Having a pricing solutions architect on your team will bring your business the expertise and dedication it deserves to handle difficult pricing issues. Handling these solutions inhouse without the proper skill set will not be nearly as effective and can be very time-consuming.
Let’s say that your business was a pioneer in its industry, and now competitors are beginning to emerge. How can your business win over the customer? Do you need to offer lower prices or maintain them and offer exclusive benefits?
This is an example of a situation in which a pricing solutions architect could help.
Here are a few reasons that a pricing solutions architect will benefit you:
Find the Best Solutions
A pricing solutions architect can dedicate all of their time and energy to finding the right solution for your business. You can tell them parameters they need to work within (e.g., budgets, deadlines, goals), and they can find the best fit for your business.
If an existing employee were to do this on top of their regular workload, they would likely end up picking a subpar solution. Solution architecture takes time and research that they may not be able to dedicate to the task.
Pricing solutions architects also have training specifically to solve pricing problems in your business. They come with expertise, skill sets, and an understanding of pricing rules. This will make the research and planning go faster because they already have a sense of what will work and what won’t.
Communicate Solution Options and Request Resources
After finding a solution to your pricing problem, it is the responsibility of the pricing solutions architect to communicate with decision-makers within the business, like CEOs, CFOs, etc.
Good communication is a key skill for pricing solutions architects. If they have a great idea but don’t know how to explain it in a way that makes sense, their idea may be tossed out for a lesser purpose that was communicated more clearly.
On top of communicating the strategies that they will use to solve pricing problems, they will also need to communicate the resources that they will need to begin the process. This can include team members, extra hours, a dedicated space, and more.
If needs are not properly communicated, it won’t be very easy to achieve the desired results.
Manage Solution Development
Once the pricing solutions architect has the green light to begin implementing the process, and they have all of their needs met, they will manage the development of the solutions process.
More than anyone else in your business, the pricing solutions architect will have a full and complete understanding of how this solution should work. They will be your in-house expert.
Once the process begins, they will monitor progress, keep team members accountable, and check in regularly with results.
Analyze the Effectiveness of the Solution
After the process to solve the pricing issue has been going for a few months, the pricing solutions architect will study the results of their solution. Is the pricing problem getting better or worse? How can it be going better? What areas are not producing the results that were anticipated? How can those areas be improved?
Evaluating the effectiveness of the solution is time-consuming and requires sharp analytical skills. You need someone who fully understands and is dedicated to the process to be able to evaluate these results thoroughly.
Once results have been evaluated, the pricing solutions architect will then present the results of their solution to the same group of decision-makers that they originally pitched to. At this time, they can make decisions as to whether the solution was effective, what areas will need to be changed, and whether certain processes should continue.
Competera mentions that pricing solutions architects will elevate your problem-solving processes around pricing. Trying to manage these processes bypassing the work off to an employee that already has a different set of responsibilities will not yield the best result.
According to Forbes, solution architects are among the highest paying in-demand jobs today. If you choose to cut corners and manage things inhouse, you may begin to lose ground with competitors who are willing to hire a specialist.
When everyone else has experts on their team, it only makes sense to hire the best for your business as well. If you have a pricing problem, the best thing you can do is hire a pricing solutions architect.
