Marcos Rivera

Most B2B SaaS leaders build value.
But forget to capture it.

Let me guess:

- You’re guessing your price
- You’re losing revenue
- Scaling feels stuck

What if pricing could drive growth?

Here’s what I help you do:

→ Capture more value
→ Make pricing your edge
→ Build pricing confidence

Why should you trust me?

- 25+ years in tech pricing
- Ex–Head of Pricing at Vista Equity
- Priced 400+ SaaS products
- Author of *Street Pricing*
- Trusted by MBAs and SaaS CEOs

Beyond coaching, 

I’m an:

→ Investor 
→ Speaker
→ Entrepreneur 

passionate about helping businesses unlock their full revenue potential.

Ready to take control of your most powerful growth lever—pricing?

Checkout my featured section.

Founder and CEO

We help growth-stage B2B SaaS companies design the right pricing model to scale up

Ready to shift your pricing from guesswork to framework?

For the first time in my career, I lowered our growth forecast.

A few weeks into 2026, and I made a decision that felt counterintuitive: we're going to grow less this year. On purpose.

Here's my thinking.

I've been watching F1 lately, there's a scene in the new movie where Brad Pitt tells the pit crew: "Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast."

That line stuck with me.

What got us to 25 people and on the way to $10M bootstrapped isn't going to get us to the next stage. 

We're about to launch our first product. 
We're shifting from pure services to technology-enabled transformation.

That's a pivot. And you can't pivot at full speed.
The sports analogy holds up everywhere. 
Tennis, basketball, skiing, you have to slow down before you change direction. 

Get your balance underneath you. 
Build momentum. 
Then move.

Business is no different.

Here's what slowing down actually looks like for us:
→ Keeping quality at 98% satisfaction instead of chasing volume.
→ Reducing the number of engagement types. Fewer SKUs, less variability.
→ Saying no to projects that don't fit the middle of our fairway, even when the money's good.

Why? Because it's way harder to recover from a quality drop than a revenue dip. 
One bad quarter of delivery can undo years of reputation.

If you're considering a similar move, here's my framework:

1/ Identify the pivot. 
2/ Reduce variability first. 
3/ Protect what got you here. 
4/ Get alignment before you announce. 

The target is lower now. 
Less ambitious. 
But it's more achievable, and it sets us up for what's actually coming.

Sometimes slowing down is the most aggressive move you can make.

What's a decision you've made that felt counterintuitive but turned out right?

CEO of Pricing I/O • Award-Winning Author • Sought after Slayer of Bad Pricing

Everyone told me I was crazy to leave.

High-paying role at a PE firm. 
Direct access to a billionaire's inner circle. 
I was flying to portfolio companies on 24 hours notice, promising boards 18% revenue increase, and delivering.

But I was hitting airline status in two months flat, with a 4-year-old at home and a daughter on the way.

So I walked away and started Pricing I/O with a credit card and my savings.

That was the beginning. 

We're 25 people now, approaching $10M, and I still get a little stunned when I see how many seats we fill at team get-togethers.

I sat down with Mark Osborne, MBA, CEPA® on the B2B Growth Blueprint podcast and got into the full journey—the leap, how we actually scaled, and the leadership framework I use to run the business today.

Watch the full conversation:
→ https://skd.so/kPle2t

Most SaaS companies are pricing blind.

They copy competitors who are also guessing. 

They slap "AI-powered" on the pricing page and hope it justifies a premium. 

They build credit systems because everyone else is doing it, without understanding why credits work for Audible but might destroy their business.

And then they wonder why sales cycles drag, why customers push back on renewals, why the board keeps asking uncomfortable questions about unit economics.

We all have seen this pattern. Right?

→ The CEO who approved a "usage-based transformation" only to watch churn spike 40% because customers couldn't predict their bills.

→ The VP of Product who spent 6 months building an AI feature, then gave it away for free because nobody knew how to price it.

→ The founder who copied HubSpot's model without realizing HubSpot has 15 years of pricing iteration behind every decision.

Here's what I've learned: pricing isn't a simple math problem. 
It's a strategy problem disguised as a spreadsheet.

Is to understand the psychology behind why customers say yes, and structure their pricing to remove friction, not add complexity.

That's why I built this playbook.

