starting from scratch.
2. Set the Right Filters
- Date range: Set start and end dates for the quarter you’re reviewing.
- Teams/segments: Filter by sales team, territory, or product line if relevant. Don’t overload with too many segments—pick what actually matters to your audience.
- Deal type: Closed won/lost, pipeline, renewals—whatever your QBR needs.
Pro tip: Save your filter set as a view (“Q2 FY24 Review” etc.), so you or your team don’t have to rebuild it next time.
3. Choose Your Metrics and Visuals
Gan lets you pick which columns, charts, and tables show up. Here’s what’s usually worth including:
- Total sales (closed won)
- Pipeline by stage (show a funnel or bar chart)
- Win rate (divide closed won by total deals for the quarter)
- Average deal size
- Top reps or teams (ranked by revenue or deals)
- Lost deal analysis (why deals slipped—and where)
- Sales by segment/region/product
Don’t bother: Pie charts with 12 slices. Tables with dozens of columns. You want clarity, not a data mural.
4. Customize for Your Audience
If your QBR includes execs, keep it visual and high-level with a few key charts. If you’re presenting to the sales team, add more granular tables (but still, not everything).
- Export options: Gan usually lets you export to PDF, PowerPoint, or even CSV. For QBRs, PDF or PPT is safest—CSV is for your own analysis.
- Branding: You can usually add your logo or company colors, but don’t spend an hour fiddling with fonts.
Step 4: Add the Right Commentary
A good report tells a story, not just a list of numbers. Gan can show you what happened, but you’ll have to say why—and what’s next.
- Highlight wins and losses. Call out what worked, what didn’t, and what’s changing next quarter.
- Trends over time: Compare this quarter to last. Are things improving or sliding?
- Context matters: “Pipeline up 20%” is only good news if win rates don’t drop through the floor.
- Don’t make excuses. If something went sideways, just say it—execs can smell spin a mile away.
What doesn’t work: Reading the report line-by-line in the meeting. Summarize, then point to specifics if asked.
Step 5: Share and Get Feedback
Don’t just fire off the report and call it done. You want people to actually use this, not ignore it until next quarter.
- Send it ahead of time. Give your audience a day or two to look it over.
- Ask for blind spots: “Is there anything missing or unclear?”
- Update your template: If someone asks for a new metric or segment, add it for next time (but only if it’s truly useful).
Pro tip: Keep a “what not to do” list. Every time you get a weird request (like, “Can I see sales by zip code for Q2 2021?”), jot it down. Save yourself from going down rabbit holes.
What to Ignore (And What to Watch Out For)
Gan is pretty good, but it’s not perfect. Here’s what to keep in mind:
- Don’t try to make Gan your BI tool. For super-custom dashboards, you’ll need something like Tableau or Looker.
- Ignore the “AI insights” unless they’re dead-on. Sometimes Gan’s suggestions are useful, but often they’re generic or obvious.
- Watch for laggy exports. Big reports can take a while to process—run them early, not five minutes before your QBR.
- Beware of “last updated” timestamps. If your sales data is synced from other systems, make sure it’s fresh before you report on it.
Wrapping Up: Keep It Simple, Iterate Fast
You don’t win points for complexity. The best sales reports are clear, focused, and easy to update. Start with the basics, improve each quarter, and don’t be afraid to cut what no one looks at. Gan gives you enough flexibility to cover 90% of what matters—just remember that you’re building a tool, not a monument.
If you keep things tight and useful, you’ll spend less time arguing with spreadsheets and more time actually improving sales. That’s the whole point.