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Share your message, research, or progress with this modern business report template. Create engaging reports that are easy to read, share actionable data, and are visually engaging with business templates. Reporting business data to potential investors or your team in a powerful way need not be challenging with the right tools. Make business reports that connect and inform with a preformatted and designed template from Microsoft.

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44 Business Report Templates for Professional Reports (2023)

Written by: Orana Velarde

Are you looking for a business report template that’s engaging and attractive but also easy to customize? Look no further because you’ve just hit the jackpot.

In this list, we’ve got 44 easy-to-use professional report templates to help you create reports for various purposes, from business to education.

Here's a short selection of 8 easy-to-edit business report templates you can edit, share and download with Visme. View more below:

Use the list below to navigate to the section that interests you the most.

44 Business Report Templates for Professional Reports

Category #1: Annual Report Templates

Companies of any size can create an annual report , or year in review, to showcase growth, improvements, changes and other significant events from the previous year.

Annual reports tend to be long but you can save time with Visme’s Dynamic Fields feature. You can input the same information on many slides at once with a few clicks.

Let’s take a look at the annual report templates available in Visme.

Template #1: Environment Annual Report

Showcase your ongoing environmental projects with an annual template that shines.

Customize this report template and make it your own! Edit and Download

This template has five pages with spaces ready for your content.

The simple and elegant style is perfect for a no-nonsense business like yours. The environment annual report template is suited for content types with a large amount of text.

Duplicate pages as needed to add charts or more information to your report. Customize the accent color by choosing your brand color and changing all elements simultaneously. Make use of Dynamic Fields to ensure your brand information is accurate on all your report pages.

Click on the button above to create your nature-inspired annual report.

Template #2: Orange Annual Report

If you’re looking for a minimalistic infographic approach to visualizing annual report content, this template is right up your alley.

Visualize important information in snackable sections that engage and call attention. Make your report more valuable by creating interactivity through outbound links to more text-rich documents as support.

Use icons that match your company style and give your annual report some personality. Easily change the colors to your brand colors and make an impact.

Click on the button above to use this template for your annual report.

Template #3: HR Annual Report

Not all annual reports need to look stern and super serious. Why not have a little fun with your corporate report template?

This HR department annual report uses shapes and color to make the information attractive and engaging. To add more content in each section, simply duplicate pages and add textual content in color boxes that match the rest of the design.

Click on the button above to use this fun and vibrant annual report template.

Template #4: Shared Value Annual Report

All you need for a great-looking annual report is three intense colors and balanced composition.

Corporate annual reports don’t need to be text-heavy to be impactful—complement content-heavy pages with a minimalistic data visualization collage and a color-coded map.

Choose icons that match each other and color them in one of the three accent colors to continue the design. Use interactive popups for added value to your pages.

Click on the button above to customize this balanced and printable report template.

Template #5: Nonprofit Annual Report

Are you looking for a clean-cut modern design for your annual report?

This template is just what you need.

This free business report template is perfect for an impactful and memorable annual report with a stable combination of data and text content. Show your stakeholders what you achieved the previous year with style.

Click on the button above to use this template and create a great-looking annual report.

Template #6: Profitable Growth Annual Report

Choose a bold design with strong fonts and a contrasting color scheme in this annual report template.

Make a statement with this data-centered design and visualize the year’s financials in a balanced composition. Take advantage of photo backgrounds with a dark overlay to showcase data widgets and icons to visualize your content.

Click on the button to get started with the personalization of this modern annual report.

Hey executives! Looking to cut design costs?

Template #7: Digital Marketing Agency Annual Report

Use a clean-cut linear design to demonstrate what your company achieved in the past year. This printable report template is just what you need.

This annual report template has strong background colors and straight lines—these contrast with a combination of desaturated photo section backgrounds and dark overlays on edge-to-edge photos.

Showcase your agency’s achievements and goals with charts, graphs and color-coordinated icons.

Click on the button above to personalize the purple and white digital marketing annual report.

Create reports, proposals, ebooks and more

Category #2: Financial Report Templates

The second category in our report roundup is financial and professional report templates. These are reports which concentrate on financial and economic data . We have four reports in the category; let’s take a look.

Template #1: Mass Market Floral Report

Are you looking for a beautiful and distinguished annual report for your business? This professional report example might be just what you need.

Use the provided photos in the placeholders or choose your unique visuals, either from your brand folder or the Visme photo library . Enter your content in the text boxes and personalize the charts and graphs with your company data.