A single page with the frameworks we actually use when we're in the trenches with B2B SaaS clients.

It's dense, but I can send you the high-res version. 
Comment "playbook" ↓

Today Satya Nadella leads a $3 trillion company with 228,000 employees.
But when he took over in 2014, Microsoft was stuck.

Losing mobile. 
Windows-obsessed. 
Falling behind Amazon in cloud. 
→ Market cap at $300 billion while competitors lapped them.

Most people expected a safe, incremental CEO.
Instead, Satya rewired the culture without burning it down.

Killed the stack-ranking system that turned teams against each other. 

Replaced "know-it-all" with "learn-it-all." 
Bet everything on cloud when Azure was still a distant second to AWS.

That bet alone now generates $75B+ in annual revenue.

But what I admire most isn't the strategy.

Technical depth. Emotional intelligence. Business instinct. 
Most leaders I've worked with have one, maybe two. Satya has all three, and deploys them quietly.

No theatrics. No ego. 
Just calm, steady decisions at a scale most of us can't comprehend.

He turned a legacy software company into the world's second-most valuable business by doing what every great leader must: read the room, commit to the shift, and bring the whole organization with you.

That last part, bringing people with you, is the hardest part of any transformation. Pricing, product, culture, doesn't matter.

I've seen it across hundreds of companies. 
The team leading the change matters more than the change itself.

A decade of selling B2B SaaS to PE firms teaches you something most pricing strategists never learn firsthand.

James joined us as a Pricing Strategist after years on the other side of the table.

If you've ever sold to PE, you know, they understand value as well as anyone, and they're ruthless about ROI.

That experience shaped how James thinks about pricing: always tie it back to quantifiable business outcomes. Never be vague about value drivers. Surface the trade-offs so clients can make better decisions, not just hear what they want to hear.

That mindset is exactly why we wanted him here.

What surprised him most about joining?
"We're a lean organization that punches well above its weight. Everyone on the team is incredibly sharp and moves fast."

He also mentioned being staffed on two client projects in his first week. That's not an accident, it's a vote of confidence in what a sales background brings to strategy work.

His mindset says it all.
Sales and product team alignment is the most crucial step in executing any pricing strategy.

Simple. True. And something most companies underestimate until it's too late.

Oh, and his karaoke song is "Escape (The Piña Colada Song)."

Make of that what you will.

Glad to have you on the team, James.

"Claude, let's code this SaaS, try not to hallucinate this time."

Honestly? We're getting there.

Recently we watched founders spin up products in weeks that used to take engineering teams 18 months.

→ Claude writes the code
→ Cursor ships the features
→ Bolt scaffolds the whole thing

But then the product is live, and someone asks: 
"What do we charge for this?"

That's where the vibe coding stops.
Because pricing isn't a code problem.

It's a "which metric scales with their success" problem.
It's a "what does your customer actually value" problem.
It's a "what does your board need this to say about your business" problem.

I've worked with 400+ SaaS companies. 
I've never seen a model spit out the right answer to those questions.

Not because AI isn't smart enough.

Because the answer lives in your customers, your data, your market, and someone who's seen enough patterns to know the difference between a pricing model and a pricing strategy.

That's still a human job.

If the pricing conversation is already giving you a headache, that's exactly what we do at Pricing I/O.

Let's talk.

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$285 billion wiped from software stocks in 48 hours.
The reason? Investors finally realized what we've been saying for 2 years, per-seat pricing breaks when AI agents replace human users.

Salesforce lost 7% in a day. ServiceNow, Adobe, Workday, all hit.

But here's what's wild: most SaaS companies I talk to are STILL running per-seat models with zero backup plan.

The "SaaSpocalypse" wasn't a surprise. 
It was a pricing model catching up with reality.

If your revenue model depends on headcount growth, and AI is shrinking headcount, and just like that: you have a monetization crisis.

"Rapid pricing experimentation" is dangerous advice.

I keep seeing the same pitch from billing platforms and entitlement tools: configure your pricing, launch a test, learn fast, iterate, repeat.

Sounds great in theory.

If you're selling a $9/month product to 100,000 users? Sure. 

Test away. Change that $9 to $9.99 and see what happens. 
You've got statistical significance and low stakes.

But if you're negotiating a $150K deal with a CFO at a Fortune 500?

