Pricing and Profitability Management: A Practical Guide for Business Leaders

Selecting Pricing Management Software

A global chemical manufacturing company established a rigorous request-for-proposal (RFP) process with pricing software vendors. After three months of demos, sales pitches, and reference checks, the lead of the RFP team summarized his frustration by saying, “I can't tell them apart. They are all the same.”

And this is true to a certain extent. For the most part, the solutions available today provide similar functionalities. At the same time, the rapid pace of software releases means vendors can quickly—albeit briefly—leapfrog their competitors with each new solution. Firms should engage in a comprehensive evaluation process to compare the attributes of each offering to determine which one best suits their needs. This process, comprising five key steps, is shown in Figure 7.10.

Figure 7.10 Pricing Software Evaluation and Selection Process

The approach is similar to that taken by companies choosing most new technology solutions. However, pricing software does present some additional considerations. As an emerging technology, it often lacks the toolsets for configuring advanced applications, thereby forcing more features to be hard-coded. In addition, pricing software vendors offer a wide range of specialized solutions based on industry and functional capabilities (e.g., analytics, optimization, deal management, and pricing management), so companies ...