Impact Pricing

Michael Hammersley co-founded and invented a payment system designed to locate the market price of any consumer good. He authored the utility patent that protects the invention. In this episode, Michael discusses the platform he co-founded, a dual-sided marketplace of buyers and sellers that helps businesses reach a pricing competitive advantage. Why you've got to check out this podcast: Discover what Drop Pilot platform is Find out how it can benefit both sellers and buyers in determining the best price possible Learn to figure out the best pricing your customers are willing to pay "Find out what your customer is willing to pay before you sell them the product." - Michael Hammersley Topics Covered: 01:34 - How he started his career in pricing 02:21 - What's so interesting about analyzing pricing potential as a distressed fund 02:55 - Getting to know what Drop Pilot is and what dual-sided marketplace mean 04:00 - Is Drop Pilot a marketplace or research area and what benefit does this platform have for the sellers? 05:26 - What kinds of businesses work with them and what it means to have multi-unit transactions? 06:18 - Buyer's benefit in using Drop Pilot and explaining the research aspect of the platform 08:34 - Proprietary payment system's role in the marketplace and where his coaching focuses on in regard to the platform 11:01 - How to get people to bid with B2B businesses 12:56 - What is a Drop Day? 18:17 - Is the platform representing the real market? 19:11 - How the whole idea about Drop Pilot started and dealing with scalping issues 20:36 - Michael's best pricing advice that impact's one's business Key Takeaways: "We have a lot of repeat droppers who each time they come up with a new product, they'll come back, release it with us, figure out how to price it, and then sell it on their own website." - Michael Hammersley "If you want to figure out customer willingness to pay for a pricing tool, you really have to generate those numbers on your own based on estimations." - Michael Hammersley "If you want to look at the pricing analytics and you want to find out what your customers are willing to pay, it actually makes more sense to operate in a pressurized environment because you get the highest and best price." - Michael Hammersley "What you would want to do is take a look at the analytics and find the clusters of where the most bids came in like what the most common bid was, and then use that as a reference point to set your retail price." - Michael Hammersley "One thing that our algorithm or our platform actually does is it completely prevents the use of scalping bots." - Michael Hammersley Connect with Michael Hammersley: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-r-hammersley-77285225b/ Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on May 11, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/price-segmentation-in-tioli-markets/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 4 of Spades from the Selling Value card deck. Every time a salesperson gets in front of a procurement officer, a purchasing agent, however they're called, the purchasing agent will act price sensitive. Their job is to get a better price for their company. And so, they will always tell you that your price is too high, they need a discount. And you have to decide as a salesperson, do you want to give it to them? And here's the trick, does the purchasing agent actually have any power or authority to influence the decision process? If you're selling a commodity, and they could go to three, or four, or 10 different sources to get essentially the exact same thing, and those are all approved sources for the manufacturing capability, procurement has a lot of power. You need to do a great job at making sure procurement stays happy and figure out what it really takes to close that deal. On the other hand, if you're selling a piece of capital equipment and you've had a long sales cycle selling to a relatively large committee of people who've been debating, what's the best solution for us? And then they take that to procurement so the purchasing can go buy it. It turns out, procurement has almost no power. They'll pretend to have a lot of power, but they really don't. The decision was made by the committee. And so, we don't have to give big discounts to procurement in situations like that. Here's the problem, it takes guts. So, do you have the guts? We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, and then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Jens Hentschel's passion is B2B relationship management and is especially interested in the interaction between the two sides at the negotiation table: buyers and sellers, suppliers and customers, sales and procurement professionals. In this episode, Jens delves into the role of procurement in guiding the internal stakeholder's buying journey on the supply side, while the sales professional assists in facilitating a value-based negotiation. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Gain a comprehensive understanding of procurement's involvement in the sales process using the direct and indirect spend terminologies Recognize the significance of involving procurement at the outset of the negotiation process Learn how procurement and sales can create a mutually beneficial scenario in pricing value "When you get into that situation where you have been put on the spot in that negotiation, don't budge on price." - Jens Hentschel Topics Covered: 01:16 - How he got into pricing 03:04 - Jens important thoughts about Mark's bad impression of procurement 07:27 - A case where it's all about price [on the procurement side] and not a win-win situation 11:12 - Understanding procurement's role in the sales process using the direct and indirect spent terms 15:00 - Why the need to involve procurement early on in the sales process 17:57 - Identifying the right procurement person and establishing the initial conversation 20:49 - A procurement's participation in the customer's buying journey 22:22 - Discussing the concept of supplies vendors list 25:00 - The role that price play in making it to the vendor's list 27:12 - Jens impactful pricing advice Key Takeaways: "What we are trying to preach is, involve them [procurement] right away because 90% of what your customers spend is managed through a procurement process." - Jens Hentschel "Something that I can only recommend to anybody to do is, interact with them [procurement] early, provide them with value insights that they're not able to gather themselves. That's how you start building that relationship." - Jens Hentschel "My thinking is, the procurement professional is the enabler of the buying journey of the internal stakeholder. And they can do it best by having a salesperson on the supplies helping them to be that facilitator." - Jens Hentschel "Where really value is created is where the sales professional on the supply side and the procurement professional on the customer side really work hand in hand to promote a solution." - Jens Hentschel Resources/ People Mentioned: Procter and Gamble: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procter_%26_Gamble Connect with Jens Hentschel: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jenshentschel Website: https://www.fivis.io/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: [email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on May 4, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/price-segmentation-by-negotiating/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 5 of Diamonds from the Selling Value card deck. We typically give our salespeople some level of discount authority. And the reason we do that is, let's say they walked in, and they asked the factory, or headquarters, 'Hey, could I have a 5% discount?' And we always say yes to that. Then all we've done is slowed down the sales process. Instead, we give them some level of discount authority. Knowing that, you know, if you come in for 5% or less, I'm going to give it to you anyway. So, you just have permission to go give 5% or less. The problem, of course, is that salespeople typically give the max that they're allowed to give. There's all these different levers that they could pull. They could sell value, and they can discount price. And discounting price is one of those levers that they're going to pull because it's easy. See how easy it is for me to discount the 5% and it doesn't hit my commission that much. So, it's okay for me to give that 5% discount. What we want to do as a company is sit back and say, what are the right levels of discount authority? What should I let my salesperson discount to? What should I let my sales managers discount to, my sales directors discount to? There are different levels, and we want them to be incented to discount as little as possible. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Alessandro Monti is a pricing enthusiast and expert on all topics related to monetization, conversion, upselling, digital pricing, price management, and business and pricing history. In this episode, Alessandro highlights the importance of adopting a monetization-led growth approach for your business and emphasizes the need to start implementing this strategy early on in your business. