How to Calculate Return on Investment (ROI)
Arlene Soto
1 min. read
Updated October 25, 2023
Return on investment (ROI) is a financial concept that measures the profitability of an investment. There are several methods to determine ROI, but the most common is to divide net profit by total assets. For instance, if your net profit is $50,000, and your total assets are $200,000, your ROI would be 25 percent. A common definition of ROI is “a profitability measure that evaluates the performance of a business by dividing net profit by net worth.”
In a small business, the uses of ROI could be to measure the performance of pricing policies, an investment in capital equipment, or an inventory investment. When purchasing assets in a business, such as inventory or equipment, you expect to get a financial benefit from the purchase. Return on investment is a tool to help decide between purchase alternatives that will either generate revenue or result in cost savings that benefit the net income of the business. Investors will also look at return on investment when choosing whether to fund a business venture.
Return on investment may also be measured unconventionally, such as in terms of social responsibility or environmental and societal benefits. This is more difficult to measure—in determining the social return on investment, the payback would need to be quantified to calculate the cost versus the benefit. A network of practitioners was formed in 2006 to facilitate the evolution of calculating social return on investment.
While return on investment is a useful tool to look at profitability, calculations are complicated by other factors such as time, maintenance costs, financing costs, other investment considerations, and the overall goals of the company. For instance, with the purchase of capital equipment, it is expected that equipment will provide a benefit to the company for several years. As such, the net income will need to be estimated for future time periods to determine the overall ROI. Additionally, maintenance costs over the life of the equipment will reduce the overall ROI. An accountant can assist with the formulas to determine more complex ROI calculations.
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Arlene Soto is the director of the Small Business Development Center at Tillamook Bay Community College. She is the former director the Southwestern Oregon Community College Small Business Development Center Director. She is responsible for outreach to Coos, Curry and Western Douglas Counties in Oregon to provide small business development services through free, confidential business advising and low-cost training programs. Arlene has been working with businesses in the accounting field since 1976 and in management since 1988. She is a Certified Management Accountant and a NASBITE Certified Global Business Professional with a Master’s degree in Management from Marylhurst University and a Bachelor’s degree in accounting from Portland State University.
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ROI Templates and Calculators For Many Disciplines
By Andy Marker | October 11, 2018
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In this guide, you will learn about the role of ROI, its formula, why you would use it, the four methods to easily calculate it, and additional methods to break down work. Download the essential Excel templates to perform a variety of ROI tasks, including content marketing metrics, website ROI analysis, healthcare quality initiative ROI, event ROI calculator, PLM ROI calculator, IT ROI, cost avoidance calculator, and TCO ROI.
Cash Flow ROI and Template
Cash Flow ROI (CFROI) is a proxy for a company’s economic return. This return is compared to the interest rate charged to commercial banks from the Federal Reserve’s standard (the discount rate), to see if there is value-added potential. CFROI is the average economic return in a year on all of a company’s investments. Enter your variables in this template to determine your company’s CFROI.
Download Cash Flow ROI and Template - Excel
In this template, you will enter the following variables:
Cost Fixed Assets : These are assets not expected to be used up or converted into cash within a year. They can include property, plant, and equipment (PPE), and may be used to generate income.
Cost Non-cash Working Capital : The sum of inventory and receivables
Cost Capitalized Operating Leases : Posted as an asset on the balance sheet, this type of lease expenses the lease payments.
Cost Accumulated Depreciation on Assets : An asset account with a credit balance.
Years Average Life of Assets : The accumulated depreciation divided by the current depreciation expense.
Percent Inflation Rate During Asset Life (Annual) : The change in purchasing power.
Years Remaining Life of Assets : This is calculated based on when the asset went into service and the preferred depreciation method.
Percent Salvage Value at End of Life : The resale value at the end of the asset’s useful life.
Cost Current Earnings Before Interest and Taxes (EBIT) : All incomes and expenses, except interest and income tax expenses.
Cost Current Depreciation : The deduction that helps spread the cost over many years.
Percent Marginal Tax Rate : The tax percent of your income based on your tax bracket.
Percent Nominal Cost of Capital : The rate of return needed to persuade your company to make a given investment.
Below are the outputs from these inputs:
Adjusted gross investment (for inflation)
Gross cash flow
Expected salvage value
Years remaining asset life
Cash flow return on investment (CFROI)
Cash flows per investment year
NPV and IRR Calculations and Template
Net present value (NPV) and internal rate of return (IRR) are metrics used to estimate ROI. NPV is the dollar difference between the present value of cash inflows and outflows over time. Companies use NPV as a tool to help them decide if an investment will provide long-term value, to compare different investment options, and to decide whether they should introduce a new product. IRR is the calculation that estimates the percent profitability of possible investments by taking the NPV equal to zero.
NPV looks at each cash flow separately, even when the discount rate is unknown. An NPV greater than zero makes a project financially worthwhile. IRR compares projects using one discount rate, predictable cash flows, equal risk, and a shorter time. IRR does not account for changes in the discount rate, which at times makes it a poor metric. Further, if there are a mix of positive and negative cash flows, IRR calculations are not effective. To calculate your company’s NPV and IRR, use this template.
Download NPV and IRR Calculations and Template - Excel
In this template, you will input the following:
Discount rate
Series payment type (None, Uniform, Gradient, or Exp Grad)
Value (A, G, or Eo)
G % for Exp Grad
The number of periods
For each period, the values
Below are the outputs for this template:
The sum for each period
The different series for each period
NPV for each series
NPV for each label
IRR for each label
Cost Avoidance Calculator Template
Preparing for a conference or large event is a big commitment for a business. There are direct costs, such as airfare, registration, and accommodations, and indirect costs such as the hours of preparation. Cost avoidance includes actions or event-substitutions that reduce future costs, such as planning virtual conferences, trainings, or parts replacement before failure (and subsequent damage to other parts). Cost avoidance activities may incur higher immediate costs but save money — sometimes totaling extreme savings — over time. This is a different concept from cost savings , in which you actually save the money you plan on spending. Lower spending, investment, or debt levels is what saves money.
Use this template to calculate cost avoidance as ROI. This calculator has a variety of event scenarios, including training, conference, and an in-person event. These costs are compared to a virtual briefing, a virtual conference, and a virtual large event, respectively. With your input, you can calculate the costs per participant for each, the cost avoidance factor per participant, and the avoidance factor.
Download Cost Avoidance Calculator - Excel
Marketing ROI and Content Marketing Templates
Marketing is a huge expense for any business. Whether your company invests in a comprehensive program that rolls out print and television ads as well as a social media presence, or just has a Facebook page, you should know the worth of your content over time. Sirius Decisions stated in 2013 that 60 to 70 percent of content goes unused. The cost of creation itself involves the per hour cost of each person by the number of creation hours involved, plus any actual content expenses. Having the ROI for marketing content can help motivate your staff to use it.
The marketing ROI (MROI) is simply the revenue generated from your content minus the cost to produce your content. This is a simple calculation, but some professionals caution that marketing professionals should define how and what they have measured in order to signal to stakeholders whether they are defining short-term channel-specific ROI or informing for long-term budget or strategic decisions. In this marketing ROI template, you will find space for multiple marketing initiatives in order to compare their relative value.
Download Marketing ROI Template - Excel
To use this template, input the following:
Total initiative cost
Total circulation/audience
Response rate (percent of generated leads by the audience)
Conversion rate (percent of leads which will purchase)
Average revenue per sale
Average profit per sale
From these inputs, you will get these outputs:
Total costs of all initiatives
Total cost/audience for all initiatives
Average profit per sale for all initiatives
Number of leads generated
Number of sales
Total revenue uplift
Total profit uplift
ROI percent
Cost per lead
Cost per sale
Break even response rate
Break even conversion rate
Break even profit per sale
The demand for marketing measurement and reporting is rising with marketing costs. There are many metrics that should be reported to show the success of your marketing program. Many professionals are not comfortable communicating their impact on the bottom line metrics to get the support they need. The key metrics that every marketing person should be comfortable reporting include the following:
Total Reach : The number of people your company can reach across your different networks and platforms. Each is a potential client.
Reach by Channel : The number of people following or subscribed per channel.
Total Website Visits : The number of people who visited your website in a period of time. This metric shows how well your inbound marketing is directing people to your website, which is also tracked month over month (MoM).
Website Visits by Source : This metric reports where people are coming to your website from to determine how well specific campaigns are working.
Total Leads Generated : This metric shows the interest your campaign generates for the products or services. It is one of the strongest ROI indicators.
Leads Generated by Source : This metric shows the channels that produce the most leads, which allows you to focus on the most valuable sources.
Total Customers Driven by Marketing : This metric tracks which marketing campaigns are yielding the most customers.
Marketing Generated Customers by Source : Track the source of the customers acquired by each campaign.
Conversion Rates
Visit to Lead Conversion Rat e: This measures the percent of people whose website visit becomes a new lead for sales.
Lead to Customer Conversion Rate : This measures the percent of people moving from leads to customers. This metric helps determine if your campaigns are generating sales-ready leads.
Visit to Customer Conversion Rat e: This is the overall funnel: whether your traffic generated turns into customers.
Content Marketing Metrics Template
Use each of the above five categories to record metrics for reporting with this template. It provides a space for each metric and ready-made graphs to add to your marketing deck so you can present your success. Fill out the reach, visits, leads, and customers templates, and your conversion rates template will automatically fill from your data.