→ Try explaining that your quote from last week was "just a test."
→ Try telling your sales reps that pricing changed again—third time this quarter.
→ Try building credibility when the prospect remembers seeing different prices six months ago.

Expertise over experimentation. 
That's my stance.

I'm not against testing. 
Testing is essential. 

But blind, rapid iteration creates more problems than it solves: internal confusion, external credibility risk, sales teams who don't know what to sell, and customers who don't know what to trust.

The answer isn't more speed. 
It's more intention.

Informed. Measured. Deliberate.

If your team is about to make a pricing decision too fast, that's exactly what we work through at Pricing I/O. Drop a comment or DM me.

Most SaaS companies blame product for churn.
But the data usually points somewhere else: pricing.

3 steps. 10 minutes. 
You'll know if churn is pricing-driven or product-driven.

Segment by cohort. Compare NRR vs. LTV. 
Read churn surveys for the real signals.

If customers say "can't justify cost", that's not a product problem.

2026 is the year the pack separates.
Not with a dramatic crash, more of a slow exposure.

On one side: companies that are deliberate about AI integration, honest about their metrics, and strategic about pricing.

On the other: the copycats. The aimless AI adopters. The ones chasing "Wishful Thinking ARR" with creative revenue definitions and 50x valuations.

The fallout we expected in 2025? 
I think it shows up in 2026. 

Here's why:
→ AI scrutiny goes up (budgets need justification now)
→ Differentiation pressure increases (the checkbox AI gets exposed)
→ Companies under pressure make desperate pricing moves

And here's the opportunity: the smart operators will start picking up technology AND talent from the companies that couldn't adapt.

Acqui-hiring in 2026 is going to be massive.

The question is: which side of the separation are you building for?

The best pricing leaders are readers.
And these are the 12 books every SaaS pricing expert should read.

Save this one to read later ↓

→ Month 1:
Monetizing Innovation
The Pricing Roadmap

→ Month 2:
Street Pricing
Blue Ocean Strategy

→ Month 3:
The Cold Start Problem
Hooked

→ Month 4:
The Go-To Market Handbook
The Lean Startup

→ Month 5:
Influence
Predictably Irrational

→ Month 6:
The Art of Pricing
The Subscription Boom

If you want to go deeper than books, this is what we work on every day at Pricing I/O.
Drop a DM and let's talk.

After working with 400+ SaaS companies, I see three types when it comes to AI integration, and only one of them survives the next 2 years.

Most companies say they're using AI.
Very few can explain why.

The difference isn't budget. It's not talent either.
It's whether AI is a checkbox or a strategy.

Some companies know exactly where AI fits in their pricing, packaging, and go-to-market. 

They've mapped the ROI. 
They've planned the process change.

Others bolted AI onto a roadmap with no monetization strategy behind it, and their boards are starting to notice.

Where does your company fall on this spectrum?

I almost lost myself to AI news last year.
Every day there was something new. 

OpenAI did this. Anthropic launched that. Google's catching up. Startups raising at 50x revenue.

I was reading everything. 
Trying to understand every perspective. 
Watching every announcement.

And then I noticed something: 
I was paying less attention to my team.

The conversations were shorter. 
The check-ins were surface-level. 

I was physically present but mentally somewhere else, chasing the next headline, the next hot take, the next "you need to know this" thread.

FOMO was pulling me away from the work that actually matters.

Here's what I've been obsessing over instead: clarity.

Not mission statements. Not OKRs. 
Actual clarity, where your team can articulate what they're doing, why they're doing it, and how it connects to where you're going.

It sounds simple. 
It's brutally hard.

I've started asking my direct reports one question:
"Do you understand what we're doing and why?"

If they have a different point of view, I want to hear it. 
If they're confused, I need to know. 

A 10-second answer tells me everything: 
"Yes, I get it, I think we're going the right direction." 

Great. But more often, that question opens a door to something I was missing.

Here's my test:
→ If you have 5 direct reports and all 5 say the same thing about your direction—high five, you're leading well.
→ If all 5 have completely different views of what you're trying to do? That's not a them problem. That's a you problem.

People can feel when you're paying attention. 
They can also feel when you're not.

Forget FOMO. Focus.

