Impact Pricing

Do I really have to tell you how pricing is for? 

I hope not, but let's talk about powerful pricing. It is incredibly powerful. 

You might've heard that, if you could improve pricing by 1% on average, that has an impact of 10% or 11% profitability on your company.

This is huge. 

“Pricing is such an amazing topic. It's complex, quantitative, and psychological. It's huge, powerful, and emotional. Most of all it's fun.”- Mark Stiving

This is powerful, but I have to say what I think I love the most about pricing is nobody else really understands it. 

Once we become an expert at pricing, a value, and we're able to communicate that in other departments, in our company, we ended up building our own reputation. We build our own value inside the company because we're able to do things and we know things that other people don't.

Now that doesn't mean that we can be A-holes about it. We have to teach. We have to be collaborative. 

We're helping people do their jobs better. But if every department in the company focused on customer perceived value, which is something that you and I understand better than most, then the company would be much, much better off.

We hope you enjoyed this podcast. If you see have any questions or feedback please email me [email protected]. 

Now go make an impact.

Connect with Mark Stiving: 

• Email: [email protected]
• LinkedIn

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/

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on October 27, 2021, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go.

Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/pricing-saas-on-top-of-aws/

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

Nobody cares about your features. They only care about what value your features provide them. 

That happens to be one of my favorite sayings. ‘Nobody cares about your features.’

And what's pretty fascinating is when you look at companies' webpages, what do they talk about? 

They talk about their products. They talk about their features and it's true. Nobody really cares.

“Nobody cares about your features. They only care about what value your features provide them.” - Mark Stiving

Actually experts can look at one of your features or look at your product and say, yeah, I know what that does for me.

I know what value, I'm going to be able to get out of this. But how many people are truly experts when they're shopping for your product? 

Most people look at your features and don't know if that's important or not. They don't know if they need it. 

They don't know how much value they're going to get from it.

If they buy your product and use that feature a much better approach is to think about value. 

What does value mean to your customer? And I can tell you what value actually means. It means they have a problem. Can you identify with the problem they're looking for a result? 

What's the result they're hoping to achieve and achieving that result provides value to them.

In the B2B world, that value is measured in dollars in increased profitability. 

Our job needs to be, how do we find the words to resonate with our marketplace?

 How do we find the ways to communicate that we're providing value to our buyers and not expecting our buyers to look at our feature set and understand what we can do for them.

We hope you enjoyed this podcast. If you see have any questions or feedback please email me [email protected]. 

Now go make an impact.

Connect with Mark Stiving: 

• Email: [email protected]
• LinkedIn

Joe Woodard's vision is to "transform small businesses through small business advisors." And in the service of that vision, he and his team educate, coach, provide resources and build communities for small business advisors, with the overarching goal of empowering them to play a powerful, high-impact advisory role with their clients.

In this episode, Joe shares how you can create product differentiation that provides maximum pricing leverage where people lean in to the product’s value more than the price.

Why you have to check out today's podcast:

• Find out the key factors that create pricing leverage
• Find out how to make your services or products more valuable
• Learn how to truly get differentiated from among the rest of your competitors

"Well, I'm going to restate something I've already said: Be unlike everybody else. But I'm going to state something I haven't stated before: Make sure you over-manage your brand because you could be unlike everybody else, and nobody knows it."

- Joe Woodard

Topics Covered:

01:50 - Talking about classical Greek

02:40 - Coaching business with a pricing attitude

06:40 - Getting rid of clients you don't want to work with and keeping the ones you want

11:18 - How 'relationship work' gets the highest capacity yield off the least valuable clients

12:34 - Leveraging your unique knowledge or skill to add value to your client

18:39 - Product differentiation: flat fee versus hourly pricing

25:59 - Is it impossible to get accountants to coach their clients on price and what are they capable and very good at doing

28:46 - Joe's pricing advice that can create a significant impact on one's business

Key Takeaways:

"Just because you're valuable and essential, though, doesn't mean that that creates pricing leverage. You must also be differentiated and unique, and ultimately you must be wealth-generating." - Joe Woodard

"To have an empowerment impact on small business, they must be healthy themselves, and health naturally involves healthy pricing." - Joe Woodard

“Their problem is they're underpricing because they're penalizing their own efficiency. So, you're benefiting from the fact that they're penalizing themselves. And as long as that exists in the space, and it's going to exist in the space pervasively that people are flattening it out to increase efficiencies and gross profit margin, you are not going to be able to compete on price. So, the only way to get out of that trap for you, as the client and them as the professional is to not offer flat fee services, but instead to offer subscription services.” - Joe Woodard

People/ Resources Mentioned:

• Ron Baker: https://impactpricing.com/podcast/ep44-ronald-j-baker-trash-the-timesheet-exploring-opportunities-in-subscription-businesses/
• Xero: https://www.xero.com/
• Sage: https://www.sage.com/en-us/
• Intuit: https://www.intuit.com/
• H&R Block: https://www.hrblock.com/
• Liberty Tax: https://www.libertytax.com/
• Tax Slayer: https://www.taxslayer.com/
• Turbo Tax: https://turbotax.intuit.com/

Connect with Joe Woodard:

• Website: https://www.woodard.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/quickbooksadvisor/

Connect with Mark Stiving:

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

This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on October 20, 2021, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go.

Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/pricing-saas-on-top-of-aws/

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

I hate the word commodity. When I see product managers or marketers or salespeople using it, it makes me think they're lazy.

It makes me think they haven't thought through what they're really saying because there really is no such thing as a commodity. 

Think about the ultimate commodity product for second and that's gold. I could look online and tell you what the spot price is for gold right now. 

And then I could go to a webpage and I could buy a gold medallion and it turns out if I go to more than one gold broker, I'm going to get a different price for that gold coin.

“There is no such thing as a commodity. There is no such thing as a commodity. There is no such thing.” - Mark Stiving

Now, why is that even possible? 

This is a commodity. 

How could one company be charging me more money than another company would?

 Well, there are lots of reasons. Maybe the company that charges more has faster delivery or better credit terms, or they've built a reputation with me, or they have a better looking webpage or they do a better job at marketing and attracting customers.

There are lots of possible reasons. Maybe the gold itself is a commodity, but there's so much going on around any acquisition, any purchase that we shouldn't be thinking about our product as a commodity, because the moment we think we have a commodity, we stop thinking about how can we differentiate it?

How can we create value in the buyer's mind? So repeat after me. There is no such thing as a commodity. 

We hope you enjoyed this podcast. If you see have any questions or feedback please email me [email protected]. 

Now go make an impact.

Connect with Mark Stiving: 

• Email: [email protected]
• LinkedIn

Mark Cox has been fortunate enough to have sold, structured, and negotiated some of the largest single-sale transactions in North America (including a billion-dollar transaction with a top-10 U.S. bank). He founded In the Funnel (ITF) with the mission of dramatically improving the performance and professionalism of business to business sales teams. He accomplished this via (1) Public Sales Workshops for salespeople and sales managers and (2) Sales Enablement Consulting.

During this episode, Mark discusses how it is crucial for salespeople to focus on selling value instead of price. The company would benefit from this move economically, ensuring long-term profitability.

Why you have to check out today's podcast:

• Learn how your capability to communicate as a salesperson contributes to your customer’s desired business outcome
• Uncover top 3 business leader's desired outcomes for each sales transaction to help you lead the sales conversation with value rather than pitch
• Learn the 'common sense revolution' every salesperson needs to achieve top-tier results

"Don't give a price until you understand the impact of the solution on the customer."

- Mark Cox

Topics Covered:

01:19 - The economic impact of selling on value versus on price

02:39 - Talking about the crisis in professional sales

05:44 - Understanding the customers' problems and the desired outcome they want to achieve

09:00 - What should transpire in a value conversation

14:28 - Breaking the wall that often goes up in an encounter with the salesperson

16:41 - Talking value in terms of communication not so much in financial exchange

19:37 - Overcoming fear in outbound demand generation

21:50 - Professional sales compared to performance art and a professional sport

23:38 - How to capture that value proposition in twenty minutes

25:05 - Pricing advice that gives a great impact on one's business

25:49 - Understanding 'solution selling'

Key Takeaways:

"Let's get a little away from trying to persuade and control and trick and do all of these crazy things. Why don't we just actually help buyers buy, help them make great decisions, help them get to a better future? And the more they believe we're sincere and authentic in our desire to do that, the better off we're going to do." - Mark Cox

"The near version of a salesperson to trick somebody into doing something, nobody wants to get persuaded to do anything." - Mark Cox

"People don't buy software; they actually buy what it does for them. The one thing I will kind of call out that I'd love to see a little more up today in professional sales, we're trying to help. The big job though is, we do really need to understand that customer we're reaching out to." - Mark Cox

"This is why we identify this ideal customer profile really, what are they going through? What are they trying to do? And so instead of selling my product when I'm talking to a client or prospect, the first couple of conversations are: just let me understand you and your business and your environment and what you're trying to achieve. "- Mark Cox

"The whole sort of system right now in professional sales is a little bit broken. And that's where we're coming at it with just saying, let's just have this common-sense revolution here. Let's start to sell the way somebody actually wants to buy and start to sell the way you want to buy. And also go at this whole thing so you can be proud of what you do for a living." - Mark Cox

People / Resources Mentioned:

• Philip Squire: https://www.linkedin.com/in/philipsquire/?originalSubdomain=uk
• Levi's: https://www.levistrauss.com/

Connect with Mark Cox:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markandrewcox/
• 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 October 13, 2021, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go.

Read Full Article Here: https://impactpricing.com/blog/why-aws-can-sell-credits/ 

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

Buyers by perceived value, but perceived value is easiest to come about. If we build products that are better than our competitors, and then we make sure we communicate that to our customers so they understand our products are better.

“You create real value by improving your products and services relative to your competition.”- Mark Stiving

So I break this up into real value and perceived value perceived says, yes, we had to have done our marketing, but real value says. Is our product truly better than our competitions?

 If you want to win more deals, we should be building products that truly are better than our competitors. So let's be thinking about what it is that our competitors have? What can we do better? 

And in particular, what problems does our marketplace have that our competitors are not addressing? If we can do that exceptionally well. And then we're able to communicate that to the marketplace. 

We end up winning more deals at higher prices. 

We hope you enjoyed this podcast. If you see have any questions or feedback please email me [email protected]. 

Now go make an impact.

Connect with Mark Stiving: 

• Email: [email protected]
• LinkedIn