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The Product Experience

The problem with freemium pricing - Dan Balcauski (Chief Pricing Officer)

Oct 25, 2023
Dan Balcauski, pricing strategy expert, shares his thoughts on measuring uncertainty in pricing, using tools like Fermi decomposition. He discusses managing existing customers during pricing tweaks and the reasoning behind 'contact us for a quote' approach. The podcast explores the dislike for freemium pricing, ownership of pricing in B2B SaaS companies, case studies from product leaders, and strategies for handling pricing changes for existing customers.
44:02

Episode guests

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

  • Offering a free trial rather than a freemium model can provide more reliable revenue and profitability data in pricing strategy.
  • Product marketing should take ownership of pricing decisions and establish a pricing council with stakeholders from sales, customer success, and finance.

Deep dives

The Importance of Pricing Strategy

Dan Belkowski, founder and chief pricing officer at Product Tranquility, returns to delve deeper into pricing strategy. He discusses the limitations of a freemium approach and highlights the value of offering a free trial instead. Dan explains that the success stories surrounding freemium models often lack significant revenue or profitability data. He recommends a precise definition of freemium, distinguishing it from multi-sided networks and ad-supported free models. Moreover, he emphasizes the need for a pricing council within organizations and suggests that product marketing should take ownership of pricing decisions.

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