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5 minute read
In today's hypercompetitive global marketplace, a company's pricing policy can make or break the bottom line. Yet a surprising number of firms attempt to increase profits without the aid of a carefully and creatively designed pricing strategy.
Have a read at our list of best books about pricing strategies below!
1) Power Pricing: How Managing Price Transforms the Bottom Line by Robert J. Dolan and Hermann Simon
In this long-awaited book, the world's two leading price experts Robert J. Dolan and Hermann Simon take managers beyond conventional thinking to show how their breakthrough system of "power pricing" will improve the bottom line by an order of magnitude. They destroy popular but not necessarily financially savvy ideas on pricing, such as relying on a standard markup on cost rule. They expose as passive the "strategy" of letting the market or a competitor "set the price." But the key is in what they provide: the tools by which the pedestrian pricer can become a "power pricer" who achieves quantum leaps in financial performance by aggressively implementing sophisticated pricing strategies.
Drawing on their firsthand experience with firms throughout the world, they make available for the first time the logic behind the actual practices of "power pricers" engaged in fierce global competition. Market segmentation, promotional pricing, competitive strategic pricing, international pricing, nonlinear pricing, interrelated product line pricing, and time-customized pricing are just a few of the crucial concepts which the authors explore and explain when and how to implement.
2) Confessions of the Pricing Man: How Price Affects Everything by Herman Simon
The world’s foremost expert on pricing strategy shows how this mysterious process works and how to maximize value through pricing to company and customer.
In all walks of life, we constantly make decisions about whether something is worth our money or our time, or try to convince others to part with their money or their time. Price is the place where value and money meet. From the global release of the latest electronic gadget to the bewildering gyrations of oil futures to markdowns at the bargain store, price is the most powerful and pervasive economic force in our day-to-day lives and one of the least understood.
The recipe for successful pricing often sounds like an exotic cocktail, with equal parts psychology, economics, strategy, tools and incentives stirred up together, usually with just enough math to sour the taste. That leads managers to water down the drink with hunches and rules of thumb, or leave out the parts with which they don’t feel comfortable. While this makes for a sweeter drink, it often lacks the punch to have an impact on the customer or on the business.
3) The Strategy and Tactics of Pricing: A guide to growing more profitably by Thomas T.Nagie and Georg Müller.
The Strategy and Tactics of Pricing explains how to manage markets strategically and how to grow more profitably. Rather than calculating prices to cover costs or achieve sales goals, you will learn to make strategic pricing decisions that proactively manage customer perceptions of value, motivate purchasing decisions, and shift demand curves.
This edition features a new discussion on harnessing concepts from behavioral economics as well as a more streamlined "value cascade" structure to the topics. Readers will also benefit from:
- An expanded discussion of big data analytics and a revised chapter on "Specialized Strategies", which addresses timely technical issues like foreign exchange risks, reactions to market slumps, and managing transfer prices between independent profit centers.
- A chapter on "Creating a Strategic Pricing Capability", which shows readers how to implement the principles of value-based, strategic pricing successfully in their organizations.
4) Monetizing Data: A Practical Roadmap for Framing, Pricing & Selling Your B2B Digital Offers by Stephan M. Liozu and Wolfganf Ulaga.
The Digital revolution promises trillions of dollars in created value by 2030. Consultants and researchers are projecting massive and disruptive disruption in entire industrial sectors. As a results, PwC reports in their DigitalIQ report that 73% of executives say that they are investing in internet of things (IoT) and 54% in artificial intelligence. ABB predicts that 33 billion things or objects will be connected to the internet by 2020. So we are experiencing a deluge of digital investments, programs, and large-scale transformations.
Yet, and despite this tsunami of activities,In 2017, Siemens also revealed that less than a fifth (18%) of surveyed companies analyze more than 60% of production data they collect. Finally, Simon-Kucher & Partners (SKP) reports that 3 out of 4 firms that invested in digitalization in the past 3 years fail in their efforts due to the lack of monetization strategies, the focus on the wrong priorities, the lack of customer intimacy, and the neglect of digital pricing best practices.
This book focuses on the topics of data monetization and of the value-based pricing of data-driven offers.
5) Price Management: Strategy, Analysis, Decision, Implementation by Hermann Simon and Martin Fassnacht.
In this book, the world’s foremost experts on pricing integrate theoretical rigor and practical application to present a comprehensive resource that covers all areas of the field. This volume brings together quantitative and qualitative approaches and highlights the most current innovations in theory and practice.
Going beyond the traditional constraints of “price theory” and “price policy,” the authors coined the term “price management” to represent a holistic approach to pricing strategy and tactical implementation. They remind us that the Ancient Romans used one word, pretium, to mean both price and value. This is the fundamental philosophy that drives successful price management where producer and customer meet.
The result is a “bible” for leaders who recognize that price is not only a means to drive profit in the short term, but a tool to generate sustained growth in shareholder value over the longer term, and a primer for researchers, instructors, and students alike.
6) Pricing Strategy: Setting Price Levels, Managing Price Discounts and Establishing Price Structures, International Edition by Tim J.Smith
Learn how to make pricing decisions that will maximize a firm's profits by creating and capturing customers with Pricing Strategy: Setting price levels, managing price discounts and establishing price structures. Written by recognized pricing thought leader and principal of a successful pricing firm, Tim J. Smith, this comprehensive book emphasizes the stakeholder's importance in making decisions, while highlighting key trade-offs to consider when choosing between opposing outcomes. In this book's balanced presentation of quantitative instruction and qualitative concepts, learn more about the influences that should guide your decision making.
7) Pricing Done Right: The Pricing Framework Proven Successful by the World's Most Profitable Companies by Tim J.Smith.
Practical guidance and a fresh approach for more accurate value-based pricing
Pricing Done Right provides a cutting-edge framework for value-based pricing and clear guidance on ideation, implementation, and execution. This book introduces a holistic strategy for ensuring on-target pricing by shifting the conversation from 'What is value-based pricing?' to 'How can we ensure that our pricing reflects our goals?'
You'll learn to identify the decisions that must be managed, how to manage them, and who should make them, as illustrated by real-world case studies. The key success factor is to build a pricing organization within your organization; this reveals the relationships between pricing decisions, how they affect each other, and what the ultimate effects might be. With this deep-level insight, you are better able to decide where your organization needs to go.
Few managers are confident that their prices accurately reflect the cost and value of their product, and this uncertainty leaves money on the table. This book provides a practical template for better pricing strategies, methods, roles, and decisions, with a concrete roadmap through execution.
8) Value-Based Pricing: Drive Sales and Boost Your Bottom Line by Creating, Communicating and Capturing Customer Value by Harry Macdivitt and Mike Wilkinson
Why would any customer choose Brand X over Brand Y, regardless of price? In a word: Value.
When customers feel they are getting good value from your product or service, they are more than happy to pay more―which is good news for you and your business. Even in today’s global market―with its aggressive competitors, low-cost commodities, savvy consumers, and intangible digital offerings―you can outsell and outperform the rest using Value-Based Pricing. Done correctly, this method of pricing and selling helps you:
- Understand your customers’ wants and needs
- Focus on what makes your company different
- Quantify your differences and build a value-based strategy
- Communicate your value directly to your customers
Now more than ever, it is essential for you to reexamine the reality of the value you offer customers―and this step-by-step program shows you how.
If your company is looking for best practices in understanding customers' willingness-to-pay and optimizing prices, please sign up for a demo or try our cloud-based price research platform for free:
