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After pioneering, but insular, work on the conceptualization and measurement of customer value in business markets undertaken in the 80s and 90s, interest in this topic is substantial since the beginning of this decade. Despite this recent interest, marketing scholars concur that value in business markets is still an under-researched subject. This contribution to the debate is threefold. The paper first proposes an own model of customer value conceptualization in business markets; based on several rounds of testing this theoretically grounded model in managerial practice indications exist to conclude that this model may offer benefits over current models.

Secondly, the paper provides a comprehensive survey of pricing approaches in industrial markets. The paper integrates this literature overview with own empirical findings. Concurrently the paper summarizes extant research on the link between pricing approach and profitability in industrial markets. The paper thirdly proposes a framework for value delivery and value-based pricing strategies in industrial markets. Proposing such a framework is both useful as well as necessary. Useful, since this framework guides new product development and pricing decisions and assists in the implementation of price-repositioning strategies for existing products; necessary, since the theoretical and practical adoption of value-based delivery and pricing strategies may have suffered from the lack of a unifying conceptual framework. Two case studies, one involving the pricing decision for a major product launch at a global chemical company, the other involving value delivery at an industrial equipment manufacturer, illustrate the practical applicability of the proposed framework.

In this paper, we examine the elements of pricing approaches in export businesses and their performance in an international environment. The elements of pricing approaches consist of cost-based, competitor-based, and value-based decisions made by different levels of management. By providing an integrated, holistic view, we investigate how different types of export-pricing strategies influence export performance, and which elements strengthen or attenuate the outcomes of strategic actions.

Using data from a survey of 172 export managers, we test our hypotheses in a two-step approach. First, we use an unsupervised approach to group the export companies and to validate the cluster solution internally and externally. Second, we test our hypotheses regarding export performance.

The results show that the types of export-pricing strategies are unequally distributed, and the elements of the strategies have different complexities. Export performance varies significantly by type of pricing orientation used.

George E. Cressman, Jr. is President and Founder of World Class Pricing, Inc. George spent 30 years in industry, and has been consulting in marketing strategy, competitive strategy, and pricing for 15 years. George provides marketing and pricing solutions for global business-to-business and business-to-consumer firms. George has been named Marketer of the Year by the American Marketing Association, and is a frequent speaker in management education programs.

In this chapter, we follow the growth of the pricing discipline, especially through the ideas of one of the earliest of pricing's pioneers: Dan Nimer. The Nimer influence on pricing has been foundational, sewing seeds for the growth and development of various pricing fields and subfields – pricing objectives and pricing strategy, value-based pricing, costing and pricing, financial analysis of pricing, and price sensitivity. The ideas we present in this chapter originated largely with Nimer, many in his own voice. We interweave them with the ideas of other contributors to the pricing discipline to show the development of the field. Dan taught many foundational pricing concepts; they are captured in seminars and articles kept through the years. Founding pioneer to pricing, Nimer's influence will remain long into the new century as pricing enters a new phase as a strategic capability of the firm.

John McGee's 1958 paper, “Predatory Price Cutting: The Standard Oil (NJ) Case,” has had an astonishing influence on both antitrust policy in the United States and economic lore. McGee argued that predatory pricing is irrational and his analysis of the Standard Oil Company Matter, decided in 1911, led him to conclude that the Record in this case does not show that Standard Oil engaged in predatory pricing. This single publication appears to serve as a foundation of the U.S. Supreme Court's position on the issue of predatory pricing, as well as the assertion by many economists that predatory pricing is irrational and rarely occurs.

Numerous arguments have been advanced during the past 25 years that predatory pricing can be a rational strategy. As to McGee's empirical findings, there has been no re-examination of the Record of the Standard Oil case to determine the validity of his finding that the trial “Record” does not support the claim that Standard Oil engaged in predatory pricing.

We examined this Record and have found that the trial Record contains considerable evidence of predatory pricing by Standard Oil. Therefore, the Record does not support McGee's conclusion that Standard Oil did not engage in predatory pricing.

Thus, the decisions of the Supreme Court in recent years, as well as the opinions of many economists, concerning predatory pricing are not consistent with either current theory or the empirical record.

The Bureau of Economics in the Federal Trade Commission has a three-part role in the Agency and the strength of its functions changed over time depending on the preferences and ideology of the FTC’s leaders, developments in the field of economics, and the tenor of the times. The over-riding current role is to provide well considered, unbiased economic advice regarding antitrust and consumer protection law enforcement cases to the legal staff and the Commission. The second role, which long ago was primary, is to provide reports on investigations of various industries to the public and public officials. This role was more recently called research or “policy R&D”. A third role is to advocate for competition and markets both domestically and internationally. As a practical matter, the provision of economic advice to the FTC and to the legal staff has required that the economists wear “two hats,” helping the legal staff investigate cases and provide evidence to support law enforcement cases while also providing advice to the legal bureaus and to the Commission on which cases to pursue (thus providing “a second set of eyes” to evaluate cases). There is sometimes a tension in those functions because building a case is not the same as evaluating a case. Economists and the Bureau of Economics have provided such services to the FTC for over 100 years proving that a sub-organization can survive while playing roles that sometimes conflict. Such a life is not, however, always easy or fun.

Advances in technology, operations research, and data driven pricing and marketing are leading pricing strategy into new and untested waters – toward dynamic pricing, and variable pricing strategies, which ultimately require changes in how we view pricing strategy. The dominant view of pricing strategy is that pricing goals, objectives, and strategies should be formulated a priori, and should be consistent with marketing and corporate strategies – deliberate pricing strategy. This chapter argues that firms need to develop new strategic pricing skills that lead to more improvisational, innovative, or adaptive pricing strategies. I call this type of price strategy-making emergent pricing strategy. Innovative pricing strategies that the organization judges, or senses to be effective, are repeated, shared, expanded, and refined into successful pricing patterns that, over time and across situations, become pricing strategy. Thus, rather than specifically designing pricing strategy to achieve a goal, here the organization acts upon a price innovation that seems to make sense for this customer, this market segment, this setting, and this situation, then interprets the outcomes, signals, and reactions that seem to flow from the pricing action, and shares and encourages adoption and adaption by others in the organization. Emergent pricing strategy is particularly useful in unstable, turbulent, and complex product and market environments in which price-sensitive buyers wield significant power and influence.

Digitalization and marketing technologies have made it possible to overcome some barriers to pricing – a multidisciplinary field between marketing, finance and IT – and have set the stage for a paradigm shift in the pricing profession. Value creation, the pricing process, and price communication have been transformed by innovative business models and advanced algorithmic and human–machine solutions. This chapter synthesizes the literature to date and provides a comprehensive framework for an all-encompassing 360° pricing approach that broadens the understanding of pricing in the context of digital business across all steps of the price management process. Starting from product attributes and motivational beliefs in consumers' value assessment and adoption of (technological or digital) products or services, new business models and pricing models emerge in the digital economy, human–machine solutions for price implementation and repricing are increasingly applied, and price search and communication take place through a variety of digital communication channels. Each stage of this framework discusses concrete examples, highlighting the freemium strategy, the subscription model, price tracking and repricing tools, and digital price information channels such as e-commerce, marketplace, or price comparison platforms. The implications for price management in a digital, technology-driven landscape are discussed from the executive level to the analyst level.