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Overview

Financial data requires precision and context. SkoutLab helps finance teams move beyond reporting to understanding — finding the “why” behind the numbers.

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Common Questions

Performance

  • Why did margins change?
  • What’s driving cost increases?
  • Where are we over/under budget?

Trends

  • How are unit economics evolving?
  • What’s the runway impact?
  • Are expenses scaling efficiently?

Anomalies

  • Are there unusual transactions?
  • What’s causing variance?
  • Are there data quality issues?

Planning

  • What drives forecast accuracy?
  • Where are budgets typically off?
  • What assumptions need revisiting?

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Example: Margin Analysis

Question asked:
“Why did gross margin decline from 68% to 62% this quarter?”
What SkoutLab found:
Status: Confirmed (explains 4 of 6 points)Lower-margin products grew 34% while high-margin products grew only 8%. The product mix alone accounts for 4 percentage points of margin decline.Recommended action: Review pricing strategy for growing product lines
Status: Confirmed (explains 1.5 points)Cloud infrastructure costs up 28%, outpacing revenue growth of 18%. Cost per customer increased from 12to12 to 15.Recommended action: Engineering review of infrastructure efficiency
Status: Confirmed (explains 0.5 points)$180K in consulting fees for compliance project. Non-recurring expense affecting current quarter only.Recommended action: No action — one-time expense

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Data You’ll Need

DataWhy It Helps
P&L / Income StatementRevenue and expense breakdown
Budget/ForecastFor variance analysis
Transaction detailsLine-item analysis for anomalies
Historical periodsTrend and seasonality detection

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Finance-Specific Capabilities

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Variance Analysis

SkoutLab automatically:
  • Compares actual vs budget/forecast
  • Identifies largest drivers of variance
  • Distinguishes one-time vs recurring impacts

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Anomaly Detection

Flags unusual patterns:
  • Transactions outside normal ranges
  • Unexpected category spikes
  • Missing or duplicate entries

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Trend Analysis

Identifies:
  • Metric trajectory (improving, declining, stable)
  • Seasonality patterns
  • Inflection points

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Tips for Financial Analysis

Specify Periods

“This quarter vs last quarter” or “YoY” gives context

Name Metrics

“Gross margin” is clearer than “profitability”

Include Benchmarks

Mention targets or thresholds you care about

Layer Analysis

Start with summary, then drill into specific line items

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Sample Questions to Try

"What's causing the variance between actual and budgeted expenses?"

"Which cost categories are growing faster than revenue?"

"Are there any unusual transactions this month?"

"How do our unit economics compare to 6 months ago?"

"What's driving the change in customer acquisition cost?"