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Retail Business Review | Wednesday, October 19, 2022
Value-based pricing is setting a price by which a company calculates and tries to earn the distinguished worth of its product for a particular customer segment compared to its competitor.
FREMONT, CA: Value-based pricing (value pricing) is the most commonly discussed and misunderstood concept. Therefore, it creates more confusion among marketers, even many pricing experts, than any other pricing concept. Moreover, these misunderstandings often lead companies to shy away from utilizing it, settling for cost-based or other pricing ways that leave money on the table.
Value-Based Pricing
Value-based pricing is setting a price by which a company calculates and tries to earn the distinguished worth of its product for a particular customer segment compared to its competitor.
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Now let's apply value-based pricing by bearing in mind each part of the definition carefully:
1) Focus on a single segment. Value-based pricing often references one specific segment(For B2B products, it can be a sole client).
2) Compare with the next best alternative. This pricing method works when the objective segment has a specific competitor's product they can buy instead. Value-based prices always ask: "What would this segment buy if my product wasn't available?" This "next best replacement" for the target is the essential point of comparison for calculating the value-based price. For truly new products without peers, the value-based pricing methodology won't work well.
3) Understand differentiated worth. The next task is determining which product features are unique and differentiated from the competitor's offering.
4) Spot a dollar amount on the differentiation. The last and most difficult step in calculating value-based price is estimating the differentiated features' dollar value.
Dispelling Key Misconceptions About Value-Based Pricing
Value-based pricing is employed in virtually every industry to price everything from TVs and drugs to oil rigs and airplanes. Yet, despite its popularity, marketers have considerable misconceptions about the approach. Here are three of the most general ones.
Misconceptions
1. Value-based pricing needs the company to evaluate consumers' willingness to pay for every product feature.
Some marketers falsely believe that when a company utilizes value-based pricing, it has to assess how much the customer values every product characteristic, assign a dollar amount to each one, and then add them all until it calculates the product's final price. However, even the simplest products have dozens of features. Imagine the trouble of pulling this off for an oil rig or even a TV. This misunderstanding turns many marketers off at the outset.
A feature normal with the next best alternative is captured by its price.
2. Even if competitors are not smart with pricing, utilizing value-based pricing will lead to success.
This is probably the most dangerous misperception about value-based pricing because it can create false, high expectations. Many marketers believe that value-based pricing is a panacea. If they utilize it, they will make lots of money under any circumstances. Not true! The success of value-based pricing is based on how smartly competitors have priced their products. Value-based pricing can't save you if they have set untenably low prices.
3. The brand's value is a piece of the value-based pricing calculation.
The marketer aims to put a dollar amount on its differentiated features with value-based pricing. The method focuses on features that add value to the customer, which can be converted into dollars and cents.
But it's much heavier to deal with a brand's value this way. Hence the brand value is left away from the equation with value-based pricing. And it is one reason the method is more popular in B2B settings, giving less weight to the brand value.
Value-based pricing is an effective method of pricing products. Accordingly, it's a lot easier in practice than it appears to be in theory. The marketer must identify and assess its products' differentiated features (except the brand's value), not every feature. And when competitors have priced their products absurdly, value-based pricing won't help. But, on the other hand, with a stronger grasp of how this method works, marketers can make smarter pricing decisions and utilize value-based pricing to boost profits.
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