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Learn to redefine growth in the sense of making it profitable and sustainable Discover the importance of a monetization-driven growth strategy for the long-term success and sustainability of your business Find the ideal pricing metric for your business to attain optimal product-pricing-market fit and achieve success "Choosing the appropriate price metric seems to be probably one of these game-changing moments for your businesses." - Alessandro Monti Topics Covered: 01:32 - What brought him to pricing and what made him choose SKP 02:43 - Why he believes in supply and demand 06:01 - Delving into the concept of "growth at any cost" and shifting our focus away from it 08:31 - Defining digital industry and turning away from this 'growth at any cost' mentality 09:36 - Redefining growth 12:25 - Challenging the tools and techniques to get to this ultimate growth 14:49 - Deciding between freemium and free trial [and starting monetization-led growth early on in the business] 20:25 - Extracting value to monetize a product and what is true business success 23:03 - Alessandro's best pricing advice that impacts anyone's business 24:05 - Finding the best pricing metric to use Key Takeaways: "Let's redefine growth in the sense of let's make profitable business." - Alessandro Monti "We don't need the free, just for the sake of having free because there is value in having free users. But besides that, I think you need to seek the conversion and the monetization as early as possible." - Alessandro Monti "It's growth understood as profitability using all of our modern monetization techniques and there's room for alternative content." - Alessandro Monti People / Resources Mentioned: Taylor Swift: https://www.taylorswift.com/ Connect with Alessandro Monti: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/profmonti/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: [email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on April 27, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/simplify-your-pricing/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 5 of Clubs from the Selling Value card deck. Most salespeople are paid on commission, and typically that commission is a percentage of the revenue. So, 2% of the revenue, 5% of the revenue, somewhere in that ballpark. The problem is, that incremental revenue, if I want to grow my revenue by 1%, the salesperson is only going to get 2%, or their commission rate, of the 1%. And it's a really, really tiny number. However, for the company, that 1% could be a really big number especially if your overall margins are relatively small, because that incremental 1% of revenue is a hundred percent profit. But we don't incentivize our salespeople to get that next 1% very much. Ideally, what we would do is, we would create a sales incentive structure so that covering costs, maybe they don't make anything, but anything from cost to list price, the amount of commission, the amount of incentive payment they get goes up for the higher the price they get. I, typically, like to have a target price. I also have a list price and a floor price. And I'll set three different commission rates. Anybody who can sell at list gets a really high commission rate. Anybody who sells at Target or above gets a mid-level commission rate. Anybody who sells above the floor and below the target, it's a really low commission rate. But the key is, we want to give our salespeople incentives to negotiate for that last 1%. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, and talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Andrew Bailey is a Value Pricing and Price Negotiation Specialist. He is the founder of Commercial Strategy 4. He helps you unleash your pricing power to sell more, more often, and at a higher price to achieve the profits you deserve. In this episode, Andrew shares his strategy for value-based pricing negotiations to help you achieve the highest possible pricing for your product or service. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Explore how you can present alternative options during negotiations by combining price and value selling strategies Discover one great technique for setting the stage and preparing the buyer's mindset for a pricing value conversation Uncover a more effective approach to pricing instead of simply relying on discounts "Improve your prices and just get really good at customer conversations." - Andrew Bailey Topics Covered: 01:14 - How he started in pricing 03:40 - Important consideration for negotiation 04:58 - Defining value for clients and questions to ask to understand the value you're delivering 09:21 - Dealing with procurement people versus the pricing committee as you go through value discovery process 12:32 - Key insights on opposing viewpoints between procurement and committee 14:28 - Practicing real-life price negotiations 16:36 - Pricing and value negotiation strategy that people rarely do but should be considered 24:08 - The biggest mistake in pricing negotiations and what should be done instead 27:53 - Andrew's best pricing advice to impact one's business Key Takeaways: "Ultimately, your ability to achieve the results that you want in pricing and negotiating is focused around your negotiating strength." - Andrew Bailey "What I talk to people about is understanding what's really important to customers, what matters to them." - Andrew Bailey "Don't try to make a whole long list of things that you can do for your clients and customers. It's probably two or three things that's really important to them. Just focus on that. That's a great place to get to." - Andrew Bailey "We can give some discount and then we agree to it without really thinking about, could we do this differently? Is there a better way, is there more value here than simply that price and that quantity?" - Andrew Bailey Connect with Andrew Bailey: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pricingmentor/?originalSubdomain=uk Email: [email protected] Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on April 20, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/nobody-cares-about-your-product/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 5 of Hearts from the Selling Value card deck. It's true, customers hate price increases. Heck, I get an annual price increase from Intuit for my QuickBooks, and I hate it. But there's nothing I can do about it. I just have to sit around and stew about the fact that I really despise that Intuit raises my price every year. However, when we blame costs, then people hate us a little bit less. So, we know as pricing people, as salespeople, we know that our prices really have nothing to do with our costs. But our customers don't really know that, and our customers believe the cost drive pricing. So therefore, if we're going to raise prices, the only real reason customers accept is that our costs went up. Imagine if Intuit sent me that email every year, and instead of it said, 'Hey, we're raising your price by $8, $10,' whatever it happens to be. Instead they say, 'Hey, our costs have gone up this year. We need to pass that on. We're going to increase your price by $10.' sure, I still dislike it. But I dislike it a little less. It's like they have a reason other than, 'Hey, I want you to pay more so that I can make more money.' So, think about blaming costs when you increase prices. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Darlene Nordstrom is an accomplished pricing professional with experience in developing and implementing worldwide software pricing and licensing strategies spanning traditional on premise, cloud and software as a service (SaaS) offerings. Broad financial knowledge including revenue recognition, standalone selling price, return on investment, profit and loss statements and various analyses such as profitability, variance, impact, market and competitive analyses. In this episode, Darlene highlights the crucial role of interdepartmental collaboration in developing a robust pricing strategy. Additionally, she stresses the importance of having a designated pricing specialist to oversee the entire process. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Find out why interdepartmental cooperation makes a successful pricing strategy What added value does a pricing person bring to the table with departmental integration notwithstanding Learn why you should be discerning when creating short-term and long-term pricing efforts "Cross-functional collaboration - to me that is key. What's been successful in my 15 plus years of doing pricing is having that cross-functional collaboration where everyone feels like they have a voice." - Darlene Nordstrom Topics Covered 01:30 - What prompted her to pursue a career in pricing? 02:15 - Pricing as a team effort and a collaborative endeavor 04:49 - How does a collaborative effort in pricing look like in IBM? 05:29 - Discussing the process in reaching a pricing decision 07:18 - Which pricing decisions need this complicated process of decision making? 08:52 - Why the need for a pricing person when there is already a collaboration with other departments? 11:50 - What added value does a pricing team bring to a corporation? 