Download Content Marketing Metrics Template
Excel | Smartsheet
Website ROI Analyses and Template
Google Analytics 4 (GA4) can help you determine the financial value of your content so you can calculate ROI. Use GA4 to track the URLs from all your web materials, such as your website, Facebook, newsletters, and any other sources. You can track who comes to your site and the path they took to get there. For example, you can get a count of how many times someone accessed your site from a Facebook post, or how many times your content was downloaded from your site.
To set up Google Analytics 4, start by either signing in or creating an Analytics account. Set up your GA4 property, add a data stream and install your Google Analytics with Google Tag Manager. Here’s how to set up Google Analytics 4:
Create an Analytics account, unless you already have one.
Create a Google Analytics 4 Property:
Go to the Admin section of your Google Analytics 4 interface and then click Create Property .
Enter the name of your property, choose your company’s country, reporting time zone, and the main currency your business operates.
Press Next , and answer several questions.
Then select your business objectives.
Click Create .
Configure your first Data Stream:
In Admin , in the desired Property column, click Data Streams > Add stream .
Click iOS app , Android app , or Web . In this article we focus on the Web stream.
For the Web , enter the URL of your website (the protocol https is already selected) and enter the name of your website.
You have the option to enable or disable Enhanced Measurement feature. By default it is enabled, but you can disable it if you want.
Press the Create Stream button.
Install Google Analytics 4 with Google Tag Manager (GTM):
Install GTM on your site.
After that, go to GA4 > Admin > Data Streams , select your Web data stream, and copy the Measurement ID .
Go to your Google Tag Manager container > Tags > New and choose Google Analytics: GA4 Configuration .
In the Measurement ID field, enter the Measurement ID you copied in the GA4 interface.
In the Triggering section, select Initialization – All Pages .
Name the tag and save it.
Test the GA4 installation:
Click Preview in the top right corner of the GTM interface.
Once you enable the preview mode, you should see the new GA4 tag among the tags that fired. If your tag didn't fire, check your tag's trigger settings.
Publish your changes in GTM by clicking the Submit button in the top right corner and then completing all the other steps that the user interface asks you to do.
Website ROI Calculator Template
You can add Goals in your analytics page to determine how well your pages are performing. Import the information from your website or app into this website ROI calculator to determine the ROI for your web-based traffic. You’ll find a full website campaign overview in a roll-up sheet, which tells you which campaigns are the most successful so you can compare them.
Download Website ROI Calculator - Excel
In this calculator template, you will find spreadsheets for each of your campaigns. The inputs for each campaign are as follows:
Date figures updated
Name of staff updating
ROI goal (percent)
ROI goal (days)
Site launch date
Number of unique visitors
Net number of unique visitors
Number pageviews
Development costs
Concept development
Operation, support, hosting
Internal resources
Other costs
Marketing costs
Calls to action and revenue
From these inputs, the following are your outputs:
Days ste ran
Average pageviews (pages per visitor)
Total development and operations cost
Total marketing cost
Total development operations and marketing
Total revenue
ROI percent (greater than 0 percent is a profit)
Revenue/costs (percent investment returned)
Days to break even (at the current rate of activity)
Days to reach ROI goal (at current rate)
Prognosis: ROI based on the time period listed and the current rate
Another way to figure out the revenue from your web content is to look at your online sales. Each time you sell products on your website, you can use your digital content to push customers to your sales pages. Each time you post a blog article, there should be links your customers can follow to reach your products. From these page visits, look at the revenue earned over the period and the number of visits from your content.
There are other programs you can use to manage your social media and marketing content that you can purchase as well. Some of these plug into your existing software to make your reporting easier. It’s worth reviewing their features and ease of use for your company if your revenue is dependent on your social marketing content. Some of these apps include Hootsuite, Hubspot, Buzzsumo, and Quintly.
Healthcare Quality Initiative ROI Templates
With the cost of health care skyrocketing, state-sponsored and private health plans should be able to prove their ROI to measure the effect of their quality improvement initiatives. These seven worksheets can help you prove the ROI of your quality improvement initiative:
Initial Costs : In this template, the costs of the personnel involved in the initiative are laid out, as well as any additional costs such as supplies, contracted services, and equipment. The total costs of the initial investment are calculated. This is Year 1 costs.
Operating Costs : This spreadsheet template pulls data from your initial costs spreadsheet for Year 1 and allows you to add data for consecutive years of your initiative. You can add and adjust for additional staff and known costs, and then the worksheet calculates the total costs for each year.
Claims-Intervention : Data from claims is used to estimate savings per year. Inputs for this spreadsheet include the actual payments from each claim category and the estimated savings by claim category for each year, the monthly membership for the initiative, and the number of months in the year the initiative was operational.
Claims-Control : Data from a control group of claims (without the intervention) shows a difference in the intervention versus changes that are an artifact of other reasons. It is important to maintain a control group to show that improvements come from your initiative and not from other or natural progressions.
Claims-Incremental : This spreadsheet compiles data from your claims-control and claims-intervention spreadsheets to determine your savings, and whether these savings are relevant to your quality initiative.
ROI : This spreadsheet automatically compiles data from your other spreadsheets and calculates the total discounted annual investment costs, the total discounted annual savings, and the ROI summary, which includes undiscounted annual net cash flows, cumulative ROI, net present value, and internal rate of return.
ROI-Incremental : Like the ROI spreadsheet, this template calculates the savings and ROI summary, but for incremental data.
Download Healthcare Quality Initiative ROI Templates
Project ROI Templates
There are many projects that require you to calculate ROI. Some of these may be due to technology or software system changes that can get extremely expensive, so being able to report ROI to your stakeholders becomes critical.
IT ROI Calculator Template
The following is an IT ROI calculator for any basic IT initiative or project. This calculator provides columns to include data for up to eight years, but you can add more years as columns. Inputs include the following:
Cost savings by year
Selection costs
Implementation costs
Ongoing costs
Project discount rates
The outputs from this include subtotals of each, cash flow, cumulative cash flow, and results. The results include the following:
Total project cost savings/income
Total project expenditures
Net project savings/income
ROI (after five years)
Net present value (NPV)
Internal rate of return (IRR)
Payback (breakeven) year
For ease of reporting, charts have been included that automatically show yearly project cash flows, overall project implementation analysis, and overall project cost savings/income analysis.
Download IT ROI Calculator
ROI Calculator for Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) Systems
Another software ROI calculator is for product lifecycle management (PLM) systems. Inputs for this calculator include the following:
Organization total revenue
Three-year total investment
Cost of capital
Direct cost of goods
Direct cost of goods benefit
Current operating margin
Current new product revenues
New product growth
Total research and development cost
Product development savings
Scrap reduction
Total inventory cost
Total labor cost
ECO labor cost/annum reduction
Percent total investment per year
Outputs from this calculator include the following:
Investment amounts
Part standardization benefit
TTM and collaboration
PDM savings
ECO reduction savings
Rework savings
Net cash flows
Use the diagram that visually shows the NPV of cumulative cash flow to update your stakeholders.
Download ROI Calculator for Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) Systems
Business Case and Event ROI Template
Building a business case helps your team or company justify the funding in any proposal. This is the expected benefit from any undertaking, whether you are making a case for replacing old equipment or starting a fresh marketing program. Using ROI and other cash flow metrics are an excellent method to help you build your business case — especially in the case of technology investments where financial managers can identify expected costs and benefits to calculate ROI. For example, you may want to make a business case for an event your company is considering hosting. Based on the ROI of past events, you can give your company information on what level of event is relevant for their goals. For example, you can make a case for a large formal event rather than a small less-costly cocktail party if the ROIs are markedly different, and the large event generates more customers. Use this simple event ROI calculator template to discover what ROI your past events yielded by inputting the number of attendees, costs, and deal information. The outputs then give the event cost per person, the ROI, and the ROI percent.
Download Business Case and Event ROI Template - Excel
Justification and Total Cost of Ownership ROI Template
In the same vein as proving a business case, a business plan must have some type of economic justification to provide stakeholders with the knowledge that they are making sound policy and finance decisions. ROI is an appropriate choice, although it does not consider the intangible or fuzzy costs and the benefits that a cost-benefit analysis (CBA) might reveal. However, since those measures are fuzzy, they may not accurately represent the data anyway.
Total cost of ownership (TCO) helps assess costs across an enterprise for products or systems. Mainly used in IT, TCO generally includes not only the hardware and software, but the acquisition, management, support, expenses, training, and any other productivity losses to be expected during implementation. This calculation is made using data over a number of years, so you can present the TCO lifecycle. TCOs can be used to comprehensively justify new software purchases — especially since they are generally such expensive prospects. TCO is the negative data in an ROI equation that shows what you are spending.
Additionally, many professionals interested in TCO also want cost avoidance data, or the positive data in an ROI equation. For example, with both TCO and cost avoidance, you can calculate the ROI of replacing a software system that performs some function that saves you money.
Use this template for such a scenario, where the TCO of a software system (such as a virtual briefing platform) and the cost avoidance of a virtual briefing are combined to discover ROI. You can also use the template independently to determine either TCO or cost avoidance. In this template, you will find space to input your direct and indirect costs across several years. Inputs include costs for the following:
Implementation
Programmatic work
There is also space to enter cost avoidance data. The following are calculated from the input data:
Total cost of ownership/year
Total substitution cost avoidance
Total potential cost avoidance
Potential ROI
Potential ROI percent
Potential ROI/year
Download Justification and Total Cost of Ownership ROI- Template – Excel
Simple ROI Templates
An ROI analysis can vary in the levels of its complexity. Regardless of the amount of data, the basic ROI formula details three steps:
Estimate the Cost : Costs may be hard or soft, depending on the project or event planned. Hard costs are simple and are anything that comes with a receipt, such as travel costs, registration fees, and entertaining costs. Each of these can be a line item when you build or use an ROI calculator. Soft costs are more complex since they can include the number of hours spent on preparing, attending, and following-up after the event. This can also include the time spent corresponding, researching, and traveling. Multiply these “soft” hours by the employees’ hourly rate from their base pay to calculate the soft cost. Combine the hard and soft costs for a better representation of the cost estimate.