2026 isn't the year SaaS dies.

It's the year people finally realize AI needs SaaS as much as SaaS needs AI.

Distribution, data, workflows, customer trust, none of that disappears because ChatGPT exists. 

But the SaaS companies scrambling to slap "AI-powered" on their pricing page without rethinking what they actually deliver? Those are the ones in trouble.

We've watched this play out across hundreds of companies.

Companies treating AI like a feature are missing the real forcing function, the question they've been avoiding for years: what outcome are we actually selling?

Seat-based pricing made sense when humans were the unit of consumption. 

When AI agents are doing the work, you're not selling seats anymore, you're selling results, throughput, outcomes that scale beyond headcount.

Most SaaS companies haven't touched their pricing model in years. 
AI just made that procrastination expensive. 

→ Boards are asking harder questions. 
→ Valuations are getting squeezed. 
→ And every month without a clear answer is revenue left on the table.

To surf the hype in 2026, get deliberate about monetizing what AI actually delivers.

That's what we spend every day working on at Pricing I/O, and the urgency we're hearing from founders and boards right now is unlike anything from the last few years.

The window to get ahead of this is open. It won't be for long.

I had to look in the mirror and ask myself a hard question.
Am I drinking my own Kool-Aid?

I've sat in rooms with founders who had their goggles on. 
Convinced they're smarter than everyone. 
Convinced the market is theirs for the taking.

And I've watched them fail.

Smart. Ambitious. Dedicated. Motivated.
Still failed.

So when I started building our new product, I made myself three promises:

1/ Assume there won't be a warm reception.
2/ Assume my assumptions are wrong.
3/ Assume this is a longer journey than I think.

Mike Tyson said it best: 
"No plan survives the first punch in the face."

We're going to get punched in the face. 
Every product does.

The question isn't whether it happens. It's how we react.

So instead of chasing a blowout launch, I'm building systems. 

Feedback loops. 
Prioritization frameworks. 
Quick cycles to learn and pivot.

How do I figure out how to figure out stuff?

That's the real question.

If we get a blowout launch? Hallelujah.

But I'm planning for the worst and hoping for the best.

Building something new is freaking hard. 
And it's full of trapdoors.

What's one assumption you're making about your business that might be wrong?

I think Mark Benioff is overrated.
I'll say it out loud.

Look, Salesforce is the godfather of SaaS. 
Many people give it that title, and it's earned. 

They pioneered cloud software. Built a $40B+ company.

But I think that was more Mark's team and the great people he had around him than Mark himself.

He's good at sales. He makes smart decisions. He’s a pioneer.  
I'm not saying he's bad.

But I lost a lot of respect for him when he said AI would be easy. 
That he could sell the world on his AI overnight.

That's obnoxious.

AI isn't easy. Anyone who's actually building with it knows that. 
Anyone who's helping companies integrate it knows the complexity, the change management, the friction.

Saying "AI is easy" tells me you're selling, not building.

I'd rather follow leaders who are thoughtful than leaders who are loud.
Give me Satya Nadella's calm over Benioff's bravado any day.

Pricing for the wrong thing is one of the most expensive mistakes I see.
(And still most companies miss this completely)

In a PLG motion, pricing does the heavy lifting early. 
→ It's the packaging, the free tier boundary, the upgrade trigger that converts users before a human ever gets involved.

In a sales-led motion, pricing shows up late. 
→ It's a negotiation lever, a discounting battlefield, and often an afterthought bolted onto whatever the rep promised on the call.

I've seen 400+ SaaS companies try to use the same pricing playbook for both motions. 

It doesn't work, because the moment where pricing creates or destroys value is fundamentally different.

The consequences cascade:
→ Your packaging
Does it need to sell itself on a webpage, or does it need to survive a 6-month procurement process?

→ Your discounting exposure
PLG has almost none. Sales-led can hemorrhage 20-40% if there are no guardrails.

→ Your expansion path
PLG expands through usage and upgrades. Sales-led expands through rep-driven upsell conversations.

→ Your pricing team's focus
Optimizing conversion rates vs. optimizing deal structures.

Neither is wrong. 

Your go-to-market motion dictates where your pricing has leverage.

If you're not sure your pricing is built for your motion, that's the first thing we diagnose at Pricing I/O. 

