One of the hardest things to sort out in pricing seems to be wrangling the product catalog. Sales need it in CRM/CPQ systems. Finance need it in Billing/ERP systems. Product/Pricing need it in ... where? When products have usage-based pricing or entitlements, many ERPs can't handle it, and the product catalog spreads into a third system that handles usage, credits, entitlements, etc. We see how this crosses organization boundaries, lacking a single clear owner, and keeping everything in sync becomes super important - and very difficult to keep 100% correct over time. And most likely, someone in your organization is using Excel in some part of this process. Curious to hear how others split the product catalog, both horror stories and success stories.

Salesforge is the only company I have seen do this ⬇️ On their pricing page, they clearly delineate the “human path” and the “AI path” and have pricing packages for each. They charge a premium for the AI agent. $499/m vs. $80/m for their top “human” package. Part of this is a growing trend we see in the data around high WTP (Willingness to Pay) for AI capabilities that solve for specific jobs. But it's not just about the functionality. It's also about the optics. Venture-backed brands looking towards their next series not only want the functionality but they want to tell a story of how they are using agentic software as part of their scalable growth playbook. Enterprise organizations don’t want to be left behind. Pressure from the top is high to deploy more agents to solve different organizational pain points. The teams that best adopt and execute agentic software into the organization's processes are rewarded and given more resourcing. Even if many of the agentic tools require meaningful human oversight today, the idea that the tech can learn and evolve with your team, and ultimately be highly scalable, is an investment many software leaders are eager to make. What do you think? https://www.linkedin.com/posts/caseyhill_salesforge-is-the-only-company-i-have-seen-activity-7432076873213419520-QXfY?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAAAULZvkBJhmWcLLU-35ban2YYnjvvzf_6Mc

It's something lots of people talk about but few succeed at. I'd like to argue it's partially because a confusion about where to solve it. The attached Wardley map explain this better visually, but in essence: - Defining "positive outcome" is hard and unless solved the rest is ofc pointless. This is highly contextual. - Correlating the usage events with the outcome events (and/or queries) in time and by identity must be done BEFORE pricing is done. Pricing systems aren't built to do this. - Once the combined event exists, existing usage-based pricing systems can be used without modification. Makes sense? (Edit: Improved wardley map)

Had an interesting conversation this week on credit based pricing and I know this group has the experience, curiosity, and expertise. I’d love your thoughts on this little AI Ramblings blast I put out once in a while. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/akshaypatel07_productmanagement-venturecapital-privateequity-activity-7425524767883169792-SdgG?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_ios&rcm=ACoAAABJjBEBGcaO8S8AHEITnczM9B_WTSKa6dc

Hi all, I'm a technical product manager for Usage Cloud at DigitalRoute, based in Sweden. Been working with real-time prepaid credits and batch-based pricing, charging and billing since 2004 at scale - also deep knowledge of usage data mediation (the stuff that happens to get the messy real-life operational system events data in shape so it _can_ be priced). I have a fairly solid grasp of the entire quote-to-cash process. I co-host DigitalRoute's invite-only Usage Unlocked roundtable every month or so, where we discuss all things related to usage and pricing. I'm also a Wardley mapping nerd building the collaborative mapping SaaS https://mapaware.io (feel free to try it out), and I co-founded the Blockchain Sweden industry association. And overall tech nerd.