Duplicate pages to add more content, either text or visuals and make your report richer. Improve your report by creating a digital and interactive document with video and interaction that you can share online.

Click on the button above and start personalizing your beautiful report template.

Template #2: Weekly KPI Report

Share your key performance indicators in a compelling document that you can customize week to week.

The KPI Weekly report can be your branded, corporate report template to use every week within your team. Simply switch the colors and the fonts and save the document as a template in your Brand Kit.

Use our Google Analytics integration to add detailed charts and graphs of the week’s performance. Duplicate as many pages as you need. Insert all the charts and data visualizations necessary to share pertinent KPIs.

Click on the button above to start sharing key performance indicators in style. Then take advantage of Visme’s analytics reporting to check your report’s performance.

Template #3: Promotional Campaign Report

Financial reports visualize past performance and also promote more business. This promotional template does just that.

Use the template imagery already included in the template but we suggest you use photography from your business. As a promotional document, you should be using content from your work and data from your performance.

Detail the performance of your ongoing and past campaigns and describe the future campaigns you have in store.

Click on the button above to create your promotional report with stunning visuals.

Template #4: Budget Report

Do you need a report to visualize your budget to share with investors and stakeholders? This free business report template is just what you need.

Showcase your company’s budget in an impactful and unforgettable design. Input your data for the graphs by importing a CSV file , a Google Sheet, or by hand. Use your company colors to color code the diagrams and maintain a visual identity.

Add photographs of your products or campaigns to make the template your own. Duplicate pages if you need to show more data or share additional content.

Click on the button above to personalize this budget template and share your goals and projections with stakeholders.

Category #3: Project Report Templates

The next category on the list is all about project reports. This particular category is not so much about the topic but more about the report format. Here you’ll find both business report templates and academic report examples .

Let’s dive in.

Template #1: Non-Fiction Book Report

Book reports don’t need to be bland and forgettable. If you’re looking for a way to make your book report unforgettable, this template is the answer.

This book report template has all the sections you need to showcase your chosen book’s summary and personal commentary. Select imagery from the Visme library; there are millions of photos to choose from.

Add color-coordinated icons and illustrations to visualize the content sections in the report.

Click on the button above to start creating a beautiful book report for your studies.

Template #2: Landing Page Project Status Report

Is your team working on a project? You’ll need to keep stakeholders in the loop about what’s going on. This template is just the thing you’ve been looking for.

Every section of this report template showcases every step of your project’s process. The content was created for a Landing Page design and implementation but will work for any project type.

Change the colors and fonts to match your company brand and save the final design as a template for your team members to use on future project reports.

Click on the button above to start reporting your project’s progress in style.

Template #3: Qualitative Analysis Lab Report

If you’re looking for a visual and exciting way to report a scientific analysis, this template is right up your alley.

The analysis lab report template has seven pages full of visualizations like tables, flowcharts and graphs to share your scientific findings. There is enough space for written content to support the data.

Wow, your professors and lab teammates with a well-designed analysis report that goes above and beyond a spreadsheet. If you have Tableau visualizations , you can bring them into your pages for added value.

Click on the button for the template below to start creating a visual scientific lab analysis report.

Template #4: Real Estate Industry Report

An Industry Report showcases research conducted about a specific industry’s status; the past, present and future. This real estate template might be just what you’re looking for.

The Real Estate Outlook report has five key sections for descriptive text, industry analysis and projections. Use the color-coded data widgets to visualize specific areas of data and information.

Change the images to represent your research and either keep the yellow or change the accent color to something more suitable. Use a legible font for the paragraphs and a strong font in the headings.

Click on the button above and start putting together your industry report.

Template #5: The Effects of Stress Report

Research reports range from any variety of topics and niches. If you’re looking for a report template to visualize and share your research project, this template is perfect.

With a modern take on report design, our Effects of Stress report has a good even mix of text content and data visualization. Photography and imagery play a simple role in this report template as a storytelling angle.

Add your research content to each page easily by pasting your content and then adjusting the size and spacing. Use the same colors or change them for others in the color theme library.

Click on the button above to use this project report template for your research.

Template #6: Weekly Project Status Report

Are you looking for a better way to show the status of your project? This status report template might be just what you need.

Your team members and stakeholders will look forward to seeing your well-designed reports and get excited about the process.

Use as many data visualizations as possible to show the data and the timeline of your project. Personalize the timeline page to follow the steps of your team’s progress, including your goals and expectations.

Click on the button above and bring fun back into your project status reports.