12:52 - Important considerations to think about in terms of creating short and long-term efforts in pricing 15:17 - Partnering with financial folks to do the analytical part of interpreting data and KPIs 17:14 - IBM as a premium price leader doing the competitor-based pricing 18:57 - Talking about the differential value in a competitor-based pricing 20:57 - How hard was it changing a pricing metric for a product and when do you consider changing it? 22:58 - Darlene's pricing advice that could impact one's business Key Takeaways: "You don't set your price once and done, you just keep reiterating it. And the pricing team is responsible for providing those meaningful insights." - Darlene Nordstrom "What you shouldn't do is make short-term decisions that will impact your long-term goals. Being short-sighted and reacting, you don't want to end up in a price war and react because a competitor did something." - Darlene Nordstrom "You always have to be thinking in terms of that end goal in mind and work backwards, and maybe there are some iterative steps that you could take to get to that end goal. I'd be careful about making some short-term decisions that impact your long-term goals." - Darlene Nordstrom People / Resources Mentioned: IBM: https://www.ibm.com/ Connect with Darlene Nordstrom: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darlene-nordstrom-96ab4220/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: [email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on April 13, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/lessons-from-a-cute-story/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 5 of Spades from the Selling Value card deck. A value table consists of four columns: the solution, the problem, the result, and the value, typically in dollars. And when we do this, we think of creating the information, or the data in each cell for a typical customer. But we would never walk into a customer and say, 'You should expect to make a million dollars by buying this product.' Or we would never walk into a customer and say, 'We would expect you to have 3% more productivity if you buy our product.' Instead, when we think through all of the columns in a value table, and where additional profit comes from, and where additional productivity or reduced turnover, or whatever other effects we're going to have for our customers, then all we've done is say, 'This is a possible scenario.' But if we understand what those are, then when we go in and start having conversations with our buyers, and we say, 'What problems are you trying to solve?' Or, 'What results might you be looking for?' We already know how to take those problems, turn them into results. Those results turn them into profit dollars to the customer. So, I think of a value table more as a roadmap, as a conversation starter. As a way to say, 'Here's where I think the dialogue may be going.' But it certainly isn't the sales pitch we walk in with. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Michael Tatonetti is the Founder and CEO of Pricing for Associations. He is also a Pricing and Value Speaker and Consultant and a Certified Association Executive as well as a Certified Pricing Professional. In this episode, Michael discusses the importance of aligning pricing and value with the mission of associations and non-profit organizations. He emphasizes that value should be the central factor in creating a pricing strategy, as it resonates more with members and strengthens their connection to the organization. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Discover the three factors that distinguish associations from traditional subscriptions and find out their similarities in some aspects Find out how to price an association and why these two components of value and price tie in together to create the best pricing Learn how associations communicate better value in their pricing and the formula you can use to best convey your pricing "Focus on the value. Always put the value before the price." - Michael Tatonetti Topics Covered: 01:01 - How he started a career in Pricing 02:36 - What differentiates non-profit associations from subscription businesses? 03:59 - How does competition feels different in an association space? 05:37 - Looking at an associations membership bylaws, pricing objectives, their competitive positions in the space 07:16 - Three things that makes an association different from subscription business and what makes them the same with it 10:15 - What to consider when shifting from annual to monthly billing for associations and what he advocates as the biggest thing that differentiates association from subscription 12:32 - Pricing an association and when does he consider competitors when pricing? 15:08 - Questions to ask to come up with the best pricing 17:17 - Using Van Westendorp to help in data analysis for pricing [and the number of samples needed for this tool] 18:17 - Michael letting Mark share his own idea of the right number of responses needed for Van Westendorp data analysis 20:49 - Relying on value and not on cost when communicating pricing 24:38 - Michael's best pricing advice that could impact any business Key Takeaways: "Most subscriptions, not all, of course, run on like a monthly basis. Of course you can do annual, but most of them, you think in monthly terms where most associations are billing annually." - Michael Tatonetti "Most subscriptions for profit are able to just auto-bill where some associations, depending on state, cannot auto-bill, they can opt in, but for some they cannot." - Michael Tatonetti "Associations are typically divided into one of two categories, either organizational or individual. They're typically called trade or individual, trade is organization. Now, when you have an organization, then yes, typically they're not going to have it on renew." - Michael Tatonetti "I think of traditional subscriptions as an individual, I sign up and then I cancel when I want. Where with associations, there's typically more thought-power that goes into the decision to continue year over year." - Michael Tatonetti "I lean in on value a lot. I typically will not do work with an organization on just price. I typically require that we're doing value and price because most organizations don't change their value too often." - Michael Tatonetti People / Resources Mentioned: Robbie Kellman Baxter: https://impactpricing.com/podcast/ep94-powerful-pricing-insights-from-a-subscription-expert-with-robbie-kellman-baxter/ Van Westendorp: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Westendorp%27s_Price_Sensitivity_Meter Connect with Michael Tatonetti: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drtatonetti/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: mailto:[email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on April 6, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/you-have-the-curse-of-knowledge/ [powerpress] If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 6 of Diamonds from the Selling Value card deck. If you are having value conversations, you're focusing on, what's the problem the client's trying to solve? What's the result they might expect to achieve? And if that result is quantifiable and we're selling to a company, then almost certainly you can turn that quantifiable results into incremental profit to that company. But in order to do that, we have to understand the business of our customers. I remember a long, long time ago when I was in sales, we were selling automatic test equipment and we had a device that was more accurate. But in order for the test equipment that was more accurate to have value to the client, we had to show, how does this more accurate tester generate more profit? Well, the answer was, in order for a semiconductor manufacturer to ensure that a part was of a specific speed, they had to take in the accuracy of the test equipment. And so, if a test equipment was less accurate, they would build a bigger guardrail. And if a test equipment was more accurate, they could have a smaller guardrail, which meant more parts would pass the test. And those more parts passing tests were sold at higher prices, meaning they made more profit. The point is, if we don't understand the business of our customers and we don't understand how they're going to make additional profit, then it's really hard for us to help our clients say, here's why this capability generates more profit for you. And when we're able to do that, then clients are much more likely and willing to buy from us. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, and read the saying. Then, talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Robbie Kellman Baxter is an Advisor to the world's leading subscription-based companies, a Keynote Speaker and Author of The Membership Economy and The Forever Transaction. She is also the Host of Subscription Stories Podcast. In this episode, Robbie discusses the significance of upholding ethical standards when implementing a subscription business model, as it greatly affects the company's long-term viability. