Added Days to Close for Anticipating Demand
In the original code of the seasonality adjustment to the raw demand data we're getting, I had added in a fixed 6 weeks lead time for getting and closing deals. This was given to me by the project manager, and I used it because I didn't know any better number to use. What this allows us to do is to anticipate the demand rise (or fall), and adjust who to call today. Sounds like a good idea, but it could always be better.
This afternoon, it got a lot better. Ryan looked into Teradata at the time (in days) between the first call to a merchant, and the closing of the deal and came up with an average number of days for a deal cycle - bucketed by the category of the business. He sent these to me, and I was able to use this - along with a more general global average number of days for all deals, and use this in the code.
Now we have a solid default deal time, as well as better values for specific categories of businesses. This is great news. It took him less than a few hours, and I implemented it in about 15 mins. Fantastic work.
Ever better. Sweet.