To book a free discovery call drop me a DM.

Most companies wait until something breaks to revisit pricing. 
Here are the 7 signals it's time to take a closer look.

In this video I'll talk you through:
→ Triggers that indicate pricing needs attention
→ Why "not the right time" is costing you money
→ Common patterns from 400+ SaaS companies

#saas #pricing

When people ask who I'm being inspired by, I don't have a good answer.

I never looked for figures to follow.
No heroes. No role models I'm trying to copy.

Just me, trying to make more good decisions than bad decisions. 

Keep learning forward. 
Treat people right.

That's it. That's the whole philosophy.

I like outside perspective. I get inspired by others. But what works for them doesn't necessarily work for me.

And I think that's okay.

Not everyone needs a leader to chase.

Some of us just need to stay honest with ourselves about where we're strong and where we're not.

Be introspective. 
Be blunt with yourself. 
Make trade-offs intentionally.

In the end, business is all about getting people to do stuff for you. 

→ Engineers to build for you
→ Employees to work for you
→ Customers to buy from you

Once you figure out how to do that, there's really no limit to what you can do.

No heroes required.

SaaS Founder: Stop copying competitor pricing pages.

That pricing page you're copying was built for a completely different business.

Here's how to fix it.

Watch more pricing insights here https://skd.so/E9ur5M

Most companies make pricing an after thought.

Most companies also are never able to use pricing as the superpower it actually is.  

I have had the privilege of overseeing revenue management for over $6 billion in revenue across a diverse range of industries during the past decade. Throughout this experience, I've gained a deep understanding of the critical role that pricing plays in business success. 

I'm passionate about sharing my expertise and insights to help organizations harness the power of pricing strategies to improve profitability and overall performance.

Karan Sood

I can't teach you pricing in a day or week, or a month. 
There is a reason I no longer offer a monthly membership. 

None of the things that matter in pricing can be learnt in days or weeks. 

It took me: 
- 5 years to move off cost based pricing

- 10 years to learn building reputation with sales

- 15 to likely learn that  I am not even in the pricing business

- 17+ to learn what truly generates growth in pricing people

These things were learnt over the years, not in weeks or months. A lot came not from any text book, or linkedin post, but from test and learn and working with other professionals. 
 

A lot came through working with execs, learning how to really speak their language, going on hundreds of sales calls..


There is a reason I am bullish about PricingTribe and the way we run it. For all the above reason I know in the age of AI where content is dime a dozen, a place for connection with peers will be sought after. 


We discuss deeply, frequently and more broadly. We are way beyond what we would discuss and say in public. 


That's why I think PricingTribe will be the marquee place for all pricing professionals ! If you haven't check it out, you should. 

Apply on website: pricingtribe.com

#PricingTribe.

Join the best private community for all pricing professionals ! Apply on website !

I am going to keep reminding pricing people ! 
You need to be expert in pricing, but generalist in nature. 


Your pricing skills matter, but your other skills matter just as much.



1) Core Skill - Pricing: This is your foundation.

You need breadth across pricing models AND depth in how pricing actually works across industries. It’s not enough to just know one space. You need to be open to learning from other industries. SAAS can learn a thing from manufacturing and they can learn a thing from services.. 

Your pricing instinct comes from multi model knowledge - not just the one in your company. Talk to people outside of your core.



2) Essential Skills - Finance + Industry +AI

Finance is non-negotiable. If you don’t know what’s inside a P&L, you should start now. You should be able to understand:

AR
BOM
payment terms
reserves
accruals
margin math contribution vs. gross…
P&L management is essential. 

Industry knowledge is the other essential. Knowing the market, competitors, and the value chain. It will let you speak with authority in any room. Pick up a basic book like "Financial Intelligence". Easy !

I don't want to talk about AI, you know that's an essential skill now to ingrain into your processes, workflows, analysis. 

3) Preferred - Soft Skills:

This is where careers are made. You need to grow your Influence and be better at executive communication. 

Executive communication upwards
Framing difficult conversations.
Reading a room full of execs. 
Know when to be firm and flexible.

You need to stand up for yourself sometimes too, you may go against the grain. But it's okay it builds your character. 