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Learn about the unethical practices in subscription pricing and their long-term implications for your business Find out effective price segmentation strategies that can be applied to your subscription-based business model Know why these companies are the best models when it comes to subscription pricing "Have a rationale for your pricing structure that you would be comfortable showing to a loved one who is a customer." - Robbie Kellman Baxter Topics Covered: 01:49 - What drove her entry into Pricing 04:28 - Why some companies make it hard for subscribers to cancel and what is it's negative implication in the long run 08:12 - Bad karma as a consequence of hiding a cancellation button 09:20 - Discussion around an advancing legislation on making it easier to cancel subscriptions anytime 11:11 - Understanding price segmentation in a subscription pricing 17:20 - How she negotiates when buying a car, for instance, knowing someone else paid a different price for that 19:20 - Price segmentation discussion around Everyday-Low Price[EDLP] versus High-low Price 21:09 - Discussing pricing segmentation used by Netflix and news organizations 23:25 - Another price segmentation point of discussion [based on where you live and how busy these areas are] 26:06 - Case in point at Macy's on price differential as the topic of discussion 27:51 - What makes her price sensitive even when she's non-price sensitive 29:20 - Robbie's best pricing advice Key Takeaways: "I tried to explain to them how [putting some friction into your cancellation process] in the short-term does work, in the long term, it kills your business. It kills your reputation, it ruins the trust." - Robbie Kellman Baxter "Whatever it took to get you in there, it should take you out. If you can sign up any day of the week, any time of day, you shouldn't be required to cancel Tuesdays between two and four." - Robbie Kellman Baxter "Where I come down on differentiated pricing or segmented pricing is if you can explain it to somebody. If your mother would be okay with being on the high end of that pricing and understanding why you're doing it, then I'm okay with it." - Robbie Kellman Baxter People / Resources Mentioned: SiriusXM: https://www.siriusxm.com/ Wells Fargo: https://www.wellsfargo.com/ Suzi Watford: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suzi-watford-18547817/ Dow Jones Wall Street Journal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dow_Jones_%26_Company Booz Allen: https://www.boozallen.com/ Macy's:https://www.macys.com JCPenney: https://www.jcpenney.com/ Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/ Connect with Robbie Kellman Baxter: Website: https://robbiekellmanbaxter.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robbiekellmanbaxter/ Email: [email protected] Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: [email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on March 30, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/ford-patents-feature-with-negative-value/ [powerpress] If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 6 of Clubs from the Selling Value card deck. First, let's talk about an analytical journey. These are those people who, once they realize they have a problem that they might want to go solve, they spend a bunch of time doing their own research, probably on the internet, figuring out what are the different options, where they might buy it, what are the price points? These are the most price sensitive buyers we can deal with. And yet, if we get an opportunity to talk to them as a salesperson would talk to a potential client, we could be sitting there saying, Hey, here's why our product is better than our competitor's product. But my recommendation would be to make sure we have the value conversation about the inherent value of solving the problem. If we have that conversation, it may be that the buyer didn't realize that there were a lot of other opportunities or a lot of other places where there's value if they buy a product like this. The person might begin to trust the salesperson more and say, Hey, this person's really looking out for my best interest. The buyer is more likely to buy because we're showing them more and more value. So, for a lot of different reasons, it makes sense for us to make sure that we're going back to, let's call it "first principles". We're going back to help our buyers understand what's the value of solving the problem. And in the meantime, we also need to talk about how we are differentiated and possibly better than competitive alternatives. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, and then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

JD Dillon is the Chief Marketing Officer, Communications Leader, and Pricing Professional at Tigo Energy. In this episode, JD shares his 8D problem-solving technique that helps create a solid pricing strategy in place. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Understand what the 8D technique of problem solving is and where you can specifically apply it to Learn how to figure things out and find solutions logically rather than emotionally Discover about the 'Five Why' in verifying the root causes of a problem "If you are in a situation where there's a price reduction, try to do two or three other things first." - JD Dillon Topics Covered: 01:15 - How JD's Pricing journey started 02:21 - Updates about T.J. Rodgers 03:23 - Overview of what the Eight-D problem-solving technique is all about 04:12 - How does a quality program relate to pricing? 05:32 - What goes on in D-Zero? 07:32 - Where do we ideally apply Eight-D to? [Showing a case study] 08:51 - D-One: What happens here? 10:24 - How do you go about D-Two? 12:36 - Action steps you need to do in D-Three 14:49 - Finding the root causes with D-Four and using the 'Five Why' technique 17:36 - How do you verify permanent corrective action in D-Five? 18:49 - Getting everything executed in D-Six 20:05 - Digging deeper into D-Five and [culture and internal processes] 20:58 - Preventing recurrence in D-Seven 22:48 - D-Eight: Congratulating the team 24:23 - How often do you perform the Eight-D process? 26:55 - JD's best pricing advice 28:25 - Connect with JD Key Takeaways: "Pricing is the quality metric for revenue." - JD Dillon "If you do it right [Eight-D process], it builds into the DNA of the company. And after a few years you've improved your DNA continuously and quite a bit." - JD Dillon "What I described is a thought process, that's all. You can do it in a meeting with people that know what they're doing. I can do it with somebody who's worked for me in the past and we can quickly go through the process in 10 minutes about one small little issue and then move on." - JD Dillon People/Resources Mentioned: Ted Levitt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Levitt T.J. Rodgers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._J._Rodgers Connect with JD Dillon: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jd-dillon/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: [email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on March 23, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/discrimination-or-segmentation/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 6 of Hearts from the Selling Value card deck. I work with clients frequently about creating these value tables. And what we essentially do is we identify, what are the best features in the product? What problem does that feature solve for the client? What's a quantifiable result that client may expect? And then, what's the amount of profit that client may be able to get when they achieve that result? In a way, you could think of this as an ROI calculator. But the problem is, you can't go in with an ROI calculator and tell a buyer, 'Hey, you're going to go make this much money if you buy my product.' They don't believe you. In fact, if you use the document and everything that we put on there, it's probably not accurate for every single customer. In fact, it's probably not accurate for any customer. So, our recommendation is always, when you've created the value table, think of it as a thought process, this is where the value could be. And now we go talk to a buyer. And we understand, do you have this problem? 'Oh, yeah.' What kind of result do you think you might expect? 'Oh, let's see if we can figure out the profit to your company if you achieve that result.' We use this as a map, as a document to help us understand where we're going, but we don't use the document to say these are the facts for any given client. So, we want to use the information, not the details of the document. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

As the founder and CEO, Joe Woodard empowers small business advisors to transform small businesses. He works toward this vision as the host of the annual Scaling New Heights conference, the host of Woodard Alliance, the head of Woodard Institute and various speaking and writing engagements he performs throughout the accounting and bookkeeping professions. In this episode, Joe discusses how to design a subscription pricing model that prioritizes building strong relationships with clients, empowering them, and generating a long-term impact on their businesses. This approach also helps increase the lifetime value of clients. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Get an in-depth discussion on pricing result versus pricing transaction Understand how charging relationships works in a subscription pricing model Uncover how to price human connections that go beyond financial reasons "Be bold with pricing. You are worth more than you think you are, and definitely more than your clients think you are." - Joe Woodard Topics Covered: 01:29 - Talks about getting differentiated from the rest with his degree in classical Greek 03:37 - How his career path ended in Pricing 04:25 - What is so significant about the subscription business model? 06:16 - How do you price a relationship? 