• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

CPG Data Tip Sheet

Transforming your syndicated data into business insight

  • Home
  • Glossary
  • About Robin Simon
  • About Sally Martin
  • Contact
Blog » How To Answer Business Questions

How To Answer Business Questions

Featured Article

Thank You, Readers on Our 10th Anniversary!...

Robin Simon

Miscellaneous

Featured Article

20 Golden Rules to Help You Shine As An Analyst

Sally Martin

How To Answer Business Questions

Featured Article

Visualization: A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Numbers...

Robin Simon

How To Communicate Insights

Featured Article

Syndicated Retail Sales Data 101...

Sally Martin

How To Get Started with Nielsen/IRI

Volume Decomposition Using Panel Data: Why Are Sales Up or Down?

April 30, 2025 By Robin Simon Leave a Comment

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Many people are familiar with the analysis known as a volume decomposition (or due-to) that uses POS data.  This allows you to explain a change in sales and attribute gains and losses to specific business drivers like distribution, pricing, trade promotion and some other things.  We have a series of posts on this, starting with […]

Filed Under: How To Answer Business Questions Tagged With: due-to, panel data, volume decomposition

Tip Sheet Mailbag: Q&A on Velocity

May 31, 2023 By Sally Martin Leave a Comment

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

We get a lot of questions from readers. Sometimes our answers touch on things we haven’t fully explored in our articles. We want everyone to benefit from these nuggets of information so decided to post a series of Q&A articles which will highlight some interesting correspondence. Our first post covers three questions on the always […]

Filed Under: How To Answer Business Questions, Know Your Measures: Sales Tagged With: velocity

What will happen when we raise our price? (How to Apply Price Elasticity)

September 12, 2022 By Robin Simon 11 Comments

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

It’s almost impossible to read anything in the business press these days without coming across the term “inflation” and hearing about which companies have announced price increases this week. (In case you missed them, here are posts that we did on inflation:  from April and then a follow-up to a webinar we conducted in late […]

Filed Under: How To Answer Business Questions, Know Your Measures: Pricing and Promotion Tagged With: elasticity, pricing

A Few More Thoughts On Inflation…

June 7, 2022 By Sally Martin 1 Comment

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Last month, we were delighted to present a webinar through the Category Management Association. The webinar content was inspired by our inflation post from earlier this year. We wanted to share both the video replay and our slides from the CMA webinar. In addition, in preparing for the webinar, we had a few additional thoughts on […]

Filed Under: How To Answer Business Questions Tagged With: everyday price, inflation, pricing strategy

Inflation…It’s Back!

April 6, 2022 By Robin Simon Leave a Comment

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

“There are a lot of questions about inflation and how it impacts the business.  We would love to hear your thoughts on how we can analyze this topic!”    – Actual reader comment on CPG Data Tip Sheet, 3/22/22 Well, here are some thoughts for you! Background and Context Let’s start with some basic information:  […]

Filed Under: How To Answer Business Questions Tagged With: inflation

Analysis Tips: A Year Later

May 7, 2021 By Robin Simon 4 Comments

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Wow – we are now more than a year into the COVID-19 pandemic, which has impacted virtually all aspects of life and business.  And analysis. Around this time in 2020 I wrote this post which talks about important things to consider while doing analysis during uncertain, volatile times.  During several weeks in March-April, 2020, sales […]

Filed Under: How To Answer Business Questions Tagged With: analytic skills, coronavirus, covid-19

  • Page 1
  • Page 2
  • Page 3
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Page 7
  • Go to Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

Top Posts

  • The 2nd Most Important Measure: % ACV Distribution
  • Velocity: How Well Your Product REALLY Sells
  • Total Distribution Points: Master of All Distribution Measures
  • xAOC and MULO: Multi-Channel Markets in Nielsen & IRI
  • The Beginner’s Guide to Trade Merchandising Measurement

Search CPG Data Tip Sheet

Subscribe to New Posts

Get new posts delivered straight to your inbox. We won't share your email address with anyone.

Thank you for subscribing!

Subscribe

About CPG Data Tip Sheet

We (Sally Martin and Robin Simon) first met in business school and bonded over our interest in geeky marketing stuff. Eventually we both started independent consulting practices. Now we’ve reunited to share with you some of what we’ve learned in our decades of experience working with syndicated CPG data.

Categories

  • Glossary (79)
  • How To Answer Business Questions (42)
  • How To Communicate Insights (17)
  • How To Get Started with Nielsen/IRI (22)
  • How To Understand Your Database (12)
  • Know Your Measures: Distribution (24)
  • Know Your Measures: Pricing and Promotion (45)
  • Know Your Measures: Sales (21)
  • Miscellaneous (6)

Tags

ACV analysis examples analytic skills attributes average items base base weighted weeks career development category management channels characteristics coronavirus coverage factor covid-19 Database distribution due-to Excel tips Facts incremental markets Measures merchandising new items panel data periods pricing pricing strategy products promoted price quantify opportunity retailer direct data retailer markets shopper data store data Syndicated TDP the basics trade promotion trading areas velocity visualization visualizations volume bridge volume decomposition

Footer

Categories

  • Glossary (79)
  • How To Answer Business Questions (42)
  • How To Communicate Insights (17)
  • How To Get Started with Nielsen/IRI (22)
  • How To Understand Your Database (12)
  • Know Your Measures: Distribution (24)
  • Know Your Measures: Pricing and Promotion (45)
  • Know Your Measures: Sales (21)
  • Miscellaneous (6)

Search CPG Data Tip Sheet

Tags

ACV analysis examples analytic skills attributes average items base base weighted weeks career development category management channels characteristics coronavirus coverage factor covid-19 Database distribution due-to Excel tips Facts incremental markets Measures merchandising new items panel data periods pricing pricing strategy products promoted price quantify opportunity retailer direct data retailer markets shopper data store data Syndicated TDP the basics trade promotion trading areas velocity visualization visualizations volume bridge volume decomposition

Terms of Use | Copyright © 2025 CPG Data Insights · Log in