APPLE of Business's Eye!

Today, i want to share a subtle observation in the world of pricing in B2B space. It is something interesting which i have observed over last few years and thought would be fun to share with the larger world and solicit ideas. In B2B sales, pricing is very much a standard rate card agreed based on demand and supply, market rates, perception of your services, market willingness to price that differentiation and volumes negotiated. This is how even the IT industry has moved. Most of the large firms negotiate long term contracts, define the rules and standards for pricing and then on it is really not about the rate card; the game of business growth is about better services, high end specialized packaged projects and end to end delivery with unique commercial packages. IT services firms are yet to get more and more innovative on this bare all pricing side to deliver outputs without really pricing each component of it. But all said and done the financial boundaries are very much set and the game has to be played with in the same unless you have a path breaking truely outcome driven solution to offer.
When you move your engagement with large customers from transactional sales to partnership mode, just like automotive industries, you as service provider, have an open book of rules to follow. The parter almost always knows how and what is playing in standard offering, then on it is about working in tandem to ensure the supply chain, quality and output with very predictable commercial variations. The more coherent you become with the orgazniational output, the more your grow and become an integral part of the organziation. As a sales person, someone needs to really look at the final output with a consultative approach and setup team structures to provide efficient services, which shall form the foundation for growth and entry into various parts of IT supply chain. In partnership, the value is not in price, its really in output, innovation, cultural adaptation and acceptance in more and more segments of services supply chain.
It is interesting, but pricing to a large extent is not the differentiator in large engagements, it is the footprint expansion and process innovation. When you talk and target volumes, price is a difficult negotiation point. It is very much kept aside right at the onset to engage stakeholders on services and not finances. This is BAU world of IT and given the size, this is what most IT service providers have chased so far.. Right strategy is to grow, commoditize, normalize, drive efficiency; but there is indeed a path less travelled..

So, if you really want to position yourself APPLE way; you just step out of the crowd, create your solution taking market intel and then with the finesses go back to market and say, here i am, NO, i dont want it all, i just want those few of you, who want excellence, i have taken even the remotest of details into consideration; i am your style statement.. In this case, i will not target entire market, i will target few services, niche firms and will not grow based on numbers on ground, but will grow based on people who follow me and adopt me.. Welcome to the new era of APPLE of Business's Eye- build your enterprise with the best in the world.. We are business partners, we excel, we deliver, we innovate with you and we just want few of you who want to make business different leveraging IT.. No, IT is not about price killing BAU (it is a major part though), it was meant to make business efficient and global and when you use IT for that as CIO or CTO, you are integral to the business.. Here on you add your vendor partners to talk of experience and differentiation and pave your way to be the APPLE of Business' Eye!