Template #7: E-Commerce Fashion Industry Report

Market research is a big part of the E-commerce industry and teams work better when they know what they’re up against. This report template is just what you need to show your findings.

Across seven initial pages, this report sets you up for a great start to your industry report. You’ll likely need more pages if the research is extensive. Duplicating pages is easy; all you have to do is input your text and data.

Select a different color palette from the color theme selector in the toolbar or use a new color palette that you can create yourself.

Click on the button above to start personalizing this fashion industry report.

Template #8: Technology Trends Report

Trend research for your industry needs a report to show findings and projected outlooks. This template is what you need to get started.

Present your important research using this uniquely designed template. Asymmetrical layouts and bright color accents are what make this trend report unique. All you have to do is input your content and research data.

Click on the button above and start visualizing your data in a meaningful way.

Category #4: Social Media Report Templates

Social media teams are always having to show their progress and ongoing work . For those searching for a visual solution to a social media report or the results of a social media marketing plan, this category is for you.

Template #1: Social Media Ads Report

Social media ads are a big part of digital marketing and need to be analyzed from beginning to end. This report template will help you do it better.

This template has just the right pages to get your report started—an introduction, strategies, result and conclusion. If you need more space for added content, simply duplicate pages and you’re ready to go.

If you have Google Analytics tracking for your social media ads, simply use our integration to add your results from GA directly. Personalize your charts to match the rest of the report.

Click on the button above to start creating better social media ad reports.

Template #2: Monthly Social Media Analytics Report

Monthly social media reports don’t need to be boring or bland. If you’re looking for a way to spice up your reports, this template will help you.

This 8-page printable report template was designed with a geometric color block layout that makes an impact. Your social media data can be easily copied into the placeholders for your team and stakeholders to visualize. Charts and graphs are laid out over a couple of pages so you can select which types of charts you need.

Use the Visme and Google Analytics integration to add current GA data to your report. Personalize and customize your charts with the Visme Graph Engine.

Click on the button above to start personalizing your monthly social media analytics report.

Template #3: Social Media Marketing Weekly Report

Sometimes it pays to keep things simple. That’s where this one-page template comes in.

Include this template as a PDF in your digital report files, or print out low ink copies on recycled paper to use in a binder. Change the fonts and colors to match your brand, or use your favorite fonts for a little fun.

Click on the button above to personalize this one-page printable report template in minutes.

Category #5: Sales Report Templates

Is your sales team on the lookout for a better way to report progress, solutions and goals? This category of report templates is just what you need. Let’s take a look.

Template #1: Yearly Sales Report

Do you need to report on your sales for the year? This template is your solution.

This template’s pages give plenty of visual space to charts and graphs to showcase your sales data—large charts for more critical data and smaller charts for varying layers of importance.

The bright color block design is perfect for a dynamic company that stays away from bland reports.

Click on the button above and start making memorable yearly sales reports.

Template #2: Monthly Sales Report

Are you looking for a free report template that will make the monthly meeting a breeze? This template is just what you need.

Big and bold numbers make it fun to visualize the quantitative data that doesn’t fit into a chart. Show off how much you sold this month and make an impact with your report pages.

Customize the colors and fonts to match your brand using the Visme Brand Kit or choose your favorite color theme from the toolbar.

Template #3: Promotional Sales Report

Are you running a promotion and need to show progress, timelines, goals and achievements in one report? This template is what you need.

Black and white images contrasting with a vibrant yellow are what makes this template so unique.

To use your photos, simply replace the ones in the template and the filter will apply automatically. Choose the accent color if your brand colors are different.

Input all your data in colorful charts and data widgets without wasting time. Simply import your Google Sheet data and customize the colors to match the rest of the report.

Click on the button above to start personalizing the promotional sales template.

Template #4: SaaS Quarterly Report

Your SaaS company needs quarterly reporting. You need this corporate report template to get that done in style.

The best part of creating digital PDF reports with Visme is that you can use hyperlinks to navigate the pages you want to see the most. Additionally, you can add popups to provide more information than what fits on the page.

This template has all the makings of a memorable quarterly report. Save the first one as a template and simply reuse it every month. Don’t forget to change the date and data and you’ve got yourself a perfect reporting system for your team.

Click on the button above and start personalizing your SaaS quarterly reports.

Template #5: Company Quarterly Report

Reporting quarterly sales for your company doesn’t need to be a difficult affair. With this template, you can visualize sales for your team in style.

Quarterly reports tend to be long and full of data. This free business report template has eight pages to get you started in the right direction. Use the overall layout of the pages to format your text and data in one stylish document.