Estimate the Return : First, define your success metric. For a conference-type event, this may vary, but consider the type of event and your company’s function in the marketplace. Your team should help you define your success metrics. Defining success metrics is part art, part science. If the metrics are developed, they should align with your strategic plan and your key performance indicators (KPIs) .
Compute ROI : Calculate ROI by dividing the activity return by its cost. Below is another formula you may follow:
ROI = (Gain from investment – Cost of investment) / (Cost of investment)
Simple ROI Calculator Excel Template
The attached simple ROI calculator is an Excel template. ROI may be calculated in Excel, but there is no specific formula for it — it simply displays inputs and outputs to help you come up with the final number. In this template, you will find four different methods to calculate ROI. But, you will always need to enter either your original investment value or share price.
Download Simple ROI Calculator Template
The four methods in the above template include net income method, capital gain method, total return method, and the annualized method: Net Income Method: Divide net profit by total assets. Enter your original investment value and its net income, which is what was earned less the taxes and deductions.
Capital Gain Method : Subtract your cost base from your capital proceeds. Enter your original share price and the current share price.
Total Return Method : The actual rate of return on an investment over a period of time, including capital gains, interest, and any dividends. Enter the original share price, your dividends, and the current share price.
Annualized Method: This is the geometric average amount earned every year over a given time. It is geometric to show compounding. Enter the original share price, the sale share price, when you purchased the share(s), and when you sold them.
What Is a Return on Investment (ROI)?
Companies use ROI to gauge the profits from any type of investment, whether time, money, or energy. Return on investment (ROI) is a performance measure that can be calculated in simple cases through a formula or in more complex cases via a template with multiple formulas. Calculations occur when you input what is spent versus what is earned. It can also be an investment view of a company’s cash flow via an action they took. In other words, the benefit of an investment is divided by the cost to see if it was worth making. ROI has many interpretations, depending on the business industry. For many businesses, ROI is simply the measurement of financial gain or loss relative to the costs such as deductions, fees, labor, or resources.
In project management, ROI helps businesses determine whether they want to invest in specific projects, and in the case of several projects, to decide between them. In the case of long-term projects, businesses must take into account inflation and future income to accurately calculate ROI. In the case of some quality projects, the ROI may be difficult to calculate because it’s hard to turn non-quantifiable data such as ideas and good feelings into monetary values. For example, spending money to put in a new breakroom may make your employees happier and feel more positive towards their environment. However, it’s difficult to calculate the revenue of a new break room.
ROI is used as a concept and a specific formula. As a concept, it can measure profitability or efficiency. People refer to ROI when discussing what they get back for their input. However, ROI is a true metric that can be calculated as a ratio or percentage. The basic formula to calculate ROI is:
ROI = Net Profit / Total Investment *100
You would use ROI for several reasons:
Provide Quantifiable Value : ROI provides leaders with information about a project’s worth, and can help garner their support by removing uncertainty and subjective benefits.
Build Stakeholder Support : When a project is up for decision (whether or not it gets approved), calculating the ROI gives stakeholders the information they need to either provide or deny their support.
Show Additional Benefits : Calculating ROI becomes a forcing function for staff to determine benefits they may not have considered at the start of a project.
Prioritize Projects : Many companies use ROI as a metric to rank their projects.
However, ROI modeling has some limitations. Some models do not adequately factor in accurate-enough costs and returns. Soft, or intangible, costs are difficult to assess. Another issue is that the costs and returns of a project may not match predictions. Finally, some ROI models may not give more than a financial measure of a project, giving stakeholders an inadequate measure of return or making the project’s actual return misunderstood.
There is more than one way to model ROI, and different analysts can model differently, possibly mischaracterizing the outcome. Therefore, stakeholders and business leaders should ask not only the ROI of a project but how it was modeled. The effects that a project has on more than just the business are sometimes left out. For example, social return on investment (SROI) is a modern metric that considers social, environmental, economic, and environmental outcomes in projects. SROI uses impact mapping, which is a strategic planning technique.
The ROI Formula
ROI is calculated by subtracting the project cost from the financial value. Financial value is what the project pays you back, but occasionally there is uncertainty in assigning monetary values to outcomes. To do so, break the values into known components and define them. These components usually include time, volume, and dollars for both the present and the project, such as this formula:
Financial value = TVD present – TVD project
V = volume, quantity of units
D = dollars/cost
Present = the current value
Project = the value of a successful project
One example of using this formula considers a project that decreases the production cycle by 20 percent. The team calculated that the production cost of their product was $5,000. The time to produce one unit was 10 hours, with a $90/hour wage and $41,00 worth of materials. For the production of 500 of these units, the product line cost was $2.5 million.
The project decreased the production cycle time by 20 percent, from 10 hours to eight hours, while keeping the remaining costs the same. The new production cost is $4,820 per unit and $2.41 million for the yearly product line. Therefore, using the formula above, the projects financial value is:
Financial value = $2,500,000 - $2,410,000 = $90,000 in annual savings
The project cost is the second component of the ROI formula. There are two main variables that compose project cost: work decomposition over time and cost of the work. The work decomposition over time breaks down the work or tasks into the most granular level possible, and in best practice by chronological order. In project management, this may also be known as the work breakdown structure (WBS). Here’s an example:
Insert Chart Here
For more information about WBS, see “ Getting Started with Work Breakdown Structures (WBS) .”
The costs of the required work need the practitioner to consider certain factors when they allot costs. Even these factors they can vary widely, they can include the following:
Any rentals/leases
Resources, such as workers
Hours to complete the work
Capital costs (hardware/software)
Once you have these costs defined, you can add them to your WBS, such as in the following example:
Some other methods of breaking down work include the following:
Gantt Charts : These are the WBS over time, and put your tasks into phases of work. To create your own, see “ How to Create a Gantt Chart in Excel .”
Process Maps or Process Flow Diagrams : These show the project work as workflow steps. This is a visual representation of your work. For more information on process maps, see “ Essential Guide to Business Process Mapping .”
These are all helpful tools to cost out your projects, but practitioners should also consider the following:
One-time Costs Versus Costs Over Time : Some equipment may be a one-time purchase or a rental over years. Include those costs over the period to get accurate ROI figures.
Consider What the Opportunity Cost May Be : When you have more than one project to compare, there may be savings you can attribute back to your company. Remember that the opportunity to perform the project may have value.
Estimate Liberally : Whenever there is a gray area for cost estimation, estimate higher. Cost overruns delay projects and erode confidence.
Once you have calculated all the financial values and project costs, the ROI formula is simple. Let’s assume in the following example that there is a one-time cost of $400,000 for our project to decrease the production time by 20 percent. In this example, Year 5 breaks even, and as the company goes forward, there is an appreciable saving:
ROI and Returns-Based Analysis
Another calculation that is important in a discussion of ROI is returns-based analysis . The financial industry performs style analyses when they are trying to determine the type of investment behavior either an investor or a money manager is using. Two distinct types of styles are holdings-based and returns-based. Returns-based is more widely used by financial professionals because monthly input data is readily available. The returns-based analysis compares three to five years of a portfolio’s monthly returns to the total returns of various style-based indexes. Inferences can be made about how closely the portfolio resembles the different indexes. In other words, a fund manager or investor professes that they will invest in a certain manner. A returns-based analysis is a model that shows if they have done so. Although not directly calculating ROI, a returns-based analysis can help determine whether your investment manager is worth their cost.
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How to Calculate ROI to Justify a Project
- 12 May 2020
Understanding how to calculate the potential return on investment (ROI) of a project is an essential financial skill for all professionals to develop.
If you’re an employee, knowing how to calculate ROI can help you make the case for a project you’re interested in pursuing and have taken the lead on proposing. If you’re a manager, understanding ROI can give you greater insight into your team's performance . If you’re an executive, working knowledge of ROI can make it easier for you to identify which projects should be greenlit and which should be passed over. Once ROI is proven, it may be possible to replicate success by applying lessons learned from the first project to other segments of the business.
If you’re unfamiliar with accounting and finance , the prospect of determining the ROI of a project may seem beyond your abilities. However, it’s not an overly complicated process. By understanding the basics of financial valuation, which can enable you to put a monetary value on companies, projects, or anything that produces cash flows, anyone can learn to calculate the ROI of a project.
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What Is Return on Investment?
Return on investment (ROI) is a metric used to denote how much profit has been generated from an investment that’s been made. In the case of a business, return on investment comes in two primary forms, depending on when it’s calculated: anticipated ROI and actual ROI.
Anticipated vs. Actual ROI
Anticipated ROI , or expected ROI, is calculated before a project kicks off, and is often used to determine if that project makes sense to pursue. Anticipated ROI uses estimated costs, revenues, and other assumptions to determine how much profit a project is likely to generate.
Often, this figure will be run under a number of different scenarios to determine the range of possible outcomes. These numbers are then used to understand risk and, ultimately, decide whether an initiative should move forward.
Actual ROI is the true return on investment generated from a project. This number is typically calculated after a project has concluded, and uses final costs and revenues to determine how much profit a project produced compared to what was estimated.