10:08 - Going in-depth into pricing for a relationship 13:40 - Measuring the service-provider-client relationship 15:12 - Going beyond financial outcomes when measuring the economics of relationship 16:25 - Discussions around Mark's objections: 'I don't see how you price for it [relationship] 17:02 - Pricing human connection that transcends economics 20:57 - The danger about price segmentation in relation to pricing relationship 22:03 - Pricing segmentation's end-goal in a subscription model 23:38 - Healthy subscription versus toxic subscription 25:48 - Driving customer lifetime value plus creating experiences for engagement 27:43 - Joe's pricing advice 29:19 - Connect with Joe Key Takeaways: "We're intensely focused on the customer's outcome, and our outcomes become a means to that outcome. And therefore, we are pricing the relationship we have with the client because it's about the outcomes we're driving in that relationship." - Joe Woodard "I am delivering, within the context of a relationship, value. And part of that is, I'm giving you attention at the individual level. Not a newsletter, not cookie cutter answers. There's something where you're individually being touched." - Joe Woodard "Relationship economics is about the business outcomes or the business benefits that are gained by being in a relationship." - Joe Woodard "The intensity of the relationships increases based on the value that you've added in the amount of attention that you're able to give." - Joe Woodard People / Resources Mentioned: Ron Baker: https://impactpricing.com/podcast/ep44-ronald-j-baker-trash-the-timesheet-exploring-opportunities-in-subscription-businesses/ Connect with Joe Woodard: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/quickbooksadvisor/ Website: https://www.woodard.com/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: mailto:[email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on March 16, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/interesting-starlink-price-changes/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 6 of Spades from the Selling Value card deck. Make it simple for buyers to decide. One of my favorite sayings is, "A confused buyer won't buy." If you think about it, we're all afraid to make mistakes. We don't want to make mistakes. And the more difficult we make the decision, the more likely somebody thinks, a buyer thinks, they might make a mistake. We want to make the decision really simple, really clear, really obvious, so that our buyers don't think they're making a mistake. There are two techniques that are really common in simplifying this decision process. One is Good-Better-Best. If you have a complex price list, a complex set of options, buyers get confused. They really don't want to make that decision. They don't want to make a mistake. But if you can simplify the decision into a good-better-best offering, it's so much easier for buyers to make that decision, and they're so much more likely to make it. Another place we often see the simple decision for buyers is called The Decoy Effect. This is a psychological aspect in pricing. But a decoy effect is essentially good-better-best, but it's where you make the better price and the best price really, really close to each other. And so, buyers look at that and it's easy to make a decision between best and better because it's a slight, or maybe even no price increase, and they get a lot more. And so, yeah, I can choose best over better. And once they know they can make an easy decision, they feel like they're not going to make a mistake. So the rule here, make it simple for buyers to decide. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, and then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Steven Forth is Ibbaka's Co-Founder, CEO, and Partner. Ibbaka is a strategic pricing advisory firm. He was CEO of LeveragePoint Innovations Inc., a SaaS business designed to help companies create and capture value. Steven is what I consider one of the great pricing thinkers in our industry. In this episode, Steven enlightens us about hybrid pricing models and explains why we should adopt it. He also shares why pricing people need to change the way they see AI along with the work they do in pricing. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Understand one of the unstated rules of pricing that talks about pricing power along with insights into future risk Find out how artificial intelligence (AI) can help address concerns regarding the connection between pricing and predictability, and why pricing people should change how they see AI in line with pricing Discover the reason on why most of us need to adopt hybrid pricing models and why the two pricing metrics in that should be independent of each other "Most of us need to adopt hybrid pricing models, and the two pricing metrics should be independent of each other. If the two pricing metrics track each other closely, why bother having a hybrid pricing model? You need two metrics that are relatively independent of each other, and that will give you the flexibility you need to respond in a difficult economic environment." – Steven Forth Topics Covered: 00:42 – Steven's insights on what a hybrid pricing model looks like 02:30 – Issues on pricing model that applies credits/tokens to usage 04:44 – Predictability; whoever has the best insight into future risk has the greatest pricing power 09:37 – Pricing people vs. the recent trend: AI and how it sets prices 12:02 – The Achilles heel of value-based pricing, and the hybrid pricing practice in companies 18:09 – What real value-based pricing is about 20:52 – An optimal pricing model if you want to combine two metrics 24:31 – Confused buyers don't buy and renew 27:18 – Three reasons why calculators don't expose their logic 28:42 – Steven's pricing advice 29:42 – Connect with Steven Key Takeaways: "If you have enough data, you can actually get pretty good at predicting future usage." – Steven Forth "One of the unstated rules of pricing is that whoever has the best insight into future risk has the greatest pricing power. The better we get at prediction, the more accurate we can get at pricing, and the question then becomes, who has the data to make those predictions? And I think in many cases, it's actually the vendor who has better access to data." – Steven Forth "This whole question of predictability and pricing is going to be a key question for pricing over the next three to five years, and the artificial intelligences are going to help us to answer that question much better than we've ever been able to answer it before." – Steven Forth "If you're optimizing value for the customer, you're optimizing the amount that they're willing to pay you, so if you just do it to optimize revenue, you'll end up shooting yourself in the foot because you'll trigger that negative feedback loop." – Steven Forth Connect with Steven Forth: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevenforth/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: [email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on March 8, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/pricing-professionals-have-trained-incapacity/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 7 of Diamonds from the Selling Value card deck. So, when you talk to your buyers about value, they do shift the way they think from spending on an expense toward investing. Because typically when you or anyone is shopping for something, we're thinking, how much do I have to pay and what are the features that I'm going to get? And we stop thinking about the value of what it is that we're buying. And if we have the opportunity to help our buyers understand, hey, when you go solve this problem, what's the value of solving that problem? So maybe, yeah, you're going to pay me a lot of money, but think about all the money you're going to make in additional profit because of the fact that you bought an implemented and used my product. And if we can get them focused on the value, they become a little bit less price sensitive and they trust us and like us even more. So, my recommendation is, talk about value way more than we talk about features and price. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Dick Sobel was with Emerson for 21 years where he mostly worked on pricing roles. Currently, he is the managing director of PricePoint Partners, a company that helps clients achieve significant gains in price realization and profitability with salesforce implementation utilizing cloud-based Acuity Margin Management BI software. In this episode, Dick talks about the work they do at PricePoint Partners as he points out the importance of assessment and consulting in coming up with optimal solutions to clients' problems. He also touched on the topic of AI interference in the pricing world. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Learn the work that PricePoint Partners does, the range of clients they serve, and how they could help your company in pricing Find out why you can't rely on AI alone in doing prices and why AI can do better in B2C than in B2B Find out why today is the best time to raise your prices "Inflation's persistence is here to stay for a long time. And if you're not doing something right now, you are really missing out." – Dick Sobel Topics Covered: 01:49 – How Dick got into pricing 04:40 – How Emerson did pricing before, and how they moved to value pricing as time went by 06:50 – The work that PricePoint Partners does, and the range of clients that they support 08:21 – Is PricePoint Partners a software company, or a consulting company? 10:23 – What prompts companies to focus on pricing 13:19 – Does PricePoint Partners charge for assessment? 