PricingBrew

Insights & Tips

Already a subscriber? Login

Become a subscriber and unlock an information arsenal focused on making your pricing efforts more effective.

Why Your Approach Matters in B2B Pricing

At PricingBrew, we sometimes get a bit of grief for focusing so much attention on the organizational aspects of pricing in B2B environments. Frankly, some practitioners simply believe that technical pricing proficiency is all that’s required to be effective.

But as former practitioners ourselves, we know that the organization itself can often act as a gauntlet to effective pricing in B2B. Figuring out what to do is just the first step, and very often, figuring out how to get it done is the more challenging part.

A new case study in the Journal illustrates how much difference your approach to “getting it done” can really make…

Two Ways to Champion Pricing Initiatives details one practitioner’s experiences securing internal support and buy-in for new pricing initiatives. Subscribers should find this case study to be particularly instructive as it contrasts two different approaches used by the same practitioner, toward very similar pricing initiatives, in very similar situations.

In one situation, the practitioner used an approach that we see all the time. It’s an approach that will probably sound very familiar to a lot of readers. In a nutshell, the practitioner identified the pricing problem; determined the most effective solution; and then spent the next 10 months getting the management team to agree to move forward with the solution.

That’s not unusual, is it? These things just take time, right?

Later, when the practitioner found themselves in a nearly identical situation, they decided to take a very different approach in an attempt to speed things up. This time around, they paid much more attention to how organizations and management teams actually make decisions—particularly decisions that involve significant change and investment. And using this approach, securing the necessary approvals took a little over six weeks.

Six weeks versus ten months. Which would you prefer?

As this case illustrates, your approach can make huge difference. Technical pricing proficiency will help you identify the problems and even help you devise the right solutions. But given the organizational dynamics involved in any B2B environment, technical skills alone won’t get it done…at least, not in a timely fashion.

Get Immediate Access To Everything In The PricingBrew Journal

Related Resources

  • The Functional Area Cheat Sheet

    A quick overview of the common ways different internal groups can have an effect on pricing outcomes and suggestions for how you might be able to diplomatically help them help you.

    View This Tool
  • How to Retain Your Key Customers

    When you lose business from existing accounts, the sales team must acquire even more new business to compensate. In this on-demand training session, learn how pricing analysis skills are ideal to identify and minimize revenue attrition and customer defection.

    View This Webinar
  • 13 Unique Price Segmentation Attributes

    When you identify meaningful segmentation attributes, you also uncover a source of competitive advantage. This research brief explores a variety of unique price segmentation attributes that companies in the PricingBrew Network have found to be important.

    View This Research
  • Manage Your Customer Mix to Improve Profits

    It's natural to assume that you need to raise your prices or lower your costs to improve gross margins. But there's another powerful variable in the equation that can help grow profits.

    View This Tutorial