Positive vs. Negative ROI
When a project yields a positive return on investment , it can be considered profitable, because it yielded more in revenue than it cost to pursue. If, on the other hand, the project yields a negative return on investment , it means the project cost more to pursue than it generated in revenue. If the project breaks even, then it means the total revenue generated by the project matched the expenses.
Return on Investment Formula
Return on investment is typically calculated by taking the actual or estimated income from a project and subtracting the actual or estimated costs. That number is the total profit that a project has generated, or is expected to generate. That number is then divided by the costs.
The formula for ROI is typically written as:
ROI = (Net Profit / Cost of Investment) x 100
In project management, the formula is written similarly, but with slightly different terms:
ROI = [(Financial Value - Project Cost) / Project Cost] x 100
Check out our video on return on investment below, and subscribe to our YouTube channel for more explainer content!
Calculating the ROI of a Project: An Example
Imagine that you have the opportunity to purchase 1,000 bars of chocolate for $2 apiece. You would then sell the chocolate to a grocery store for $3 per piece. In addition to the cost of purchasing the chocolate, you need to pay $100 in transportation costs.
To decide whether this would be profitable, you would first tally your total expenses and your total expected revenues.
Expected Revenues = 1,000 x $3 = $3,000
Total Expenses = (1,000 x $2) + $100 = $2,100
You would then subtract the expenses from your expected revenue to determine the net profit.
Net Profit = $3,000 - $2,100 = $900
To calculate the expected return on investment, you would divide the net profit by the cost of the investment, and multiply that number by 100.
ROI = ($900 / $2,100) x 100 = 42.9%
By running this calculation, you can see the project will yield a positive return on investment, so long as factors remain as predicted. Therefore, it’s a sound financial decision. If the endeavor yielded a negative ROI, or an ROI that was so low it didn’t justify the amount of work involved, you would know to avoid it moving forward.
It’s important to note that this example calculates an anticipated ROI for your project. If any of the factors affecting expenses or revenue were to change during implementation, your actual ROI could be different.
For example, imagine that you have already purchased your chocolate bars for the agreed-upon $2 apiece and paid $100 to transport them. If the most that the store will pay you is $2.25 per chocolate bar, then your actual revenues drop substantially compared to your projected revenues. The result is a reduced net profit and a reduced actual ROI.
Actual Revenues = 1,000 x $2.25 = $2,250
Net Profit = $2,250 - $2,100 = $150
ROI = ($150 / $2,100) x 100 = 7.14%
Circumstances are rarely as straightforward as this example. There are typically additional costs that should be accounted for, such as overhead and taxes. In addition, there’s always the possibility that an anticipated ROI will not be met due to unforeseen circumstances, but the same general principles hold true.
How to Use Finance to Pitch Your Project
Have you ever pitched a project to senior management, only to have the idea shot down under the guise of “not making financial sense?" It happens more often than you might think. By learning how to calculate ROI for projects you’re interested in pursuing, you can self-evaluate them before they're raised up to decision-makers within your organization and defend them as they’re being considered.
Similarly, by understanding how to calculate ROI after a project you’ve spearhead is done, you can better speak to the contributions that you and your team have made toward shared company goals.
High-performing businesses are successful because they make smart decisions about when and where they allocate available resources. Calculating the ROI of a project before it moves forward can help ensure that you’re making the best possible use of the resources you have available.
To learn more ways that you can use financial concepts to improve your efficacy and advance your career, explore our online finance and accounting courses . Download your free flowchart to determine which is right for you.
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What Is Return on Investment (ROI)?
- How to Calculate ROI
Why Is ROI a Useful Measurement?
- Limitations
- Developments
The Bottom Line
- Corporate Finance
- Financial Ratios
Return on Investment (ROI): How to Calculate It and What It Means
Return on investment (ROI) is a performance measure used to evaluate the efficiency or profitability of an investment or compare the efficiency of a number of different investments. ROI tries to directly measure the amount of return on a particular investment, relative to the investment’s cost.
To calculate ROI , the benefit (or return) of an investment is divided by the cost of the investment. The result is expressed as a percentage or a ratio .
Key Takeaways
- Return on Investment (ROI) is a popular profitability metric used to evaluate how well an investment has performed.
- ROI is expressed as a percentage and is calculated by dividing an investment's net profit (or loss) by its initial cost or outlay.
- ROI can be used to make apples-to-apples comparisons and rank investments in different projects or assets.
- ROI does not take into account the holding period or passage of time, and so it can miss opportunity costs of investing elsewhere.
- Whether or not something delivers a good ROI should be compared relative to other available opportunities.
Investopedia / Lara Antal
How to Calculate Return on Investment (ROI)
The return on investment (ROI) formula is as follows :
ROI = Current Value of Investment − Cost of Investment Cost of Investment \begin{aligned} &\text{ROI} = \dfrac{\text{Current Value of Investment}-\text{Cost of Investment}}{\text{Cost of Investment}}\\ \end{aligned} ROI = Cost of Investment Current Value of Investment − Cost of Investment
"Current Value of Investment” refers to the proceeds obtained from the sale of the investment of interest. Because ROI is measured as a percentage, it can be easily compared with returns from other investments, allowing one to measure a variety of types of investments against one another.
ROI is a popular metric because of its versatility and simplicity. Essentially, ROI can be used as a rudimentary gauge of an investment’s profitability. This could be the ROI on a stock investment, the ROI a company expects on expanding a factory, or the ROI generated in a real estate transaction.
The calculation itself is not too complicated, and it is relatively easy to interpret for its wide range of applications. If an investment’s ROI is net positive, it is probably worthwhile. But if other opportunities with higher ROIs are available, these signals can help investors eliminate or select the best options. Likewise, investors should avoid negative ROIs , which imply a net loss.
For example, suppose Jo invested $1,000 in Slice Pizza Corp. in 2017 and sold the shares for a total of $1,200 one year later. To calculate the return on this investment, divide the net profits ($1,200 - $1,000 = $200) by the investment cost ($1,000), for an ROI of $200/$1,000, or 20%.
With this information, one could compare the investment in Slice Pizza with any other projects. Suppose Jo also invested $2,000 in Big-Sale Stores Inc. in 2014 and sold the shares for a total of $2,800 in 2017. The ROI on Jo’s holdings in Big-Sale would be $800/$2,000, or 40%.
What Are the Limitations of ROI?
Examples like Jo's (above) reveal some limitations of using ROI, particularly when comparing investments. While the ROI of Jo's second investment was twice that of the first investment, the time between Jo’s purchase and the sale was one year for the first investment but three years for the second.
Jo could adjust the ROI of the multi-year investment accordingly. Since the total ROI was 40%, to obtain the average annual ROI, Jo could divide 40% by 3 to yield 13.33% annualized. With this adjustment, it appears that although Jo’s second investment earned more profit, the first investment was actually the more efficient choice.
ROI can be used in conjunction with the rate of return (RoR) , which takes into account a project’s time frame. One may also use net present value (NPV) , which accounts for differences in the value of money over time due to inflation. The application of NPV when calculating the RoR is often called the real rate of return .
What Are the Wider Applications of ROI?
Recently, certain investors and businesses have taken an interest in the development of new forms of ROIs, called social return on investment (SROI) . SROI was initially developed in the late 1990s and takes into account broader impacts of projects using extra-financial value (i.e., social and environmental metrics not currently reflected in conventional financial accounts).
SROI helps understand the value proposition of certain environmental, social, and governance (ESG) criteria used in socially responsible investing (SRI) practices. For instance, a company may decide to recycle water in its factories and replace its lighting with all LED bulbs. These undertakings have an immediate cost that may negatively impact traditional ROI—however, the net benefit to society and the environment could lead to a positive SROI.
There are several other new variations of ROIs that have been developed for particular purposes. Social media statistics ROI pinpoints the effectiveness of social media campaigns—for example how many clicks or likes are generated for a unit of effort. Similarly, marketing statistics ROI tries to identify the return attributable to advertising or marketing campaigns.
So-called learning ROI relates to the amount of information learned and retained as a return on education or skills training. As the world progresses and the economy changes, several other niche forms of ROI are sure to be developed in the future.
What Is ROI in Simple Terms?
Basically, return on investment (ROI) tells you how much money you've made (or lost) on an investment or project after accounting for its cost.
How Do You Calculate Return on Investment (ROI)?
Return on investment (ROI) is calculated by dividing the profit earned on an investment by the cost of that investment. For instance, an investment with a profit of $100 and a cost of $100 would have an ROI of 1, or 100% when expressed as a percentage. Although ROI is a quick and easy way to estimate the success of an investment, it has some serious limitations. ROI fails to reflect the time value of money , for instance, and it can be difficult to meaningfully compare ROIs because some investments will take longer to generate a profit than others. For this reason, professional investors tend to use other metrics, such as net present value (NPV) or the internal rate of return (IRR) .
What Is a Good ROI?
What qualifies as a “good” ROI will depend on factors such as the risk tolerance of the investor and the time required for the investment to generate a return. All else being equal, investors who are more risk-averse will likely accept lower ROIs in exchange for taking less risk. Likewise, investments that take longer to pay off will generally require a higher ROI in order to be attractive to investors.
What Industries Have the Highest ROI?
Historically, the average ROI for the S&P 500 has been about 10% per year. Within that, though, there can be considerable variation depending on the industry. During 2020, for example, many technology companies generated annual returns well above this 10% threshold. Meanwhile, companies in other industries, such as energy companies and utilities, generated much lower ROIs and in some cases faced losses year-over-year. Over time, it is normal for the average ROI of an industry to shift due to factors such as increased competition, technological changes, and shifts in consumer preferences.