14:58 – Why assessment is an essential part in consulting, and why you should definitely pay for it 17:25 – Why you should be careful in using AI, and why pricing people and clients are still more comfortable 22:02 – Dick's pricing advice 23:32 – Connect with Dick Sobel Key Takeaways: "Somebody has to be in charge somewhere that can at least gather the crew together and make it [changes in pricing strategy] happen." – Dick Sobel "At least for the people that I deal with, I don't feel comfortable having or I don't think they're even comfortable in having black box artificial intelligent price recommendations where "Okay, here's the price you should charge for this product, for this SKU". And it's given to the salespeople arbitrarily. There's got to be this human interface still. And so, yeah, you can look at it, but be careful." – Dick Sobel "This idea of "Well, you know, we're just going to try to hold the line", you keep doing that, you won't have a business." – Dick Sobel People / Resources Mentioned: Emerson: https://www.emerson.com/en-us/global PricePoint Partners: https://pricepointpartners.com/ Resilience Capital: https://resiliencecapital.com/ Salesforce: https://www.salesforce.com/ap/ Vendavo: https://www.vendavo.com/ Connect with Dick Sobel: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardsobel/ Email: [email protected] Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: [email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on March 1, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/wow-a-price-decrease/ [powerpress] If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 7 of Clubs from the Selling Value card deck. Anytime you're in a sales situation, we think to ourselves, Hey, we need to be selling against our competition. We need to point out why we're better than our competitors. Yeah, and maybe we do. I'm not going to say we don't need to do that. However, if we take the time to help the buyer understand, what's the underlying problem they're truly trying to solve? What's the value of solving that problem? And how it is that we help them solve that problem? It builds trust. They start to know that we understand their situation, we understand their problem. They believe that we'll be better at solving it simply because we've expressed the fact that we understood it. Oh, and when we help them build the business case, they are grateful because they need this information to help sell up inside their organization anyway. Because no one's going to buy something unless they know that it's going to help them make more money. And so, we need to help our buyers create that business case. So, it really is imperative that even if you know you're going to have competition, take the time to help your buyers understand the value of solving the problem. Not just focusing on why we're better. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, and then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Alex Galkin is the Co-Founder and CEO of Competera, a pricing optimization SaaS company converting technologies into ready-to-use products for enterprise retailers worldwide. Alex has been a mentor at his startups for several years, and he's a Ukrainian who left four days before the war started. In this episode, Alex helps us understand the pricing and ML work that they do at Competera as he talks about the three models they always put into use. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Understand why you should treat pricing as a process Find out how Competera helps their clients in making pricing decisions Discover three models that Competera puts into use as MLs look for reasonable factors to make a price adjustment "Pricing is a process, and you need to continuously improve as any other process in your organization." – Alex Galkin Topics Covered: 01:04 – How Alex got into pricing 03:07 – The work that Competera does in relation to pricing, and how they do it 08:28 – Using ML-driven price recommendations: Competera creating a 'gray box' 12:35 – Talking about the portfolio-wide pricing/portfolio optimization 14:12 – An ML example of the decoy effect 17:20 – Alex explains how their smart product segmentation works; a product bringing more people in the store 23:09 – Alex's pricing advice 23:49 – Connect with Alex Key Takeaways: "ML is not a human. He's not trying to play with the price; he's changing only if he sees the reasonable factor to make this price adjustment." – Alex Galkin People / Resources Mentioned: Competera: https://competera.net/ Connect with Alex Galkin: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandrgalkin/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: [email protected]

This one is the 7 of Hearts from the Selling Value card deck. It is true, value propositions really are awesome. Marketing teams, companies, sit around to try to figure out, what's the value proposition of this product? And it turns out that we can often come up with something that's pretty good, pretty general. It essentially is the solution to a problem that most people have, and we think of that as the value proposition. But the thing is, the value proposition isn't specific enough. Anytime you go to an individual customer, or an individual buyer, they've got different problems. Maybe our value proposition caught their attention, got them to come talk to us. But in the end, we need to understand, what are the specific problems that that buyer has? What's the result that that buyer's looking to achieve? And then help them figure out, what's the business case for that? How much value, or additional profit, will they make because they're solving those specific problems? So, I love value propositions. They're just not magic words that are enough to get people to buy. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, and then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on February 22, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/lessons-from-the-library/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Casey Brown is the President of Boost Pricing, and she has been since 2011. She started her career as a Chemical Engineer at GE, and she's been in pricing for almost 20 years now. Casey loves whitewater kayaking, and she's a big Buckeye fan. In this episode, Casey explains how important it is for sellers to connect with the emotional component of the buyer/s as she shares her knowledge on how to substantially increase your ability to earn higher prices. Why you have to check out today's podcast: Learn how crucial the seller's mindset and beliefs are to the business' profitability, especially as to whether they're operating from a place of confidence or fear Find out why you should not put the blame on cost increases when doing a price increase Understand the power of taking into consideration the emotional component, like selling value through the language, mind, and heart of your customer "I have yet to find, even in this current economic climate, a company that doesn't have some pricing opportunity, and I would just ask everyone to keep looking for it. It's there." – Casey Brown Topics Covered: 01:33 – How Casey got into pricing 04:54 – Mark to Casey: Why don't I know you? Why have I never seen you before? 07:00 – The biggest problem in sales being the lack of recognition that there's a problem 09:33 – Is Casey trying to compete with people who are doing sales training and education? Both yes and no 11:33 – An exchange of Mark's and Casey's magic formulas in communicating price increases 15:05 – More about blaming costs and cost-plus pricing 18:02 – Teaching salespeople how to properly sell value 20:40 – Convincing Mark that the emotional component is as important in B2B as it is in B2C 29:17 – Casey's pricing advice 30:08 – Connect with Casey Brown Key Takeaways: "Our entire profession – we are the best kept secret in business. And frankly, if more people understood how impactful pricing is to the profitability and how easy it is to pull that lever, there'd be a lot more of us." – Casey Brown "It does not occur to most people that the biggest opportunity to make a huge improvement in your pricing performance very quickly is not necessarily to fix your strategy, but instead to help the team understand the skill set and mindset gaps that your team has." – Casey Brown "Connecting with the emotional component of the buyer is not just a consumer phenomenon." – Casey Brown People / Resources Mentioned: Pricing with Confidence (Reed Holden's book): https://www.amazon.com/Pricing-Confidence-Leaving-Money-Table/dp/0470197579 Connect with Casey Brown: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseybrownboost/ Email: [email protected] Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: mailto:[email protected]