Embed bigger data visualizations from Tableau or Power BI with our third-party media integration. You can add as many as you need and personalize it to match your brand and the rest of the report.

Click on the button above to personalize your next quarterly sales report.

Category #6: Marketing Report Templates

Your marketing team is continuously creating reports to show other groups in the business or the team leader. Small businesses need to keep track of their marketing efforts as well.

With these report templates, no marketing reports will ever be boring again.

Template #1: Monthly Marketing Report

Every month, your marketing reports need to be filled out. With this minimalist design template, you have it all set up for you.

This template has soft color backgrounds, minimalist layouts and just enough elements to visualize your information stylishly. With a design like this, it’ll be easy to personalize the sections in no time.

Click the button above to personalize this stylish marketing report template.

Template #2: Retail Weekly Marketing Report

Are you looking for a report template for your retail business? This design is just what you need to visualize your marketing achievements with impact.

Bright colors in icons and backgrounds and large bold numbers make up a unique layout for an impactful marketing report. Easily customize the color palette to match your brand and switch the fonts for your brand typography.

Add complimentary photography and imagery by searching our vast library of visuals. If you’re working on a digital report, add videos or animations.

Click on the button above to personalize the retail marketing report.

Category #7: Monthly Report Templates

Reports are created and presented weekly, quarterly, yearly or monthly. This category is all about monthly reports for those of you who need them.

Let’s take a look at all the monthly report examples.

Template #1: Monthly Customer Service Report

Is your customer service team looking for a better way to share results? This pre-designed report is just what you need.

Reporting KPIs in the customer service department is essential for getting to know your client base. Following along with how many requests are coming in and who is taking care of what is a great way to improve customer service with time.

Save the first edition of this report as a template in your Brand Kit and reuse it every month to showcase customer service achievements.

Click on the button above to report customer success with impact every month.

Is your sales and marketing team looking for a template to report monthly achievements, financial reporting and budget allocation? This printable report template is just what you need.

This simple template has everything you need to start reporting monthly sales visually and interestingly. Your team will be glad to get a report like this instead of boring spreadsheets and documents with walls of text.

Simply input your data and descriptive content into the placeholders. Use color-coded icons and charts to make your information beautiful.

Click on the button above to start reporting monthly sales and achievements with your team.

Template #3: Monthly Service Report

Keeping consistent reports in the customer service department makes every team member invested in the work they do. A template like this one can help show the metrics to your team and stakeholders to keep everyone inspired to do their best work.

The seven pages on this template have a unique design with a balanced composition of colored shapes. Each page has a significant structure to showcase content or data about your company’s service team.

Import your data from Google Sheets, Excel, Google Analytics or SurveyMonkey. Then personalize the colors and the layout to match your brand and your report.

Click the button above to create your first monthly report for the service team.

Template #4: Quarterly Email Analytics Report

The success of your email marketing efforts deserves the best reporting features. This corporate report template has everything you need to share successes with your team.

Not all corporate style designs look as good as the pages on this report template. Using intense colors and large-scale photography, you’ll be able to visualize data in pre-designed sections.

Click on the button to share the results of your email marketing with your team.

Template #5: Quarterly Report

Quarterly reports come four times a year. This year, why not create one with this template and then use it as a base for the rest of the year.

With this template, you can start reporting quarterly results for any team in your company. These pages are the perfect start for an ongoing reporting strategy from sales to marketing and customer success.

Duplicate more pages to create a longer report with more diagrams and charts according to your data.

Click on the button above to gets started with the simple quarterly report.

Category #8: Nonprofit Report Templates

The eighth category on our list is all about nonprofits . They also need professional report templates. This is an important category for nonprofits that need to report their progress to grant donors.

Template #1: Annual Nonprofit Report

If your nonprofit needs to create an annual report to show the results of last year’s efforts, this is the template you need.

This annual report template has five main sections for a foreword, quick facts, contribution and upcoming projects. The data visualization on the pages is minimal, with the spirit of showing qualitative data more than quantitative.

Change the photographs to match your particular nonprofit by searching through our extensive image library.

Click on the button above to create your nonprofit annual report.

Template #2: Funding Areas Nonprofit Annual Report

Unlike the template above which is more about specific poignant data, this template is more about larger financial data sets.

The majority of this report’s pages have plenty of data visualizations, diagrams, charts and timelines. Import your nonprofit’s financial data into the placeholder graphs easily and color customize to match your brand.