Return on investment is a metric that investors often use to evaluate the profitability of an investment or to compare returns across a number of investments. It is expressed as a percentage. ROI is limited in that it doesn't take into account the time frame, opportunity costs, or the effect of inflation on investment returns, which are all important factors to consider.
World Health Organization. " Investment for Health and Well-Being: A Review of the Social Return on Investment From Public Health Policies, " PDF Download. Pages 2-4.
DQYDJ. " S&P 500 Historical Return Calculator ."
Fortune. " The Best Stocks of 2020 Have Made Pandemic Investors Even Richer ."
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8 Dependable ROI Templates to Track Returns in Excel & ClickUp
ClickUp Contributor
February 13, 2024
ROI, or Return on Investment, is the go-to metric for tracking the profitability of anything done with a business motive. It’s all about finding how much a project earns relative to its cost, expressed as a percentage. Negative ROIs mean a venture is running at a loss.
Although ROI calculations are pretty basic, they hold immense weight in the corporate world. Decisions about pursuing or dropping projects ride on these numbers.
Sounds demanding? That’s why you need the right ROI templates to manage your company portfolio and optimize your capital allocation strategy.
We bring you a list of the most sophisticated ROI templates for managing sales and investments and making data-driven decisions to maximize your bottom line.
What is an ROI Template?
What makes a good roi template, 1. clickup roi commission sheet template, 2. clickup sales tracker template, 3. clickup sales pipeline template, 4. clickup real estate action plan template, 5. clickup sales kpi template, 6. marketing roi template by slideteam, 7. powerpoint roi tracking report template by slideteam, 8. excel roi template by 365financialanalyst.
Before we get to templates, let’s refresh our knowledge of ROIs from a mathematical standpoint. Return on investment essentially reveals the rate at which your investment in a project or activity has grown or shrunk. Here’s an ROI equation:
Return on Investment (ROI) = (Total Sales – Cost of Investment) ÷ Cost of Investment
The relevance of everything a business does boils down to returns, which is why you need a template to add structure to your net income method .
An ROI template is a financial review tool geared toward project managers and strategic leaders. It centralizes data from ongoing and proposed projects, giving you insights into:
- The most worthwhile projects
- Projects that should be scrapped due to negative/low ROIs
- Lucrative investment opportunities
- Projects blocking more funds (capital) than they should
- The overall financial health of the company
This template provides the framework for planning, calculating, and illustrating your ROI for internal stakeholders. It may come with extra features to set goals, outline ROI-boosting activities, track sales metrics, prioritize projects and tasks, or make predictions.
The type of ROI template you need depends on your goal, whether analyzing a single project, comparing several of them, or creating a company-wide portfolio. Still, for the template to be effective, it should have certain key characteristics , such as:
- Customizability : It should allow you to edit and customize different sections to calculate ROI and track the total cost. For example, many templates enable you to tailor goals using the OKR (objectives and key results) framework
- Visual appeal : You should be able to add elements like images, charts, and graphs to provide a visual representation of ROIs and facilitate comparison
- Clear structure : The best ROI templates have organized sections that let you absorb key information on a price sheet
- Versatility and scalability : While ROI templates typically don’t cater to a specific industry, they must adapt easily to represent different kinds and sizes of investments, expenses, projects, or income pools
- Collaboration options : It should support real-time review and brainstorming sessions with your strategy team
8 ROI Templates to Use in 2024
You’ll find more than a few ROI calculators on the internet, but the well runs pretty dry when it comes to analysis-friendly templates to determine the company’s cash flow.
Keeping diverse business goals in mind, we have cherry-picked eight of the most power-packed ROI templates to evaluate and compare projects and business processes. A large chunk of our templates are from ClickUp —they are completely free and work for most use cases. Options beyond ClickUp may come with a price tag.
Let’s dive in and set your business up for growth!
Our first pick is the ClickUp ROI Commission Sheet Template —ideal for reviewing sales team ROIs and the amount spent on commissions for each member!
This template helps you keep track of the commissions earned by different sales teams and individual members. It’s a one-stop tool to calculate commissions against the number of units sold.
To start using the template, it’s best to keep an ROI range in mind, say 25%–30%. You can feed simple to complicated commission structures to the template and ensure everyone is fairly compensated for the work put in. Adjust commission rates based on current market trends as long as your ROI doesn’t fall below the desired rate.
One of the most commendable features of the template is that your team members can have different commission rates based on their experience or performance .
Here are some practical things you can do with this template:
- ClickUp Goals to every salesperson and track their performance (keep targets realistic to avoid demotivating your team)
- Customize formulas for total commissions or ROI
- Set milestones and incentivize team members to reach them
- Provide feedback to your sales team on a monthly or quarterly basis
- Make budget forecasts based on the latest sales reports
Using the template couldn’t be simpler—just add the names of each salesperson along with relevant information like team classification and commission structure. Track the data through Commission per Team and Commissions per Area views.
Constant changes in sales can make maintaining an average ROI challenging. Luckily, you have the ClickUp Sales Tracker Template to stabilize ROIs in the face of ever-evolving sales processes . This template comes with a chock-full of features to help you:
- Obtain accurate real-time information about all moving aspects of your sales workflow
- Tailor plans and write effective OKRs to meet targets
- Test different sales techniques
- Keep track of achieved and missed goals
If you want to use this template efficiently, all you need to do is feed the right data in the provided Custom Fields. Add info about virtually anything—from Product Type and Profit Target to Number of Returns .
Based on your team’s performance, you can calculate ROIs sorted by products or time periods. Play with the template views to get streamlined perspectives.
For example, the Sales Volume per Month View outlines the total sales for each month, helping you identify patterns and predict future sales. Or, you can use the Sales Volume per Product View and explore the ROI quality of your most popular products.
Keeping track of sales on your own can be a back-breaking task, especially if your company sells thousands of units every month. That’s hardly a problem with this template—it offers excellent features to collaborate with and delegate tasks to your teammates.
And thanks to ClickUp’s rich customization options , you can create a sales tracker that fits your company like a glove!
Keeping track of potential customers is a top priority for any business. But let’s be honest, taking care of leads, conversions, and customer journeys 24/7 is no picnic.
A trivial oversight can lead to losing credibility with customers, ultimately hurting your ROI. But thanks to ClickUp’s Sales Pipeline Template , you can watch your sales pipeline like a hawk day in and day out!
The template provides a host of savvy features to improve client management . Its multiple views and carefully-designed sections let you visualize your sales funnel from top to bottom—review, prioritize, and manage leads with a drag-and-drop interface.
This template is divided into two sections :
- Pipeline management
- Account management
Both parts provide in-depth insight into your sales processes.
To predict future sales and ROIs with high accuracy , we recommend breaking down your pipeline into smaller phases, such as Lead Qualification, Contact, Negotiation, and Closing. Assign tasks to members at each stage, establishing accountability in the process.
Account management is all about customer tracking, addressing feedback and service requests, and identifying areas for improvement. Add Custom Statuses and Last Contacted attributes to each customer to keep your CRM workflow consistent and productive!
Bummed about making manual changes to the template every day? Don’t worry! This template comes with three ClickUp Automations to update Lists and assignees on autopilot.
The ClickUp Real Estate Action Plan Template may be the only industry-specific option on our list, but trust us when we say it can help you make financial projections for any niche .
This template is designed to serve realtors and property managers . It lets you organize and prioritize tasks through daily action plans, helping you create a roadmap for your investment journey and compare properties using ROIs.
At its core, this template is about prospecting potential investment opportunities to increase your ROI. Its profitability-based comparison features make it a versatile ROI analysis tool for any project or portfolio .
Here’s how to use the template to measure the growth of your investments:
- Define measurable goals: Note your target profits and the key metrics for measuring success . You can use ClickUp Docs for record-keeping
- Identify your investments: Add uniform details about all your investment avenues to facilitate comparison. You can generate ROI projections for all or specific projects
- Make side-by-side ROI comparisons: Leverage ROI figures to select the project(s) worth investing in
It’s only a rough sketch, though, as dozens of processes stand between you and your desired ROI. But remember that this is an action plan template , so it will help you build a detailed plan for increasing your yield in the long run. 🤑
To understand and boost your ROI, you first need to analyze sales metrics from different angles. The ClickUp Sales KPI Template sets you up with a central hub for measuring your team’s performance and making plans for increasing revenue potential! 📈
The template presents sales KPIs across three sections :
- Weekly report
- Monthly report
- Revenue board per month (a Kanban-style display showcasing weekly sales for one month)
The template gives you 15 Custom Fields representing metrics like the number of sales, total sales revenue, upsell attempts, successful upsells, and number of quotes.
Want to investigate particular metrics? You can sort between fields using filters and generate focused reports with net profit figures for every week or month.
Besides helping you monitor your ROI, this template offers plenty of collaboration and customization tools . You can color-code sections, play with columns, and create unique layouts to promote at-a-glance views of relevant KPIs.
One of the fastest ways to ensure more people hear about your company is through marketing content and marketing campaigns, whether email, social media ads, flyers, or billboards. But would you be pouring money into marketing projects without calculating ROI?
A marketing-specific ROI template helps predict the success of your efforts by estimating the profitability of the relative spending. It’s used to budget or justify the marketing costs like ads, customer surveys, agency fees, and staff salaries.
Make use of the Marketing ROI Template by SlideTeam and create the perfect visual representation of your past or future campaigns for your stakeholders. This PowerPoint template comes with 100% editable slides, custom icons, and shapes.
