SOCIAL CONTRACTING: How to Justify Spend Analysis When There’s No Clear ROI Page 1
How to Justify Spend Analysis When There’s No Clear ROI Written by Rose Lee I know we don't have to preach to the choir. You already know that there are some expenses that are hard to justify – not because they aren't necessary, but because it's hard to prove that they are worth it. It can be difficult to show where the costs are going to impact the bottom line and why your CFO should consider them necessary.
Our procurement customers and prospects are all aware of just how practical spend analysis is for them, but sometimes find it difficult to explain exactly why. In a helpful paper, Spend Matters suggests 10 ways to justify the expense for spend analysis to the financial decision-makers at your company – click here to download the full article. For now, here are three of our biggest takeaways from that list:
Bundle spend analysis with initiatives that more clearly affect the bottom line. Analytics is the means to the end, not the project in and of itself – so demonstrate what that "end" is, and how it will impact the project and hence the company as a whole. Show how spend analysis will affect a range of important projects, or pitch it as a piece of one or two of those projects.
SOCIAL CONTRACTING: How to Justify Spend Analysis When There’s No Clear ROI Page 2
Make it personal. Analyze your own performance, and show how spend analysis will make your time even more productive. CFOs and Chief Human Capital Officers like it when you tell them how much more they’re going to get out of their employees when they aren’t wasting their time on over-analyzing spend-related data – so give them an example that they can’t ignore.
The biggest part of spend analysis is visibility. It shows budget holders where their money is going and what its doing. Get the spend managers to demand this kind of visibility, and Finance and IT will be much more likely to make it happen.
When your CFO, budget holders, and IT department see just how important, actionable data is contained in spend analysis, it will be far easier to get them on board. Contact us for a closer look at how to sell spend analysis to the decision-makers at your company, and discover just how quickly you can win them to your side.