Click on the button above to start visualizing your nonprofit’s financial reports.

Template #3: Annual Nonprofit Report

On occasion, a nonprofit annual report has to show a large amount of data. Nevertheless, it doesn’t all need to be included in an overview report. This template is perfect for that.

This template is the perfect start to create an interactive digital annual report.

Use the icons in each section to add popups with additional information. Apart from popups, you can also add hyperlinks to take your viewers to more detailed information about each area.

When done, share your interactive report with a live link or download as a PDF.

Category #9: Weekly Professional Report Templates

Reporting weekly status reports for team projects doesn’t need to be a tedious affair every time. With a corporate report template like this, you can make weekly reports fun. You can even use a one page report template or one that has multiple pages for your weekly report.

If you need help with writing a weekly report, we have a great tutorial on our blog.

Template #1: Content Marketing Weekly Report

Content marketing efforts need organization. In some cases, it needs to be weekly. This one-page template is great for quick notes to keep it all on track.

This weekly content marketing plan has a space for each day with specific notation areas for ideas, competitor analysis and keyword research.

You can use this template digitally as a pdf to fill in by your team. Alternatively, print out and copy to keep in a binder.

Click on the button above to start creating a weekly content marketing weekly report.

Template #2: Weekly Report

If you’re looking for a versatile weekly report that can work for any type of data, this template is just what you need.

One sheet with simple empty sections to fill out as you see fit.

Do you need to report social media? Add that as a subtitle. Looking to report daily interactions with a specific customer or collaborator, note it down here.

Click on the button to personalize this report template for anything you need it to be.

Template #3: Executive Summary Weekly Report

Executive reports tend to be long and full of important information about a company’s ongoing projects, successes and failures. These reports need a weekly summary to keep track of reporting on an ongoing basis.

This executive summary weekly report is a one-page document. It has daily placeholders for different team sections to fill in according to their part of the work.

Change the colors and fonts to match your brand and make multiple copies of the page. Use digitally as a PDF or print out to use in a binder.

Click the button above to get every person of your team tracking progress about a project in the same way.

Template #4: Retail Weekly Marketing Report

Does your retail business need to report weekly progress in a visually impactful way? This template is just what you’ve been looking for.

Intense colors and delicate details on the pages of this professional report template create a unique visual experience. Help your team report important data and company information memorably.

Click on the button above to start reporting weekly retail data.

Template #5: B2B Company Weekly Content Report

Your content team is working hard to bring results to your company. To let the rest of the team know the results, you need a template like this one.

The three main sections in this business report template include content types, content metrics and team performance. The pages have all the right charts to get you started with a content report that makes sense and keeps the team inspired.

Color-code the charts to match your brand and the rest of the report. Make sure to add all the information you need to share into the placeholders and include hyperlinks to the best-performing content.

Click on the button above to get started with your weekly content report.

Template #6: Weekly Employee Performance Report

All teams in your company need to show the progress of the work they do together. This template is perfect for employee performance reporting .

This template is a great starting point template for a digital report that includes pop-ups and hyperlinks to more data that won’t fit into five pages.

Easily personalize the icons and overall layout of the report to match your brand. Embed your data into a collection of charts and graphs that visualize your team’s progress memorably.

Business Report FAQs

Before digging in to browse the business report example list, we answer your most pressing questions first.

Q. What is a business report template?

A business report template is a predesigned document that anyone can use to create a professional report without needing design skills.

But what makes a report template even better, A BRANDED report template.

Branded report templates are like a secret weapon for brands and organizations to create reports and other visual content regularly and easily. Using branded templates democratizes de design process inside organizations and teams. You can save money and time by using branded business report templates and other visual material.

Q. What are examples of business reports?

There are many types and styles of business reports. For example:

In the list below, you’ll discover plenty of report templates organized into 9 different categories. Choose the one you need for your purpose and goal and start creating!

How do you write a business report?

Writing a business report is much like writing other documents; as long as you follow a standardized formula, you’re good to go.

Follow these steps to get started:

Read this article to get all the pro tips for writing a business report .

Q. What are the five main parts of a business report?

Business reports vary widely according to their need and purpose. But there are five main parts that you can’t skip out on, no matter what. Make yourself a checklist and never miss one.

Q. What is a business report format?

A business report format template can help you save time by organizing the layout first before adding the content. It keeps work aligned with the main goal.

Here’s a general overview of a business report layout and format. The details will change according to your content.

Read our guide on report writing to improve your report-creating skills in no time.

Ready to Design Your Own Business Report?

Wow, that was a long list of professional report templates! Did you find the one you liked the most for your content? Now it’s time to get to work!

Before we continue, did you know that even though business reports are printable? Yes, and they can also be digital, interactive, and animated!

Take, for example, our case study about how UCLA creates interactive reports with Visme .

With Visme, you’re able to create printable business reports for your business or any industry. Your Visme reports can have many pages and all the tools to visualize your data in many different ways.

Get started by creating a free Visme account , or click on the button below each business report template in the list above to register and start editing the business report.

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About the Author

Orana is a multi-faceted creative. She is a content writer, artist, and designer. She travels the world with her family and is currently in Istanbul. Find out more about her work at oranavelarde.com

Business Report Format Guide: Formal Structure & Examples

Author Author: Sam Thomas Twitter

When it comes to reporting, it may be the least fun of business daily tasks, yet, they are vital to your business growth as a good report can help you refine your strategies and plan for the future. Therefore, it is important to have an appropriate business format to present everything clearly and make your content easy to understand.

In this article, we will clarify the definition of a business report, its benefits to any organization, different types, and ways to structure it, some examples, and, more importantly, how to format a simple one.

A business report is a compilation of data that presents historical details related to the activities, development, perspectives from particular departments of an organization, and creates a framework for potential decision-making processes or factual perspectives required to coordinate business functions.

It is important to identify these types of reports to recognize the best uses for business reports better. It organizes information for a particular sector. While some reports will go through a more comprehensive approach for evaluating a specific department's functionality and policies, other types of business reports will focus more on the bigger business management picture.

Why a business report is important

Such reports also allow for data collection by tracking the progress. You can compare the different periods and operations, development, etc. You can also see which goods or services are more effective than others, which marketing campaigns perform better than others, and which markets or segments need more focus.

It's useful to acquire all this data, and in so doing, you're creating a paper record of your past events. They allow individuals outside the business, like banks or investors, to be aware of your activities and results and let stakeholders know your business's tangible and intangible assets.

The following benefits of doing a proper business report can contribute to your business growth.

Risk Assessment and Opportunity

You will improve the awareness of threats and opportunities within your organization through business report samples. Sample reports emphasize the connection between financial and non-financial performance: they streamline processes, cut costs, and enhance overall consistency.

Trends and Connections

Samples of the business report will allow you to compare your results with other business units or businesses in the same industry. A report template on a more detailed level will help you dig deep into organizational indicators, specifics and find similarities that would otherwise be unnoticed. Obtaining a deeper understanding of your data in the modern-day digital time will allow you to develop strategies that enhance major aspects of your business growth thru trend detection. The value of a business report is illustrated by this aspect alone.

Business Intelligence (BI)

The useful BI tools may decide your survival on the market.

By producing a company's business report designed to enhance your BI operations and address critical corporate questions, you can obtain the opportunity to discuss unique observations that can create a significant benefit and monitor overall spending. You could provide basic components to develop an effective business intelligence plan by understanding how to build a report with particular examples and templates.

While there are many different types of business reports for a company, they all have one common trait: gathering data and tracking the business activities related to something specific. By working with the right reports, users can perform in-depth visual analyses of many key business areas or functions and provide informed recommendations that will ultimately improve efficiency and encourage innovation.

Although an organization has several different types of business reports, they all share one similar characteristic: collecting information and monitoring business activities linked to something particular. Users may conduct an in-depth visual analysis of many important business areas or functions by communicating with the correct reports and make educated suggestions that will eventually boost productivity and foster innovation.

Operational Efficiency

The more the report becomes objective, the clearer the data. If the data is well structured and clear, it is best to observe the business operations cost-effectively, minimizing the time needed to review findings.

A strong structure for business reports provides an in-depth review in which the authors demonstrate how their results were interpreted.

A marketing report, for instance, can minimize the time taken to evaluate a particular campaign. In contrast, an HR report can provide perspectives into the recruitment process and determine, for instance, why the cost per hire has escalated.

Specificity

You will be offering yourself a vital opportunity to discuss specific concerns if you complete a business report, which is also used when decisions need to be taken. They serve many purposes: some record future planning details, some record historical data to explain a scenario, and others provide a viable alternative to a business issue. Some executive dashboards are for daily use, while a monthly business report template can allow you to more steadily and incrementally characterize your activities. They are all key to business success since they make complicated analysis results simpler.

As previously stated, the clearer the data, the more cost-effective results would be, so it should be important to bear in mind the specific data to be integrated into this type of report.