4) Desirable - Cross-Functional Knowledge

This is your long-tail advantage. Know other areas of the business like:

IT
Sales and Marketing
Operations
Contracts
Supply chain
Commercial terms
Basic legal understanding


You don’t need to master everything, but knowing how things actually work makes you a far more strategic partner.


Develop this skill set and your impact becomes impossible to ignore.


If you made it this far, please: 

👍🏼Like it or 
♻️share it with everyone
✉️ Send it to a peer.
💾 Save it for yours

This is the bedrock of everything inside #PricingTribe group if that's of interest.

Building pricing credibility is hard. 

And I mean deep credibility where people will rely your POV consistently, where people will move meetings for your POV or wait for you to come back from vacation to get your POV or just shelf a decision because you are busy. That level of credibility is hard hard hard stuff. It comes at a cost too. 


It takes years to build. Years, not months, not weeks, not days. And, you could work on it for years, and have it derailed in one quarter or worse in one meeting. I've been there, likely you too.


I have been thinking of a hierarchy of things I think pricing professionals need to master to build that credibility. Consider it a working draft. 


You could apply this framework at any level, but it does lend itself to mid to senior professionals more. 

It starts at the bottom with commercial understanding, you need to know the business better than most people. This goes a long way in establishing yourself as a business knowledge powerhouse. That builds credibility, that comes from having your ear in several functions with healthy relationships with business or area heads. 


Measure your impact your majesty ! Big or small ! These small wins go unnoticed but when put together could build a lot of trust. Document it, track it, revise it and blow it up on the slide occasionally. 


Systems: Everytime I missed a growth opty in my career it was because my systems or processes were not in place. I was too ad-hoc of a margin slinger while someone with less skill had better systems and went ahead. Systems will eat adhoc processed for breakfast anyday. Build your systems sir !!!! 


You need consistency in how you present to the exec. You have to nail the format, the message in the way they like, understand and approve decisions. If you bring a different date every time, side eye is all you'll get from them. (I am kinda proud of this non AI reference I made, please tell me you read this far). 


And, lasting credibility will come with clear ownership of decisions. Where you own, the win and the loss. And are the sole owner of pricing decisions. This is a big reason I am not a fan of pricing committee's. Pricing has one owner, who can present find to the exec committee or product or whosoever. You add too many cooks, you'll spoil the broth mama said...


Will expand on this soon in #PricingTribe...


PS: It's 6:30 AM and don't let down by the Beatles playing in the background. The version where they play their last concert together in a 42 mins set on a rooftop. Not sure why I told you this, but felt like it ! Beatles are my favourite.

Apply for our membership: pricingtribe.com

You were warned. 
Back in 2023 I posted this note on why Spotify was massively under monetized and it was leaving money by not changing price fast enough with value. 


The post went viral and I was roasted by everyone media people, marketing people, execs, coaches, teachers and janitors and even 2023 AI experts !! 


90 comments and mostly people disagreed that Spotify had any pricing power,  because replacement was easy. There was no differentiation. 

There was no value add like Netflix which constantly adds new value.


Fast forward 3 years, and Spotify has increased price every year 2024, 2025 and now 2026. The old 9.99 is 12.99. The change is probably most of its annual profit by now. 


Those same people who commented, now pay 30% higher while their value extraction from the platform has rarely changed. 


Not sure why I am bringing this up. Maybe because it goes to say why pricing power is underestimated and not well understood. 

#PricingTribe community ! We are live !

Toying with an idea of a podcast ? 

Thinking of interviewing Sr. Pricing/Finance and Strategy leaders.

Would you want to listen ?

I feel real audio in a world of AI will be valuable. 

Who would you want me to interview ?

I love talking. I want to do more talking and writing. 
 
I love #PricingTribe !!

Can we adopt the term 'Pricers'. 
I am a bit tired of telling people I am an art and science expert in Excel. 

or that we are finance, just more balanced towards org goals.. 

WTH even is a role that sits at the intersection of finance, marketing, strategy and sales ? I know that's what you tell people. 


Just like marketing has marketers. No marketer goes out and says I sit at the intersection of demand and supply by helping people convert to customers... 


The dictionary literally says 'Pricer: A person who prices things and puts price tags on them'... 


Can we pretty please ? 
Who do I have to convince ?

Pricing people: In a world of AI slop, be careful of what you read and spend time on.


