Lesson 3: Building the Forecasting Scenario

As the sales analyst for Adventure Works, you have been asked to forecast the sales of individual bike models for the next year. In particular, you have been asked to find peak times for bike sales and to learn how sales lead or lag with regard to region. Additionally, you have been asked to determine whether sales of different models vary depending on the time of the year.

To find the requested information, in this lesson you will investigate the company's data at the monthly level, and you will also divide sales into three regions: Europe, North America, and the Pacific.

After you complete the tasks in this lesson, you will be able to answer the following questions:

  • What time of year do sales peak?
  • How do the sales of different bike models interact over time?
  • Is there a pattern to sales with regard to the three regions?

To complete the tasks in this lesson, you will use the Microsoft Time Series Algorithm.

This lesson contains the following topics:

See Also

Concepts

Data Mining Tutorial

Help and Information

Getting SQL Server 2005 Assistance