How Automation Helps the Very Human Nature of Pricing

A recent roundtable from Zilliant, the leader in pricing lifecycle management, explored the natural tension which exists between corporate pricing teams and branch managers that value autonomy. In our previous article, SAPinsider explored how automating cost pass-through can help companies keep their branches independent using statistical information.

In this second part of the series, we touch on the importance of delivering pricing guidance to every sales and customer touchpoint with speed whilst empowering individuals through data. In the roundtable, Gonzalo Benitez, Director of Pricing & Data Management for commercial vehicle retailer Rush Enterprises, noted that his two-person team deals with 400 reps, and can send recommendations within only 20 minutes via a mobile-friendly format. If a rep wants to action their own pricing, Benitez can then break down how much the rep has to increase general sales to offset the pricing they are offering to a customer.

“ that 5% discount is 50% of your profit, and they say, ‘Can you repeat that again?’” Benitez says with good humor, underlining a rep’s surprise reaction to the less-than-stellar news.

This granular detail on a speedy basis comes through the power of analytics and AI tools, which Rush Enterprises developed with Zilliant. SAP users should note that such tools can be implemented by Zilliant into SAP CPQ, ERP and Commerce Cloud, as this page demonstrates.

This automation helps develop the very human relationship between corporate pricing teams and sales reps. The tension noted earlier is replaced by a better understanding of pricing and outcomes on commissions, empowering the individual with the information they need.

“We have people saying, “I want to do this, why don’t you recommend something to me?’ Instead of, ‘I want to do this cost structure, just do it’”, Benitez continues. “We have been changing that mentality […] they’re more open to receiving data instead of trying to impose what they think is best.”

Our next and final part in this series will look at the importance of sharing revenue intelligence to account reps and the power of automation behind this data.