The world of AI content is centering towards the average, and you are not average and neither is your time. Please value it accordingly. 


This is the big reason I have pivoted from writing too much on linkedin or long form articles to more peer to peer connection and to video. It just feels more authentic in this new world.


Remember….Real learning will always happen by doing, by testing, by asking questions, by failing, by mentoring, by shadowing, by reverse engineering, by taking a L sometimes, and a win other times and by peer support and networking..


That’s it ! 
#PricingTribe

Pricing is not easy. 
But #PricingTribe is making it easier.

To be successful automate yourself out of a job. 
That's a kind of north star metric that drives more success.

PricingTribe invited Megan Smith who has ran deal desk for Hubspot, Dropbox and Linkedin for a Deal Desk: Design and Setup workshop. 


Here were the key takeaways for you: 


- Setup processes and automate yourself out of a job. That should be your core objective. 

- Deal desks work because humans require human touch on deals. It can be through negotiation on discounts, terms, builds etc. 

- Deal Desk should have clear authority: “up to X discount / down to Y margin", anything outside is an escalation path. 

- Create an “easy way vs hard way” path for sales. Easy way is fast with higher success, hard way is escalations, and is slow and doesn't guarantee success. 

- Reward reps who bring complete context (faster SLA, advocacy).

- Measure what matters: time-to-close (DD deals), win rate (directional), ACV/margin impact, and attach rate (low overall, high on big deals


Here is a valuable clip from that #PricingTribe workshop. 


Posting for the : 7:45 Algo gods. While listening to "Sound of the silence: Live in central Park" where paul simon got 600K people to come in. I don't even have that many impressions all month...let me know if you read so far !!

Price increases rarely fail because of the price.
Last week’s 1Password pricing episode is a good reminder of that.


They didn't change price for 10 years and then raised them by 33%, the backlash was swift and cruel. 


Within days:

- Reddit threads exploded with complaints
- Users posted cancellation notices
- Competitors started advertising against the increase
- Discounts started appearing to calm the backlash


So here are the TLDR learnings: 

- Don’t wait 10 years to change price
- Segmentation matters more than most teams realize
- Features <> value communication (excels fans)
- Every word in price communication matters
- Always prepare for backlash

I wrote all about it in today's newsletter ! 

https://lnkd.in/ghj-JeKw

Price increases rarely fail because of the price, they fail because of the execution around the price.

What's the hardest part of executing a price change ?

I have in good faith from my 7 year old daughter that I can live with her when she get older, even with her kids. She wrote it down and we circulated it inside the house. Wife's okay with it. She knew this day would come from DAY 1. 


We also started a LinkedIn page for PricingTribe (real big boy pants). We also have one follower, that's me. You can be the 2nd if you want. 


Tomorrow I write a long post about the most recent major pricing blunder in recent history !! So bad, it makes me feel bad for the pricing team involved. 


It's 7 am EST. They say good stuff only happens after 8:30 am, but by that time I will be running kitchen !! 


So please go ahead scroll past me or not, your choice ! But I don't care anymore, I am going to live with my daughter !

PricingTribe

Pricing lesson for everyone ! 
Strait of Hormuz closed: 30% of oil gets choked

Less oil = Expensive Oil (Especially Asia)

Expensive Oil = More expensive manufacturing

More expensive Manufacturing = Higher cost

Expensive Oil= Equally expensive freight 

Higher Cost + Higher Freight = Higher Prices

Higher Prices = Less Demand

Less Demand = Less Profit

Less profit = Slowdown in economy

For pricing professionals this will be a time of re-thinking strategies again.

Is Discount a form of value ? 
Discount is a necessary evil, if anyone told you otherwise including some big pricing consultant be very cautious. 


I have been a pricer, a seller and a buyer on multi million dollar deals ! And I can tell you none of those million dollar deals I sat on would have happened without some form of discount. For a lot deals it was a mental barrier in the seller's mind. They won't sign without the perception of a deal. 

- The business owner expects it
- The procurement person expects it
- The exec sponsoring  the deal expects it
- The finance team thinks its their birthright ! 

In fact if you as a pricing team are not providing sales a discount range to negotiate within a cost framework and empower them, then you are losing a big credibility lever for  yourself in the org, and your growth will suffer. Trust me bro, I know.. I have scars to show ! 