While the default slides have predefined elements, it’s up to your marketing team to change them according to your audience and brand. You can customize the colors and fonts and add dialog boxes to make the presentation easy to grasp for first-time viewers.
This template is mostly useful for communicating your plans with your leadership or accounts teams in budget meetings.
Calculating ROIs is no big deal, but knowing how to present the data cohesively to a general audience is a tough job. In most cases, the biggest obstacle is communicating numbers to people with no background in finance or accounting.
The PowerPoint ROI Tracking Report Template by SlideTeam resolves this problem. Its simple table structure presents numerical basics without overwhelming your audience. You can list the cost of an investment and the generated revenue and connect them with the ROI value in a single window!
Representing profit numbers can be even more challenging if you’re showcasing more than one investment, which is often the case. But with this template, you’ll have more than enough room to outline multiple investments and create reports on how they compare.
One of the most significant benefits of this template is its user-friendliness . Since it’s a PowerPoint template, most users enjoy the sense of familiarity it provides.
Every element in the template is customizable—add or delete sections, change colors, or use icons and symbols to add character to your presentation!
If all you need is an ROI calculator for super complicated investments or projects, the Excel ROI Template by 365FinancialAnalyst fits the bill.
This template is intricately designed for complex ROI calculations that depend on various variables, such as sales team commissions, taxes, and dividend yields. Committing to such labor-intensive, error-prone computations is not viable manually.
One small mistake could create a distorted picture of your company’s health. As a result, you could end up taking the wrong moves and hurting your business.
This free ROI Excel spreadsheet template is all about making calculations straightforward. It comes with defined formulas for extracting the correct return rate after factoring in all variables—all you have to do is enter the data in the required cells.
The template prioritizes functionality over aesthetics, so don’t expect customization or collaboration features.
Measure Your Company’s Profitability With ROI Templates
ROI templates are valuable tools for determining your company’s profitability. By utilizing these templates, you can easily and accurately track your investments, measure their returns, and ultimately make informed decisions about finances.
Remember, the key to boosting your company’s profitability lies in consistent monitoring and analyzing. ROI templates can serve as your guiding light in this process, helping you navigate the complex landscape of business finance.
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Check out some Return On Investment examples and how to use it to invest
ROI, Return On Investment , is one of the most used methodologies to gauge the possibility of making a profit on a project or business, or even compare several of them, in order to choose the best one.
This is because this formula is very practical to use.
Actually, it’s quite simple:
Return On Investment formula (as a percentage):
ROI = RETURN – EXPENSES x 100 EXPENSES
We multiply by 100 so that the value is represented as a percentage, which is easier to understand, but not everyone does this.
So, to break the ice, let’s imagine a return on investment calculation example, merely illustrative.
Pedro, a little boy from a small country town, decided to earn some extra money for the summer vacation, and set up a small bar at the gate of his house to sell lemonade.
- Portable table and chair and insulated coolers borrowed from his father: $ 0.00
- Cardboard, pens and creativity to write advertising and price posters: $ 15.00
- 5 dozen lemons: $ 80.00
- 10 liters of ice cubes manufactured in the home refrigerator using mineral water (competitive advantage): $ 20.00
- 50 liters of mineral water (comp. advantage) to make the lemonade: $ 100.00
- 2 pounds of sugar: $ 5.00
- 300 biodegradable paper cups (ecologically responsible = market positioning): $ 100.00
Total EXPENSES: $ 320,00
With this, it’s possible to produce approximately 65 liters of lemonade (lemon juice and ice also increase the volume!).
This translates into 260 glasses of lemonade, which he wants to sell at $2.00 each, which equals REVENUE of $520.
If he sells about 26 cups a day, he will exhaust his stock in 10 days, which is his goal.
So, putting this simple return on investment calculation example into the formula, we get:
ROI = 520-320×100 320
ROI = 62.5%
That is, with each invested $ 1.00, the young Pedro gets back an additional gain of slightly greater than $ 0.62 cents.
In other words: for every $ 1.00 invested he finishes his venture with $ 1.62, making the calculation:
$ 320.00 x 1.625 = $ 520.00.
Of course, this is an example of a purely enlightening Return On Investment for those who didn’t yet know the concept.
Below are other return on investment calculation examples that may be best suited for those who want to better understand what financial management is.
See also: How to start a home business: The 4 VRIO questions
Return On Investment Calculation Example’s
It’s important to remember for anyone who wants to learn how to calculate Return On Investment for projects or companies that a common practice is: To define 3 scenarios.
Pedro simply assumed that he would sell everything he produced in 10 days, but what if it rained during that period, or on the contrary was so hot that his stock ended in 5 days?
So, let’s include this practice in the following return on investment calculation example.
Return On Investment example in a print media marketing campaign
Imagine a shoe brand that has average sales of 100,000 pairs in its summer launches every year.
This brings revenue of $ 1,000,000.00 in this period, which corresponds to a profit of $ 200,000 (around 20%), every year in the summer.
The marketing director decides to launch a new marketing campaign by posting ads in fashion magazines, all produced by their advertising agency.
The total cost of this campaign is $ 200,000.00.
- Pessimistic: 20% increase in sales = Profit of $ 240,000.00
- Average: 30% increase in sales = Profit of $ 260,000.00
- Optimistic: 40% increase in sales = Profit of $ 280,000.00
Note: In this case, the gain from the marketing campaign should be measured by the increase in profit, not total revenue, to justify the investment.
Let’s put it in the formula and see if the the board and chairperson approve the campaign:
- Pessimistic Return On Investment example – Calculation: (240 – 200)/200 x 100 = 20%
- Average Return On Investment example – Calculation: (260 – 200)/200 x 100 = 30%
- Optimistic Return On Investment example – Calculation: (280 – 200)/200 x 100 = 40%
Apparently they will approve this marketing campaign based on this return on investment calculation example. But what if these scenario forecasts didn’t materialize?
This is a risk inherent in every business, and that’s why your sales forecasts should be the best possible. Therefore, they should be based on reliable historical data and statistical software that signal the increase or decrease in demand as a result of marketing investments, among other factors .
Return On Investment example in an online media campaign
The advantage of online campaigns is that you can keep track of the Return On Investment. If the desired scenarios don’t go your way, you can quickly change your campaigns to adjust your investments across different media to improve results.
Look at this return on investment calculation example in 3 different types of marketing investments in online media:
Imagine a company that provides cloud-based BPM modeling software through SaaS , that is: with a monthly fee users are entitled to use the software.
To advertise the business they opt for 3 online strategies:
Content Marketing:
Create articles for a blog that addresses issues of interest to their audience. They lure customers to a landing page to get them to share contact information such as email and phone in exchange for differentiated materials and experiences, such as e-books or trials.
Ads on Google Ad Words:
Which will route leads to these same landing pages, offering e-books and trials.
Ads on Facebook Lead Ads :
A Facebook integration that allows users to fill out forms in exchange for the same materials and experiences mentioned above.
In this SaaS company, sales funnel analysis shows that 20% of leads to their landing pages fill out the registration form.
So, of these 20%, 40% react positively to emails with information about their BPM tool and of these 40%, another 40% end up buying the product, when they’re contacted by telephone.
Thus, the final conversion rate is 3.2% or (0.20 x 0.40 x 0.40) , for each lead that arrives at a company landing page and consequently fills out the form.
For example: out of every 1,000 people who reach their landing page, 32 end up buying the product.
The company knows from its historical marketing investment data over the years that to refer 100 leads to a landing page, it’s necessary to invest individually in each option:
- $ 200 in Content Marketing
- $ 240,00 in Facebook Lead Ads
- $ 300.00 in Google AdWords
(NOTE: this data is totally hypothetical and doesn’t indicate any tendency towards particular investments, they are mere examples!)
As the company’s average product cost is $ 100, this means that 100 leads sent to a landing page will generate, on average, 3.2 sales conversions, that is, a revenue of $ 320.00 (3.2 x $ 100.00).
Therefore, by applying this value in the formula, we can discover the ROI of each investment in social marketing:
- Content Marketing = 320 – 200/200 x 100 = 60%
- Facebook Lead Ads = 320 – 240/240 x 100 = 33.3%
- Google AdWords = 320-300/300 x 100 = 6%
So, after realizing that in this hypothetical return on investment calculation example Content Marketing is more advantageous, the company invests 50% of its budget in this, 30% in Facebook and 20% in Google.
Because after a month of making these investments, the company can analyze the conversion data with the help of analytical tools and other features offered by these media companies themselves and know exactly what the return and conversion rate of each strategy is, recalculating their Return On Investment and reallocating funds.
So, what do you think of these Return On Investment examples to define marketing investments?
Does your company use other types of investment analysis, such as IRR or Present Value? Tell us in the comments!
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Plan Projections
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Home > Calculators > Return on Investment Calculator
Return on Investment Calculator
This return on investment calculator will help you to calculate return on investment for use in the Financial Projections Template and your business plan.
The Excel ROI calculator, available for download below, helps a business calculate return on investment.
How to use the Return on Investment Calculator
To use the return on investment worksheet enter details relating to the investment and the exit valuation.
Firstly enter the following details in relation to the investment.
- The amount invested in the business.
- The percentage of the business equity purchased.
- The number of years after which the investor exits the business.
Value on Exit
Secondly enter the following details relating to the exit valuation
- The PE ratio for the business.
- The annual profits on which to base the valuation
Additionally our blog article on return on investment gives full details of how this return on investment calculator can be used.
