Ardensi conference

It’s been a real pleasure to spend a couple of days with fellow members of the pricing community at the Pricing Strategy USA Summit in Los Angeles, organized by Ardensi. These in-person gatherings are very energizing and valuable, because they are great ways for people facing similar challenges to meet up, exchange ideas, and learn from each other. They are also a great opportunity to take the community’s pulse on what’s important. It was no surprise that the promise of AI motivated a lot of discussion, but the presentations also covered hot topics such as inflation and deflation, pricing organization, change management, and new product pricing. The breadth of experience among the speakers and attendees underscored the constant need for a variety of perspectives to get pricing right. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝗶𝗰 𝗣𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗛𝗲𝘅𝗮𝗴𝗼𝗻 𝗱𝗲𝗯𝘂𝘁𝘀 My colleague John Pineda and I presented the main ideas from the Game Changer book to a live public for the first time and were glad to hear the positive reactions. In a high-pressure world where pricing professionals are often on the receiving end of a business strategy, the strategic angle that we emphasized – that pricing can also help shape business strategy – was very well received. John and I really appreciated all the questions and the opportunities to explain the logic of the Hex and the seven pricing games and to think through how the Hex can apply to all types of businesses. By the end of the first day, it was inspiring to notice attendees remembering and using the game nomenclature. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗱𝗲𝗲𝗽 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗸𝘀 𝗯𝗲𝘁𝘄𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗰𝗵𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗽𝗿𝗶𝗰𝗶𝗻𝗴 I have to say that it was fun to see chess analogies embraced broadly at the conference.  Special shout-out here to Joshua Bardell from PROS, who structured his speech around the chess analogy. Pricing, like chess, requires players to get both the strategy and the tactics right. Josh and I also enjoyed playing a game of hexagonal chess, another way to change the game. 𝗦𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗻𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗻𝘁𝘀? At some point, a debate erupted about whether B2B businesses should consider doing away with the practice of discounting altogether. They could save time by pricing according to value. Both sides raised good points, but it became clear that the perspective of the Hex and its games can help frame this debate. A B2B company with a unique and differentiated value proposition can indeed play the Value Game and get rid of individual customer discounts. But if many competitors have similar customizable offers in a large and diverse market, then individual customer discounts within an elaborate negotiation process are good ways to adjust prices to specific deal conditions. That is the essence of the Custom Game. *** I look forward to more of these discussions and interactions as we continue our book tour around the world.