Holden Advisors Blog

In what has become a common occurrence over the past 15 years or so, Amazon announced it was entering a new business last week – retail grocery stores. Well, yes, they technically are in this business already with their purchase of Whole Foods in 2017, but they see an opportunity to extend their reach beyond the more upscale customer. Then there’s Amazon Go – the cashier-less stores that are being rolled out in urban areas. They also have the food delivery business, which is a combination of Whole Foods products and others, although it has had mixed results so far. The grocery business isn’t really a new business at all.

I recently renewed my car insurance. It had been a few years since I’d changed the policy, and the cars were now half a decade older, so I decided to call GEICO to see if they could save me some money; after all, they promise new customers that 15 minutes can save them 15% (or more) from their bill. I was underwhelmed with the call. It turned out they could offer me very little, even though the policy had declined in value due to the lower value of the vehicles covered. So I decided to shop around with competitors, and lo and behold, Progressive could save me – a new customer – $400 a year on my plan.

Apple and Amazon stepped into the ring again recently, like B2B’s answer to Mayweather/Pacquiao, to cut a deal to finally land Apple’s newest products in Amazon’s marketplace on release day. In the past, these two tech heavyweights have sparred over products, apps, and availability – tactically bobbing and weaving to boost profits and stock value. But the latest bout between the two rivals showcased Apple's experience and savvy negotiating tactics (more on these in a minute) as a way to win a pivotal round.

If you’re a fan of the 1960s television show, Get Smart (or saw the 2008 movie with Steve Carrell), you know that the good guys work for Control and the bad guys work for an organization called KAOS (pronounced, “Chaos”). As a pricing or finance leader, it sometimes feels like this reflects your life as well: you're trying to maintain control over your pricing and profit, but too many times when a negotiation is left in the hands of your sales rep, it turns into chaos.

When facing low-priced competition, think twice before "sticking it to the competition" by going in with a low, low price. Watch the video to learn why:

Hear Pete Morelli talk about what we can learn from the price increase that Netflix rolled out last week.

Management guru Peter Drucker stated that the purpose of business is to create and retain customers. But Drucker omitted an essential component for how companies stay in business — namely, that the customers they select and serve must be profitable. Otherwise, hand that customer over to the competition. Not all business is good business; and last time I checked, B2B businesses were not charities.

If you made it past the headline, you are likely not an importer of knock-off goods or the Walmart-wannabe of your industry. You hopefully compete on something other than price, which means you have superior products, services, quality, coverage or something else unique. Simply said, you offer something of business value to your target customers.

2018 was an exciting year for Holden Advisors, filled with thought-provoking and timely content shared in our weekly blog as our experts summarized their key takeaways and outlined key strategies for B2B's most relevant pricing and selling challenges.

As we enter the holiday season and life becomes more hectic, great service becomes even more important. If you’re like me and your holiday shopping tends to skew toward the end of December, getting a retailer to deliver the gift you purchased before the 25^th is almost as important as the gift itself.  It reminds me that great service – throughout the year – is an important part of a business’ value prop and shouldn’t be forgotten when buyers try to negotiate.