Return on Investment Calculator Download
The return on investment spreadsheet is available for download in Excel format by following the link below.
About the Author
Chartered accountant Michael Brown is the founder and CEO of Plan Projections. He has worked as an accountant and consultant for more than 25 years and has built financial models for all types of industries. He has been the CFO or controller of both small and medium sized companies and has run small businesses of his own. He has been a manager and an auditor with Deloitte, a big 4 accountancy firm, and holds a degree from Loughborough University.
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How To Calculate ROI (Return On Investment) Learn to calculate ROI in seven steps--increasing your chances of landing an investor and dusting the competition.
Jan 29, 2010
The Gotham Gal and I make a fair number of non-tech angel investments. Things like media, food products, restaurants, music, local businesses. In these investments we are usually backing an entrepreneur we've gotten to know who delivers products to the market that we use and love. The Gotham Gal runs this part of our investment portfolio with some involvement by me.
As I look over the business plans and projections that these entrepreneurs share with us, one thing I constantly see is a lack of sophistication in calculating the investor's return.
The entrepreneur needs $400k to start the business, believes he/she can return to the investors $100k per year, and therefore will generate a 25 percent return on investment. That is correct if the business lasts forever and produces $100k for the investors year after year after year.
But many businesses, probably most businesses, have a finite life. A restaurant may have a few good years but then lose its clientele and go out of business. A media product might do well for a decade but then lose its way and fold.
And most businesses are unlikely to produce exactly $100k every year to the investors. Some businesses will grow the profits year after year. Others might see the profits decline as the business matures and heads out of business.
So the proper way to calculate a return is using the "cash flow method."
Here's how you do it.
- Get a spreadsheet, excel will do, although increasingly I recommend Google docs spreadsheet because it's simpler to share with others.
- Lay out along a single row a number of years. I would suggest ten years to start.
- In the first year show the total investment required as a negative number (because the investors are sending their money to you).
- In the first through tenth years, show the returns to the investors (after your share). This should be a positive number.
- Then add those two rows together to get a "net cash flow" number.
- Sum up the totals of all ten years to get total money in, total money back, and net profit.
- Then calculate two numbers. The "multiple" is the total money back divided by the total money in. And then using the "IRR" function, calculate an annual return number.
Here's a link to Google docs where I've posted this example . It is public so everyone can play around with it and see how the formulas work.
It's worth looking for a minute at the theoretical example. The investors put in $400k, get $100k back for four years in a row (which gets them their money back), but then the business declines and eventually goes out of business in its seventh year. The annual rate of return or ROI (return on investment) on the $400k turns out to be 14 percent and the total multiple is 1.3x.
That's not a bad outcome for a personal investment in a local business you want to support. It sure beats the returns you'll get on a money market fund. But it is not a 25 percent return and should not be marketed as such. I hope this helps. You don't need to get a finance MBA to be able to do this kind of thing. It's actually not that hard once you do it a few times.
Fred Wilson is a partner at Union Square Ventures. He writes the influential A VC , where this post was originally published.
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What Is Return on Investment (ROI)?
Return on investment, or ROI, is your net profits divided by net worth or total equity. It’s another measure of profitability.
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Projecting Restaurant Startup ROI
How do you know when your restaurant will become profitable?
How do you know how much money you can safely invest, how do you know when you can start paying back investors, by projecting your startup restaurant’s return on investment..
In this guide to projecting startup ROI we’ll cover:
- What is startup ROI
- Why it’s important to know your startup ROI
- How to determine a safe investment ratio
- How to calculate income to investment ratio
- What you can learn from successful franchises
Read More: Choosing a Restaurant Business Structure
What Is Startup ROI?
The ROI is the restaurant’s return on investment. It costs a lot of money up front to open a restaurant. Even when the restaurant begins to turn a profit it will take time to cover the cost of the initial investment.
Understanding the concept of ROI helps you to practice control when planning your restaurant budget.
Why Is Estimating ROI Important?
By projecting your restaurant startup’s ROI break-even point you can estimate when you’ll be paid back. This also helps you decide how much money you’ll need to spend before the restaurant turns a profit.
Also, knowing startup investment ROI is a vital part of your business plan. If you don't project sales and weigh them against your investments you won’t know how much profit to expect past break-even. This is important information for attracting investors.
Maintaining A Safe Investment Ratio
Expected Rate of Return
The number one determinant of whether a restaurant can keep the doors open during the startup phase can be attributed to the Income to Investment Ratio.
You need to give yourself plenty of runway for your restaurant to take off. During the first few months, building up a clientele and getting to know the business is difficult. It may even take years. That means not overspending in the startup phase and running out of cash later.
Understanding Income to Investment Ratio
The income to investment ratio is a measurement of how fast you can expect to recoup your startup investment.
The Income to Investment Ratio is not a measurement of how much money is invested; it's a measurement of the rate of return .
For example, it could be an investment of $200,000 or $2 million, if the ratio is the same, both investments will take the same amount of time to pay back. What is being measured is the expected sales volume relative to initial startup cost .
When deciding how much to invest in a restaurant, it's important to project sales as accurately as possible. To learn about projecting restaurant sales read our free guide.
Finding a Good Investment
After analyzing the success and failures of many restaurants a rule of thumb has been established for the industry. A restaurant business opportunity should be able to pay back your initial investment within the first five years or less.
If your projections show that it will take longer than five years to break even, you are making a risky investment. Estimating your startup restaurant sales for five years is already a difficult projection to make.
Who knows what will change in the world around us over the next five years? This means that an ROI longer than five years becomes more of a gamble. That can be very risky to your personal and financial future.
How To Calculate Income To Investment Ratio
A 5-year ROI break-even is a 1.2 income to investment ratio. To calculate this the formula is:
- Determine the restaurant’s annual projected net income
- Divide it by the total startup investment
A higher ratio means reaching the ROI break even point sooner.
For example, a 1.6 income to investment ratio sees your money back in about half the time as a 1.2 rate of return—only two and a half years.
Remember, that’s just a projection. It's always going to cost more than you think to start a restaurant. Be conservative with your sales projections and overestimate your costs. The ultimate decision maker is you, and how much risk you are willing to take.
How To Project Restaurant Return On Investment (ROI)
Tally up all the costs of opening your restaurant up to the first guest served
- This is your Total Startup Investment
- Make sure to do a very diligent job of researching all the expected costs
- Build in a padding of 15%-20% to account for additional costs
- This is your Total Startup Cost
Estimate the first year's sales as accurately as you can
Make three forecasts
- A “worst case scenario”
- An “optimistic projection”
- An “average of the two” that is cautiously realistic
- Using a more conservative calculation decreases risk
Estimate your first year's operating costs
Operating costs are the cost of running the business after you open:
- Cost of food
- Paying rent
- Don’t count startup costs
- Subtract operating costs from sales
- The remainder is your first year's Net Income
Divide startup cost by net income to derive the investment to income ratio
- This gives you a projected rate of return on your initial investment
Another way to understand the income to investment ratio is to say that income is, in this example 1.2 times the initial investment.
If costs and sales remain constant, it will take five years to recoup the initial million dollar startup cost and begin turning a profit.
Learning From Successful Chain Restaurants
If there is one thing the established franchises know how to do, it's reduce financial risk and establish comfortable profits. They may spend three million to open a new location, but they make sure that the ROI is fast.
Projected income in the first year may be 6 million, a ratio of 2 times the initial investment, reaching the ROI break-even the first year in business. A big part of their model is to scout for specific locations that have the greatest potential to give the highest rate of return.
When you follow the methodology presented in this guide you have the same tool they use to find restaurant opportunities that offer fast and profitable returns with reduced risk.
Hopefully after reading this guide you're convinced how important it is not to over-extend your finances when starting a restaurant. Find business opportunities that begin to return on your investment sooner: five years or less.
The key to identifying a goldmine restaurant opportunity is projecting costs accurately, estimating sales conservatively, and performing diligent market research.
Continue reading the free guides in this startup restaurant tops series, provided by Rezku, by visiting our resource library. Learn more about Rezku by visiting our homepage. Get a free restaurant management technology consultation with an expert today and get all your questions answered.
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Create a form in Word that users can complete or print
In Word, you can create a form that others can fill out and save or print. To do this, you will start with baseline content in a document, potentially via a form template. Then you can add content controls for elements such as check boxes, text boxes, date pickers, and drop-down lists. Optionally, these content controls can be linked to database information. Following are the recommended action steps in sequence.
Show the Developer tab
In Word, be sure you have the Developer tab displayed in the ribbon. (See how here: Show the developer tab .)
Open a template or a blank document on which to base the form
You can start with a template or just start from scratch with a blank document.
Start with a form template
Go to File > New .
In the Search for online templates field, type Forms or the kind of form you want. Then press Enter .
In the displayed results, right-click any item, then select Create.
Start with a blank document
Select Blank document .
Add content to the form
Go to the Developer tab Controls section where you can choose controls to add to your document or form. Hover over any icon therein to see what control type it represents. The various control types are described below. You can set properties on a control once it has been inserted.
To delete a content control, right-click it, then select Remove content control in the pop-up menu.
Note: You can print a form that was created via content controls. However, the boxes around the content controls will not print.
Insert a text control
The rich text content control enables users to format text (e.g., bold, italic) and type multiple paragraphs. To limit these capabilities, use the plain text content control .
Click or tap where you want to insert the control.
To learn about setting specific properties on these controls, see Set or change properties for content controls .
Insert a picture control
A picture control is most often used for templates, but you can also add a picture control to a form.