So this is a very interesting take from Ed Arnold's session inside PricingTribe on value communication in pricing. He has a hard stance that discount is a form of value !! I tend to agree... 

#PricingTribe.

Can someone please explain what I do to my wife ? 

Reetika Negi has a hard time understanding what I do !! 
She thinks I have some weird obsession with pricing. 

Her words: You write status messages about pricing ? 

Is she right ? Am I status message junkie ?


If my work meant anything to you. Please comment and tell her what I do. Tell her our PricingTribe is a real deal !!! We are for real community, with bells and whistles !!  

-------------
PS: She is the reason I am able to do this, so she might as well know !

Procurement Delivery Manager at Roche

Jay Odedra is the real deal ! #PricingTribe Go work for Jay.

Pricing, Packaging and Monetization Leader

One of the things I love most about working here is the level of collaboration and the trust to make real impact. We’re hiring a Director of Pricing Strategy to help set our direction in a fast‑growing industry — if this sounds like you (or someone you know), check out the role below 👇

Campbell, California, United States (Remote)

Ed arnold is a leading authority on customer value validation.

We at #PricingTribe were lucky enough to host him at our monthly members hangout !

Amazing session. We talked about what does it take to change a value model from pricing team into a value model that is owned by the customer.

The whole premise of customer value validation is to just surface the 3-4 drivers of value to the customer and filter out the noise !!

Thanks Ed Arnold , you have been too kind to the community !! Hope to see more of you.

I can’t stop thinking about the ‘Magic Trick’ value argument. That’s a great way to position value models.

#PricingTribe

I quantify the value that products deliver to customers.

Last week I met up with the good folks at the Pricing Tribe to talk about how I validate customer value. Great discussion!

Here are highlights.
https://lnkd.in/e8fFcTuG

Karan Sood Denise Gangi Jared Smith, Ph.D. Simon Lamb Cam Hartwick Rea Stamatoulakis Olga Bobikina, MBA, MS, BA

Open article: Why It’s Important to Validate Customer Value by edarnold1.substack.com

Why It’s Important to Validate Customer Value

When you have no discounting controls.

Employee creates 100% discount codes and walks away bunch of free shoes ! 

Honestly I am surprised it doesn’t happen more often given what I have seen in discount code control.

If you just starting your pricing career, this is great starting role !! Work for Valerie and James !! Great team and managers !

I’m hiring for a Junior Pricing Analyst.

I’m looking for someone who is organized, detail-oriented, analytically curious, and strong at keeping work moving across teams.
This is not just a spreadsheet role. It’s a chance to build experience across pricing, systems, dashboards, process management, and cross-functional execution.

Core strengths I’m looking for:
Loves clean process, deadlines, and operational follow-through
Comfortable managing workflows and keeping tools like Asana accurate and up to date
Strong basic Excel skills: XLOOKUP, pivot tables, formulas
Able to work carefully in systems and manage things like price book setups without creating downstream issues
Has the judgment to spot something unusual in the data and raise the right questions
Understands key pricing fundamentals like gross margin, discounting, net price, win rate, churn, and elasticity

Helpful experience:
Power BI, Tableau, or Looker
SQL exposure
HubSpot reporting
CPQ/CRM tools such as Salesforce, NetSuite, Dynamics, HubSpot, or quoting platforms
Pricing admin workflows such as discount approvals, contracting, and price book maintenance

In this role, you would:
Own Asana board hygiene and workflow tracking
Maintain pricing dashboards and reporting routines
Set up new products in our CPQ tool
Partner across Sales Ops, Finance, Product, Legal, Billing, Marketing, Sales, and Systems Administration
Conduct product market research
Support key pricing and administrative processes

This role is ideal for someone early in their career who wants to learn fast, contribute immediately, and build real pricing and commercial operations experience.

Know someone strong? Tag them or send them my way. https://lnkd.in/gphnVdfB

Why did Clay grandfather everyone ? 

I don't think clay understands the future drawback of two tier system.

taplio

The Battle

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Karan Sood

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taplio

The Battle

Marcos Rivera

Karan Sood

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Marcos Rivera's LinkedIn Performance

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Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreMarcos Rivera's LinkedIn Performance