Para reflexão

"As the world becomes increasingly price-competitive, successful companies will need to become ever more vigilant in targeting markets for profitability, not just volume growth.
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When working with the client, keep it simple. He said, “Don’t waste too much time overcomplicating the topic of customer value. Just ask the cli- ent this: ‘Do you know how much it costs your customers not to be doing business with you’?”

Trechos retirados de "Integrating Marketing and Operational Choices for Profit Growth" de Thomas Nagle e Lisa Thompson.

Imaginem o potencial de melhoria que temos pela frente...

Volto ao livro The Strategy and Tactics of Pricing – A Guide to Growing More Profitably de Thomas Nagle e John Hogan para mais um trecho:

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“Companies often design products to satisfy needs and create customer delight. Customers love to be delighted – as long as they don’t have to pay extra for the experience. When price is factored into the decision, however, many customers are willing to give up some delight in exchange for lower prices. The pricing challenge, therefore, is to understand what creates meaningful value for different customers in order to set prices that reflect the actual value received. Instead of creating products to satisfy customers, companies should create meaningful values that customers will pay for.”
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V. Kumar no seu livro “Managing Customers For Profit” ou neste artigo da Harvard Business Review, chama a atenção para o perigo de crer acriticamente que clientes satisfeitos são clientes rentáveis.
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Nagle e Hogan voltam a colocar no centro das atenções a criação, ou melhor, como refere Larreche, a originação de valor.
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Uma empresa tem de se concentrar na criação de valor. Como referimos aqui, acerca do marxianismo entranhado, o valor não é intrínseco às coisas, o valor é atribuído pelos clientes.

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Que clientes? Os clientes-alvo!
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Isto leva-nos a relacionar preços com segmentos de clientes e com proposta de valor, ou voltando a Nagle e Hogan:
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“Once you understand how value is created for different customer segments, the next step in building a pricing strategy is to create a price structure that aligns price with the value delivered and that minimizes the cost-to-serve. A common mistake made by pricing managers is to assume that their objective is to set a price for the product rather than the customer segment.”
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Quantas empresas conhecemos que não identificaram os seus clientes-alvo e que não racionalizaram a sua proposta de valor? Sendo assim, qual a base para a sua definição de preços?

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“setting one price for the product ensures that at least one group of customers will be getting the wrong price. If you price high for high-value customers, then you risk overpricing to low-value customers and reducing profits. Conversely, pricing low to serve low-value customers leaves money on the table at the high end and also reduces profits. Many companies try to solve this dilemma by setting prices for the “average” customer. But this approach also fails to address the problem because the price will still be too high for low-value customers while still leaving some money on the table for high value-customers.
The solution to this dilemma is to create a price structure aligned with the value received instead of the products delivered.”

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Depois disto, fico a magicar sobre o potencial de melhoria que temos pela frente. Se tão poucas empresas abordam o tema desta maneira... há muitas oportunidades de melhoria e muitas oportunidades com boas hipóteses de retorno.

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BTW, já equacionaram os choques deste discurso com o discurso das normas da qualidade?