Benchmarking lets you compare your business performance against other similar-sized businesses in the same industry. This will show you whether your performance is stronger or weaker than that of your competitors. As a result, it will give you a clear picture of where improvements are needed and how to increase profits.

Benchmarking will help you:

• compare your business's profits with others in the same industry
• see where you can reduce costs and improve efficiency
• forecast the impact of any changes and see how to prepare for growth.

You will be able to see how much you earn and how much you spend on advertising, rent, staff, training and other expenses compared to your competitors.

For example, you may identify that:

• you are spending too much on rent and need to consider negotiating lower rental rates
• your inventory costs are higher than competitors, indicating you may need to reduce wastage or negotiate better rates from your suppliers
• your income per employee is lower than the industry average, meaning that you may need to examine productivity and training.

The Queensland Government has a special agreement with FMRC Benchmarking to provide a financial benchmarking tool for small-to-medium businesses.

How to benchmark your business
You can quickly and easily conduct a benchmarking exercise for your business through the FMRC Benchmarking website. Enter details about your business costs, turnover, profit and other financial data and the site provides an analysis of your performance relative to other similar businesses. Once you have entered and reviewed all of your data you can:

• see how your business performs compared to the industry average (in many cases, performance data is broken down into separate benchmark categories based on turnover or location, which means you can compare against similar organisations)
• carry out interactive budgeting to see how changing your turnover or expenditure in certain areas would boost your bottom line
• generate a report customised to your business showing how you compare to others in the industry.

While carrying out benchmarking, you may be offered online assistance or advice on how to make the most of the service.

Cost
The cost is $99 (incl GST) and access is provided for 60 days from the date of your first login.¹

The Queensland Government has negotiated a special rate for businesses that purchase benchmarking data from this site. The service is normally priced at over $1,200 for a 12-month subscription.

This $99 fee will allow you to compare your business against three different benchmarks (for some industries there may only be one or two relevant benchmarks against which to compare your business).

 For example, you might compare your small restaurant against:

• other small restaurants - because these are most similar to your business
• mid-size restaurants - because this is the market segment you want to occupy
• small cafes - because lots of cafes operate nearby and are real competitors.

Also included in the fee is a free industry profile (usually sold for $220) which outlines key profit drivers and recent trends in the industry, helping a business operator assess the health of their sector and opportunities for growth.

What business types are covered?
View the industries for which benchmarking data is available.

Samples of benchmarking tool data and report
Screen shots :

• Data entry sheet
• Benchmarked data 
• Interactive budgeting sheet

Sample report:

Financial benchmarking report

Source of benchmarks
Business benchmarking data is produced from financial surveys of Australian industry and professional sectors. The benchmarking information supplied is gathered and managed by FMRC Benchmarking and is the most up-to-date data for the available industry sectors.

Information security
All information and data used to benchmark your business is confidential, retained within the benchmarking website and is not accessible by the department.

Further information
Contact the Business Resource Centre for more information about how benchmarking can help improve the performance and profitability of your business.

_{¹ Once data has been entered into the benchmarking form and locked, it cannot be changed and all benchmarking activities will be based on the information entered. If data remains unlocked, some parts of the benchmarking tool will not be activated. Locking data ensures the full array of services can be accessed.}

_{² For some industries, there may only be one or two relevant benchmarks against which to compare your business.}

_{Note: Benchmarking uses prominent financial indicators to evaluate business performance but these are not exhaustive. Many other indicators can be used to determine business performance and clients are encouraged to make use of these in addition to benchmarking. The statistics reported in these benchmarks cannot be considered to be representative of all the enterprises in a particular sector; rather they provide a guide to evaluation of an individual business or practice.}

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