Insert a building block control
Use a building block control when you want users to choose a specific block of text. These are helpful when you need to add different boilerplate text depending on the document's specific purpose. You can create rich text content controls for each version of the boilerplate text, and then use a building block control as the container for the rich text content controls.
Select Developer and content controls for the building block.
Insert a combo box or a drop-down list
In a combo box, users can select from a list of choices that you provide or they can type in their own information. In a drop-down list, users can only select from the list of choices.
Select the content control, and then select Properties .
To create a list of choices, select Add under Drop-Down List Properties .
Type a choice in Display Name , such as Yes , No , or Maybe .
Repeat this step until all of the choices are in the drop-down list.
Fill in any other properties that you want.
Note: If you select the Contents cannot be edited check box, users won’t be able to click a choice.
Insert a date picker
Click or tap where you want to insert the date picker control.
Insert a check box
Click or tap where you want to insert the check box control.
Use the legacy form controls
Legacy form controls are for compatibility with older versions of Word and consist of legacy form and Active X controls.
Click or tap where you want to insert a legacy control.
Select the Legacy Form control or Active X Control that you want to include.
Set or change properties for content controls
Each content control has properties that you can set or change. For example, the Date Picker control offers options for the format you want to use to display the date.
Select the content control that you want to change.
Go to Developer > Properties .
Change the properties that you want.
Add protection to a form
If you want to limit how much others can edit or format a form, use the Restrict Editing command:
Open the form that you want to lock or protect.
Select Developer > Restrict Editing .
After selecting restrictions, select Yes, Start Enforcing Protection .
Advanced Tip:
If you want to protect only parts of the document, separate the document into sections and only protect the sections you want.
To do this, choose Select Sections in the Restrict Editing panel. For more info on sections, see Insert a section break .
If the developer tab isn't displayed in the ribbon, see Show the Developer tab .
Open a template or use a blank document
To create a form in Word that others can fill out, start with a template or document and add content controls. Content controls include things like check boxes, text boxes, and drop-down lists. If you’re familiar with databases, these content controls can even be linked to data.
Go to File > New from Template .
In Search, type form .
Double-click the template you want to use.
Select File > Save As , and pick a location to save the form.
In Save As , type a file name and then select Save .
Start with a blank document
Go to File > New Document .
Go to File > Save As .
Go to Developer , and then choose the controls that you want to add to the document or form. To remove a content control, select the control and press Delete. You can set Options on controls once inserted. From Options, you can add entry and exit macros to run when users interact with the controls, as well as list items for combo boxes, .
Adding content controls to your form
In the document, click or tap where you want to add a content control.
On Developer , select Text Box , Check Box , or Combo Box .
To set specific properties for the control, select Options , and set .
Repeat steps 1 through 3 for each control that you want to add.
Set options
Options let you set common settings, as well as control specific settings. Select a control and then select Options to set up or make changes.
Set common properties.
Select Macro to Run on lets you choose a recorded or custom macro to run on Entry or Exit from the field.
Bookmark Set a unique name or bookmark for each control.
Calculate on exit This forces Word to run or refresh any calculations, such as total price when the user exits the field.
Add Help Text Give hints or instructions for each field.
OK Saves settings and exits the panel.
Cancel Forgets changes and exits the panel.
Set specific properties for a Text box
Type Select form Regular text, Number, Date, Current Date, Current Time, or Calculation.
Default text sets optional instructional text that's displayed in the text box before the user types in the field. Set Text box enabled to allow the user to enter text into the field.
Maximum length sets the length of text that a user can enter. The default is Unlimited .
Text format can set whether text automatically formats to Uppercase , Lowercase , First capital, or Title case .
Text box enabled Lets the user enter text into a field. If there is default text, user text replaces it.
Set specific properties for a Check box .
Default Value Choose between Not checked or checked as default.
Checkbox size Set a size Exactly or Auto to change size as needed.
Check box enabled Lets the user check or clear the text box.
Set specific properties for a Combo box
Drop-down item Type in strings for the list box items. Press + or Enter to add an item to the list.
Items in drop-down list Shows your current list. Select an item and use the up or down arrows to change the order, Press - to remove a selected item.
Drop-down enabled Lets the user open the combo box and make selections.
Protect the form
Go to Developer > Protect Form .
Note: To unprotect the form and continue editing, select Protect Form again.
Save and close the form.
Test the form (optional)
If you want, you can test the form before you distribute it.
Protect the form.
Reopen the form, fill it out as the user would, and then save a copy.
Creating fillable forms isn’t available in Word for the web.
You can create the form with the desktop version of Word with the instructions in Create a fillable form .
When you save the document and reopen it in Word for the web, you’ll see the changes you made.
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1 min. read Updated October 25, 2023 Return on investment (ROI) is a financial concept that measures the profitability of an investment. There are several methods to determine ROI, but the most common is to divide net profit by total assets.
Percent Nominal Cost of Capital: The rate of return needed to persuade your company to make a given investment. Below are the outputs from these inputs: Adjusted gross investment (for inflation) Gross cash flow Expected salvage value Years remaining asset life Cash flow return on investment (CFROI) Cash flows per investment year
Start by using the ROI formula, which is: Returns ÷ Investment = ROI To calculate your ROI for investing in Gina's business, you would use the following calculation: ($2,500 - $5,000) ÷ $5,000...
Return on investment (ROI) is a metric used to denote how much profit has been generated from an investment that's been made. In the case of a business, return on investment comes in two primary forms, depending on when it's calculated: anticipated ROI and actual ROI. Anticipated vs. Actual ROI
ROI is calculated by subtracting the initial cost of the investment from its final value, then dividing this new number by the cost of the investment, and finally, multiplying it by 100. ROI...
Written by CFI Team What is Return on Investment (ROI)? Return on Investment (ROI) is a performance measure used to evaluate the returns of an investment or to compare the relative efficiency of different investments. ROI measures the return of an investment relative to the cost of the investment. The Return on Investment (ROI) formula:
Example of the ROI Formula Calculation An investor purchases property A, which is valued at $500,000. Two years later, the investor sells the property for $1,000,000. We use the investment gain formula in this case. ROI = (1,000,000 - 500,000) / (500,000) = 1 or 100% To learn more, check out CFI's Free Finance Courses!
Now the return is $300,000 less the total investment of $220,000, or $80,000. Divide that by the $220,000 and then multiple by 100 and you get an ROI of just over 36 percent. Here's another twist ...
To calculate the return on this investment, divide the net profits ($1,200 - $1,000 = $200) by the investment cost ($1,000), for an ROI of $200/$1,000, or 20%. With this information, one...
These questions should be answered throughout your business plan, and should prove to those reading it that your company has the right product, market, team, time, and strategy to make them a return on their investment. So without further adieu, here is a breakdown of writing a business plan for investors: 1. Executive Summary
ClickUp Real Estate Action Plan Template 5. ClickUp Sales KPI Template 6. Marketing ROI Template by SlideTeam 7. PowerPoint ROI Tracking Report Template by SlideTeam. ROI, or Return on Investment, is the go-to metric for tracking the profitability of anything done with a business motive.
ROI = 520-320×100 320 ROI = 62.5% That is, with each invested $ 1.00, the young Pedro gets back an additional gain of slightly greater than $ 0.62 cents. In other words: for every $ 1.00 invested he finishes his venture with $ 1.62, making the calculation: $ 320.00 x 1.625 = $ 520.00.
Example of ROI - Let's say that a person bought a house that needed significant work for $100,000. During the course of a year, they invested an additional $100,000 to renovate the house to make it...
AROI = ROI / Term AROI = 300% / 5 = 60% Implicit in the calculation of this AROI is the assumption that the business goes on forever with annual returns of 60,000. Multiple The multiple, tells and investor how many times their original investment has been returned. The multiple is given by the formula:
Firstly enter the following details in relation to the investment. The amount invested in the business. The percentage of the business equity purchased. The number of years after which the investor exits the business. Value on Exit Secondly enter the following details relating to the exit valuation The PE ratio for the business.
The annual rate of return or ROI (return on investment) on the $400k turns out to be 14 percent and the total multiple is 1.3x. That's not a bad outcome for a personal investment in a local ...
Return on investment, or ROI, is your net profits divided by net worth or total equity. It's another measure of profitability. ... How to write a business plan; Get a sample business plan; Why you need a business plan; How to start a business; How to get startup funding; Tools to help you get started; Starting or Growing a Business? Check out ...
What factors affect ROI? The factors that impact ROI are the VC's level of investment and anything that affects the profitability of your business. Revenues, expenses - whatever impacts your income statement will inevitably show up in your investors' ROI, so it's important to make sure your VC's capital is invested in profit-producing assets.
The ROI is the restaurant's return on investment. It costs a lot of money up front to open a restaurant. Even when the restaurant begins to turn a profit it will take time to cover the cost of the initial investment. Understanding the concept of ROI helps you to practice control when planning your restaurant budget. Why Is Estimating ROI Important?
Download the Free Template. Enter your name and email in the form below and download the free template now! Return on investment (ROI) is a financial ratio used to calculate the benefit an investor will receive in relation to their investment cost - most commonly measured as net income divided by the original cost of the investment. The ...
Here's how that can work: Say you have $1,000 to invest and you expect to earn 10% returns on it each year. The first year you earn $100. But the next year you earn $110, to reflect your ...
Your investment proposal should include the following key components: the cover page, table of contents, executive summary or about us page, market analysis, value proposition and plan of action, budget and revenue model, team's portfolio, ROI or exit strategy, the next steps and call to action.
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