This one is the 7 of Spades from the Selling Value card deck. It is true that when a buyer's asking for help justifying a purchase, this is the ultimate opportunity to influence that sale. Let's take a step back for just a minute and think about what a customer is going through. And if you ever have the opportunity to help a buyer understand their underlying problems, what's the value of solving those problems, you've become a trusted advisor. You've become someone that this company, this person, looks to for real information so they can make smart decisions. Now, this is a very different decision process than, how is your product better than somebody else's product? Instead, they've brought you in to help create the business case. What a great position. And if we go to the table that I have in the Selling Value book, you'll find that this is the beginning of the trust or the relationship journey. Where they say to you, would you please help me answer, is this a good place for me to spend my money? Is this a good place for my budget? And if we can help them with that, not only have we helped them solve a problem they're trying to solve, but we've built that trust and credibility in their eyes that no competitor could ever catch up to. So absolutely, this is the biggest opportunity you have to influence that sale. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, and then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on February 15, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/amc-changes-pricing-finally/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Griff Parry is the Founder and CEO of m3ter where he helps make it easy for SaaS companies to intelligently deploy and manage usage-based pricing. He's led AWS' go-to market strategy for games and gambling in EMEA, and his background includes entertainment at Sky TV and accounting at Ernst & Young. Griff was an extra in the movie "First Night" around 1993. In this episode, Griff shares the work that they do at m3ter in helping customers deploy and manage usage-based pricing. He also discusses common pricing challenges, especially on doing a price change, emphasizing the importance of agility and transformation. Why you have to checkout today's podcast: Understand the importance of having the agility to change pricing models quickly and in different situations, especially as to why pricing is not a one-and-done thing Discover how m3ter helps SaaS companies make it easy to deploy and manage usage-based pricing Find out in which circumstance usage-based pricing works best as you learn about different pricing philosophies "Particularly in these market conditions, I would suggest that you set yourself up so that you can customize pricing by customer, or do more of that. There is a lot of money you'll be leaving on the table if you have a one-size-fits-all pricing strategy." – Griff Parry Topics Covered: 01:49 – How Griff got into pricing 03:05 – What m3ter aims to solve in relation to usage-based pricing 05:06 – Delivering agility to the customers (why pricing is not a one-and-done thing) 08:57 – How m3ter helps customers find the right pricing model for the right situation 11:30 – Circumstances wherein you'd want to use usage-based pricing 14:45 – Pricing is an exchange of value between you and your customers 16:09 – Bill for overage over cap vs. renegotiate next year (tips on do's and don'ts) 20:02 – Platform versus solution pricing (pricing philosophy of AWS and m3ter) 30:59 – Griff's pricing advice 33:05 – Connect with Griff Key Takeaways: "Pricing is complicated; it involves lots of people. You need to bring them together so that they can plan and deploy those changes." – Griff Parry "Pricing is very definitely not one-and-done." – Griff Parry "To work out what you want to price, you have to look at what's going on at the moment. You have to have ready access to data about what people are consuming and how they respond to pricing changes." – Griff Parry "Pricing is an exchange of value between you and your customers. If they understand that they should pay more because they're using more or getting more value, that's fantastic; that's great for both parties." – Griff Parry People / Resources Mentioned: m3ter: https://www.m3ter.com Connect with Griff Parry: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/griffinparry/ Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: mailto:[email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on February 8, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/a-price-signaling-example/ If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 8 of Diamonds from the Selling Value card deck. Let's say that you are in a marketplace where people almost always decide between your product and competitor's products. Gee, could I think of some? How about an automobile, right? You happen to be the Audi dealer and somebody is, somebody just crashed their car and we think they're going to walk into our Audi dealership. In our mind we're thinking, Hey, they're not only looking at us, but they're also looking at BMW or Mercedes or Lexus or Porsche, right? There's lots of different places where they might be go looking at my competitive alternatives. And so as a salesperson, I might be thinking, Ohh, I've got to sell against all of these other problems, or all of these other competitive alternatives. On the other hand, it is very possible that somebody walks into our showroom and isn't going to consider a competitive alternative. They walk into our showroom because somebody told them that we are the best product, we're the best dealership, and they should go buy a product from us. And they're not even going to go look at somebody else. Or maybe they walked into our showroom because they've owned three Audis in the past. They're an Audi loyalist. And they're going to come in and buy another Audi from us because that's what they drive. That's who they identify as. There are lots of reasons why people might choose to just buy your product. What we want to do is think about, what are those different situations? What are those different mindsets where people might just be looking at our product and not a competitive alternative? And the reason this is so important is because when we can recognize those reasons, we don't have to give big discounts. People are going to buy from us because we solve their problem, not because we're cheaper than a competitor. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Satish Dharmarajan is the Director of Pricing and Business Intelligence at Orkin, He is an Advisory Board Member at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, and has held analytics roles at Home Depot, Walgreens, and Whirlpool. Satish also acts in short films. In this episode, Satish educates us on differentiating products/services from competitors of similar offerings as he stresses the importance of understanding the buyer's journey along with the core problem that they want to solve. Why you have to checkout today's podcast: Learn the importance of knowing what the buyer's journey is and what state they are in as they come in to buy a product Find out how brands differentiate themselves from competitors when they all offer the same products/services Understand how customer-perceived value helps brands sell well even with competitors "If you know your customer, you can price it right. If you know what they're looking for, you can have them pay what you want them to pay for your product or service." – Satish Dharmarajan Topics Covered: 01:50 – How Satish got into pricing 04:29 – Talking about getting to that 'big place' and the process that it involves in order to reach that 07:08 – The importance of knowing what the customer is specifically looking to solve 11:39 – Mark's pigeon problem 12:40 – How brands differentiate themselves from competitors when they all offer the same products/services 17:54 – How customers choose where to buy between brands, and how pricing and packaging people should respond 20:59 – Appliance pricing at Home Depot; how customers care about price changes 23:34 – Looking at and analyzing competition; the importance of customer-perceived value 26:26 – Satish's pricing advice 26:59 – Connect with Satish Key Takeaways: "That's basics of customer service, which is not too different if you were in the cellphone business, if you were in the internet business, or if you are doing anything else, selling anything else online. You would want to know what specifically that customer is looking to solve for." – Satish Dharmarajan "The way your products are arranged next to each other, could be used as a leverage for selling the same products at a different price point." – Satish Dharmarajan "As pricing professionals, you need to figure out what's the bare minimum, such that you can make sure that even the person who is coming in to replace a refrigerator is going to be willing to pay. But at the same time, it's not at a giveaway price where you're not making enough margins from the other consumers." – Satish Dharmarajan People / Resources Mentioned: Orkin: https://www.orkin.com/ Connect with Satish Dharmarajan: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/satishdrajan/ Email: [email protected] Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: mailto:[email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on February 1, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/evaluating-a-pricing-strategy/ [powerpress] If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 8 of Clubs from the Selling Value card deck. Okay. You're wondering to yourself, do buyers ever not consider competitive alternatives? And the answer is, absolutely yes! Some easy consumer examples. When you buy popcorn at the movie theater, you couldn't buy popcorn anywhere else. Therefore, you didn't consider a competitive alternative. You just said, am I going to buy popcorn here or not? And that's why they get away with charging really high prices for popcorn. What about last gas for 75 miles, when you're in the middle of nowhere and you only have an eighth of a tank of gas left? Are you going to buy gas at that gas station that's four times the price? Heck, yes you are! And that's because they know you didn't consider a competitive alternative. There wasn't one to consider at the time. Our job as salespeople should be to try to find different customers and recognize whether they're going to be looking at, or talking to, competitive alternatives. For example, if someone was referred to you, they're probably not going to go talk to a competitive alternative. They might, but they might not. So let's treat them as though they won't. What if someone's buying an add-on to a current product they have that you've sold to them? They're probably only buying it from you. What if they're using your subscriptions and are they going to buy the upgraded package or are they even going to pay you this month for the subscription that they bought a few months ago? In each one of those decisions, they're just deciding, am I going to buy from you? But they're not saying, should I switch? Should I look at competitive alternatives? There are lots of situations, and product types, where buyers don't look at competitive alternatives. We should be focusing on finding those buyers and making sure we're not discounting, or if we have the opportunity, consider raising the price a little bit. I can almost guarantee you they won't make a different decision. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Johnny Cheng is the Senior Director of Pricing and Packaging at ClickUp. He was the Senior Director of Pricing and Packaging at Coupa Software, and has years of experience in Product Marketing through various companies. In this episode, Johnny shares his knowledge and experience on product marketing and product management as he educates us on the benefits of solution pricing, especially as to how a lens test helps on creating packages. Why you have to checkout today's podcast: Find out what crucial perspective companies miss when pricing sits in finance Learn about the benefits of having solution pricing, as well as to how you can sell value instead of features Discover a packaging system that incredibly works, both for the customers and the company "Go do the lens test. Even if your packaging is already set, I would go back and do that exercise. I feel like if you do it across different teams, you'll be very surprised at what you see." – Johnny Cheng Topics Covered: 01:05 – How Johnny got into pricing 01:50 – Comparing the role of product management with product marketing 05:46 – Does pricing ever exist without packaging or are the two just so tightly connected? 08:33 – Johnny as a strong believer of having solution pricing 12:18 – Johnny vs. Mark on good, better, best 15:16 – The system Johnny uses to decide which features goes in which package 20:58 – Tips and tools that can help you sell value instead of features 26:56 – Salespeople discounting too much because they don't sell the value of the product 28:47 – Johnny's pricing advice 30:05 – Connect with Johnny Key Takeaways: "I'm seeing more and more in product marketing just exactly to your point. It's more customer driven, it's more go-to market driven, it's more value driven. And so, if you sit in product management, every feature you release is the best feature ever, right? But product marketing really understands the value and how to apply to certain customers, what the use cases are, what the different profiles are and how you monetize that, and I feel like you kind of lose that lens sitting in the product management side." – Johnny Cheng "Once you have kind of that product marketing angle, that's where the magic happens, right? Because that feature could be worth $1 to this one segment and $10 to this other segment. You would never know unless you actually go find out what their pain points are, find out what their needs are." – Johnny Cheng People / Resources Mentioned: ClickUp: https://clickup.com/ Marketo: https://business.adobe.com/products/marketo/adobe-marketo.html Gainsight: https://www.gainsight.com/ Coupa: https://www.coupa.com/ Selling Value: https://selling-value.com/ Zoom: https://zoom.us/ Connect with Johnny Cheng: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jdcheng/ Email: [email protected] Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: mailto:[email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on January 25, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/transitioning-to-selling-subscriptions/ [powerpress] If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

This one is the 8 of Hearts from the Selling Value card deck. Oh, my gosh! If a buyer ever asked me to help them with a business case, I'm inside quietly jumping up and down rejoicing because they're asking me to do what I would like to be doing with them anyway. So, instead of me walking them through and convincing them that this is an important thing that they really want to know the answer to, they asked me. Oh, my gosh! And so, if they've asked me for help with a business case, what they're really asking for is, how do I convince my executives that we should be spending money on this problem? Or a better way to say that is, how do I document the value of solving these problems? How much additional profit are we going to make because we spend money to solve these problems? That is such a phenomenal place to be because inherent value, the value of solving the problems, is the piece of the puzzle that we as salespeople so rarely spend a lot of time on, and yet we should. Because not only does it help our buyer when they're trying to sell it internally, it helps them when they're trying to justify the pricing or spending the money on solving this problem. But it also helps us build a relationship with our client because we're demonstrating to them, we understand their problems. So, absolutely, if someone asks us to help them with the business case, don't look at that as a chore. Look at that as a golden opportunity because they just asked us to do what we really should be doing with them anyway. We hope you enjoyed this example of Pricing Table Topics. What you just heard was done without a script. If you want to get better at speaking about pricing and value, grab a deck of our cards, pick a card, read the saying, then talk for one to two minutes about what that card says. You'll become a better speaker and expert. If you have any questions or feedback, please email me, [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/

Ajit Ghuman is the Director of Product Management, Pricing, Packaging, and Customer Experience at Twilio. He is the author of the book Price to Scale. He's had Director of Product Marketing title at several companies, and he added pricing to his title in 2019. Ajit is fascinated by ancient mysteries. In this episode, Ajit educates us on pricing and packaging as he shares why he's passionate when it comes to changing the monetization stack, especially on companies being able to change pricing strategies a lot quicker than today. Why you have to checkout today's podcast: Learn how pricing can done through a four-step framework; Find out how to create a pricing system that can work well with all strategies; and Understand why it's an advantage to be able to change pricing strategies quickly "I think of pricing in a four-step framework. The four steps are packaging, pricing metric, tariff structure, and then price point." – Ajit Ghuman Topics Covered: 01:44 – How Ajit got into pricing 03:09 – Ajit talks about his book, Price to Scale, sharing the reason behind writing it and its key concept 04:40 – Backstory as to why Ajit wants to change the monetization stack 08:12 – Why the term quote to cash doesn't bother Mark vs. how Ajit sees it 11:01 – We need better systems to let the strategy come to life 13:16 – How to create a code to cash (pricing) system that can work well with all pricing strategies 16:33 – Do companies do this practice in pricing? 18:30 – Talking about companies not monitoring usage of their product 19:59 – How often should companies tweak their packaging? 23:08 – How Ajit and Mark decide what feature goes into what package 25:31 – Why Ajit is a bit averse to good, better, best 29:40 – Ajit's pricing advice 30:35 – Connect with Ajit Key Takeaways: "You have the best pricing strategy in the world, let's say you hire Mark Stiving to help you with your pricing, and you have the best thing on paper, but your systems don't let you operationalize it, so you're stuck in the water. That's what I'm saying. We need better systems to let the strategy come to life." – Ajit Ghuman "You're not going to have people write code all the time to do this. Otherwise, your main product will suffer. So just like you used to spend money on product analytics in the past or some other piece of core technology, I think there is a realization companies are having now, like somebody needs to build best practice products that do these things so that we can hook up into their APIs or their SDK and just do it." – Ajit Ghuman People / Resources Mentioned: Price to Scale: https://ajitghuman.com/pricing-book/ Code to Cash podcast: www.codeto.cash/author/ajitpal/ Dor Sasson: https://www.linkedin.com/in/datapm/ Connect with Ajit Ghuman: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajitpalghuman/ Email: [email protected] Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: mailto:[email protected]

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on January 18, 2023, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/another-ridiculous-fee/ [powerpress] If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: [email protected] LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/