In different industries, you can find several main performance indicator examples that should be considered when creating this type of report. To compare industry values to see your competition, you can also create an inter-departmental report and between companies.

Accuracy and Consistency

Data is a vast environment in the digital world, and if you want to make full use of it, it is important to strive for consistency and precision. If your data is missed, it might hurt the company in the long term. Using an online dashboard platform to compile your reports is an enormous benefit in terms of ease of use, time saved but most significantly, the accuracy of the information you are going to use.

All on your report will be up-to-date when you deal with real-time data, and the decisions you will make will be supported with the latest facts. Business reporting examples are incredibly useful when exploring the data and performing data analyses to obtain valuable insights. With the results' visualization, they will provide a substantial added value to the report, adding more clarity and understanding to the analysis, which is the ultimate goal of business reporting examples.

You can understand intuitive and visual business-centric reporting tools that communicate a message relevant to the audience. With only some clicks, you can get deep insights while examining your data. A clean and customized report is valuable.

Benchmarking

You will keep your company going while catalyzing your overall growth and productivity levels by regularly setting goals centered on your most critical business priorities and operating with visual reporting tools.

Communication

Improving internal coordination and connectivity is one of the key applications of business reports. You will motivate everyone in the organization with greater access to knowledge by having real-time access to the most important business data whilst improving the way you interpret and present it, which, in turn, will strengthen internal communication and collaboration.

These reports may also be of several different kinds, but they all have one common characteristic: collecting data and monitoring anything particularly relevant to business activities. From there, their author will also conduct a review and provide the organizations with insights.

Types of business report

The informal report.

One or two pages in length and formatted as a letter or memo can be the informal report. It could also be shared by email. Your business will have a particular format to adopt, so it would help to use past reports as a reference.

Alternatively, to allow for easy reading, you can select a style with headings and subheadings, numeric lists, or an outline. As a subject line, the title of the report should be added.

Make sure to take into account the reader of your report and using your audience-appropriate vocabulary and tone. Even so, accessibility and precision continue to be important components.

The formal report

Typically, the formal report is more detailed and runs many pages long. Factual accuracy, pronunciation, and grammar are a must.

If more than one person writes the report, make sure it has consistency (no abrupt leaps from one subject to another) and a clear voice (no distracting style contrasts). Your business would have its report format, or you may have to create one from scratch.

The structure of a business report

A business report's content can rely on what you're writing about. Even the writing style can rely on whom you are writing about. There is a general framework, though, which most market reports adopt. In this article, then, we can glance at how to structure a business report for full consistency and professionalism.

Each business report should have a page for the title. The title itself should state what the report is about. You should include your name and the report date, too.

A review of the key points is the beginning page for most business reports. Strive to give a brief outline of what the article is about. How the study has been conducted (e.g., methods for collecting data), the major results of the study. Also, bring to light the main conclusions and suggestions.

If a report with a paragraph or two, this part may not be necessary. Yet, a full executive summary is required for longer or more comprehensive reports.

For long reports, this page should be added. You should include each section's title and the report's structure. Try to match the headings for those used in the main text exactly. Also, number the sections properly.

Introduction

The first section of the study is the formal introduction. Here, explain the synopsis of the report you got when requested to prepare the paper. This structures the remainder of the study by covering background information (for example, company history or market data), report intent (i.e. what you've reached out to attain), and its scope (i.e. what will be included the article, and what will be dismissed).

Methods and Findings

Have a section about the methodology while performing research work. This can be as straightforward as identifying the sources you are using and why you have picked them. Show the reader how the data were gathered and analyzed.

You ought to clarify your results afterward. This section will simply and concisely describe the findings of your analysis, ensure that all the key points pointed out in the abstract are addressed.

The advice here is to split the results into subsections, including headings to direct the reader with the information you presented. In the meantime, using charts and diagrams to convey information visually, yet ensure they are clearly labeled so that the reader understands its relation to the text.

Conclusions and Recommendations

Your report's final key section includes conclusions and recommendations. The conclusion section should summarize what the study has shown you. If asked to do so, you can also, recommend relevant steps based on your results. If you are not certain about what to propose in this, then reflect the targets defined in your brief.

Show third-party sources in a bibliography if you have used them when writing the report. Examples are business documents , academic articles, or even news reports.

The objective is to demonstrate what you have premised your results and conclusions on.

