Kate Mandrell is a trusted executive with a demonstrated track record of over-delivering promised business results in large-scale commercial transformations on leading-edge marketing & sales topics. An inspiring leader, team builder, and impact-oriented problem solver.

In this episode, Kate discusses how you can embed pricing into the company culture in order to gain the best price, not just for the companies benefit, also for the customers as well.

 

Why you have to check out today's podcast:

• Learn how to instill a focus on pricing within your organization
• Find out how to differentiate your product and communicate your value
• Discover how to drive a transformative change within your company by partnering with salespeople to sell on value rather than price

 

"Make sure that you're not too internally focused. I think a lot of people get caught up in what are my costs? How do I manage my costs? But pricing has the ability to do so much more than just make money."

- Kate Mandrell

 

Topics Covered:

01:17 - How she learned to love pricing and has never looked back since

02:40 - Two things that drive her to want a pricing role

04:18 - What it takes to be successful and grow into a pricing role

07:14 - Echoing Mark's advice on how to make one's pricing role have a great impact on the company

08:03 - Sharing her thoughts on better word choice: 'make value a part of the culture' versus 'make pricing a part of the culture'

09:16 - Communicating the 'attitude of value' inside the company

11:02 - Solving the big picture rather than selling the individual pieces

12:46 - How to go about understanding your product packaging exercise

15:15 - Convincing salespeople of the right approach to 'sell on value'

17:55 - Proving value-selling works even when she was not actually out selling the product

20:51 - Where's the art in pricing

23:48 - Kate's pricing advice that has a great impact on one's business

 

Key Takeaways:

"The more that you can do to drive the pricing change, show the impact of that change, and then really embed that into the culture of how the company thinks that will help your company and it will certainly help your careers as well." - Kate Mandrell

"We changed our pricing to align to value and therefore made value of what we could deliver the focal point of the conversation versus price, as the focal point of the conversation." - Kate Mandrell

"We did a lot of research upfront. We had conversations with our customers; we understood what our competitors were doing. We really tried to see how we are differentiated, what do we do that is different, better, and special. And that was really the focal point of where we started [changing the company's pricing culture]." - Kate Mandrell

"As you go through a packaging exercise, it's really important to understand who are the different segments that you're targeting, and make sure you don't take a one-size-fits-all approach in all cases." - Kate Mandrell

"In pricing roles, we need to understand how do we tailor our packages and our pricing to deliver the value and the outcome that those unique segments are looking for." - Kate Mandrell

"Every time you introduce something new or drive a change, you have to have sales right there with you, because they're the face of the customer that has to be able to articulate that value." - Kate Mandrell

 

People/Resources Mentioned:

• McDonald's: https://www.linkedin.com/company/mcdonald%27s-corporation/
• Ecco Restaurant: https://www.ecco-atlanta.com/

 

Connect with Kate Mandrell:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kate-mandrell/

 

Connect with Mark Stiving: 

• Email: [email protected]
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/