Lastly, throughout your study, you might have obtained additional documents, like interview transcripts, marketing content, or financial details. It would make it too lengthy and confusing to include this in the main report, however at the end of the paper, you may move it to an appendix (or many appendices) in case the reader looks for it.

Examples of a business report

White paper template.

White papers are an ideal instrument for educating and persuading stakeholders. They can also be used by consultants to boost their popularity with large consulting firms and boutique companies or to use them as lead magnets in Facebook advertising, etc.

A polished template is, as always, much more prone to engage senior leaders or potential customers. The easiest way to create something that is both appealing and easy to comprehend is a business report template or consulting report template.

For example, this consulting report has a full page devoted to visuals to avoid the report being dull. It supports data as well.

Project Plan Template

The easiest way to keep a project on track is through a project schedule.

But it can be difficult to show the steps towards completing a project and to show how each step is actionable and observable. If you're a consultant and you don't have business models to depend on, this is extremely challenging.

An ideal way to imagine what needs to take place, and when, is this project plan template. With bar graphs, icons, and color-coding, this template presents information effectively. You can customize the schedule by entering the editor and clicking on the bar graph.

Business case study template

Business case studies typically provide resources to explain how actual businesses have handled a specific scenario or problem. Normally, the case study includes business theory and illustrates its relevance to actual situations.

For instance, this template illustrates how Gen Led uses high quality to boost sales in a competitive market.

How to format a simple business report

Using the conventional Single Spaced Template in Word is best when typing and formatting one-page business reports.

Start Word and maximize the Word window, and then click the File tab > New and pick Traditional Single Spaced Blank Document .

Character Formatting can be used when you want to format text like individual words in a document. It can be done by using the Mini Toolbar, which is only displayed when you point to a selected text in a document or from the Home Tab Font Group. There are widely used buttons in the Font Group that you can use to add bold, italic, underline, shadow, stroke, or color to your text.

The default font form and size are 11-point Calibri, but you can change its attributes or the way it looks after you have picked a font type. For instance, by having the font bold, italic, or underlined, you can adjust the font size or adjust its style.

To spice up your papers, you can also add color and apply special text effects. The font size is calculated by estimating the character height in units called points. The regular font sizes are 10, 11, and 12 points for text.

By changing the spacing between characters and words, you can now also add kerning to your word text. You may also adjust the document case, including the upper or lower case.

Turn on the Symbol for Show / Hide. At the top of the page, which is the existing insertion point, your I-beam will flash. Then turn the Show/Hike symbol on so you can see your paragraph and line space marks.

Tap on the Home Tab > Paragraph Group > Show/Hide Button

Click ENTER 5 times to start on the report's first line that is 2 inches from the top of the page

Choose the first two lines of the report's title and from the Home Tab > Font Group , adjust the font size to 14 points , bold and center.

With the text already chosen, tap on the Home Tab > Font Group > Change Case button and change the Case to UPPERCASE.

Click ENTER once after the TITLE to add line space between the TITLE and SUBTITLE. Choose the next 3 lines (the SUBTITLE, BYLINE, and DATE) and change the font size to 12 points, bold and center. Click ENTER after each line in order that the SUBTITLE, BYLINE, and DATE are double spaced.

Capitalize and Bold the SIDE HEADINGS. To capitalize all three at the same time, choose the first heading then hold the down the ctrl key on your keyboard and tap on the other titles.

Under the heading LibreOffice WRITER, choose the 3 lines of text

Tap on Home Tab > Paragraph Group and choose the Numbering to apply your numbering style.

Remember to Spell check, proofread and preview your document for spelling and formatting

Final thoughts

Presenting a business report in a straightforward and succinct a manner as possible is vital. Your reader wants to easily and conveniently understand the key points and you should therefore evaluate how well the structure and format of your report serve to convey this information.

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to leave a comment in the box below. We are glad to help you out. If you find this post useful, you can share this with your friends.

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Modern business report
Reporting business data to potential investors or your team in a powerful way need not be challenging with the right tools. Make business reports that connect and inform with a preformatted and designed template from Microsoft. Download with Microsoft 365 Word Explore premium templates
44 Business Report Templates for Professional Reports (2023)
The company you work for may already have an established format for formal business reports. Check your company handbook or ask the person who wants the report to see if there's a specific format you should use. Using an established format will help your report look more professional. 3. Add a title
Business Report Format Guide: Formal Structure & Examples
Types of business report The informal report One or two pages in length and formatted as a letter or memo can be the informal report. It could also be shared by email. Your business will have a particular format to adopt, so it would help to use past reports as a reference.