v2.1.0 to v2.1.0

---

name: suede-pricing

description: "Suede-owned pricing and packaging discipline. Use when deciding what to charge, structuring tiers, choosing a value metric, comparing free trials with freemium, researching willingness to pay, planning a price increase, or tearing down a pricing page for clarity and AI-readability. NOT FOR: in-product upgrade screens (use suede-paywalls), offer bonuses and guarantees (use suede-offers), or executing billing changes."

metadata:

version: 2.1.0

---

# Suede Pricing & Packaging

Suede Pricing turns verified product economics, buyer evidence, and commercial

constraints into testable prices, value metrics, tiers, and migration plans.

It produces a decision brief and measurement plan while keeping billing changes

behind explicit approval.

## Before Starting

**Check for product marketing context first:**

If `.agents/product-marketing.md` exists (or `.claude/product-marketing.md`, or the legacy `product-marketing-context.md` filename, in older setups), read it before asking questions. Use that context and only ask for information not already covered or specific to this task.

Gather this context (ask if not provided):

### 1. Business Context

- What type of product? (SaaS, marketplace, e-commerce, service)

- What's your current pricing (if any)?

- What's your target market? (SMB, mid-market, enterprise)

- What's your go-to-market motion? (self-serve, sales-led, hybrid)

### 2. Value & Competition

- What's the primary value you deliver?

- What alternatives do customers consider?

- How do competitors price?

### 3. Current Performance

- What's your current conversion rate?

- What's your ARPU and churn rate?

- Any feedback on pricing from customers/prospects?

### 4. Goals

- Optimizing for growth, revenue, or profitability?

- Moving upmarket or expanding downmarket?

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## Pricing Fundamentals

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## Value Metrics

### What is a Value Metric?

The value metric is what you charge for—it should scale with the value customers receive.

**Good value metrics:**

- Align price with value delivered

- Are easy to understand

- Scale as customer grows

- Are hard to game

### Common Value Metrics

| Metric | Best For | Example |

|--------|----------|---------|

| Per user/seat | Collaboration tools | Slack, Notion |

| Per usage | Variable consumption | AWS, Twilio |

| Per feature | Modular products | HubSpot add-ons |

| Per contact/record | CRM, email tools | Mailchimp |

| Per transaction | Payments, marketplaces | Stripe |

| Flat fee | Simple products | Basecamp |

### Choosing Your Value Metric

Ask: "As a customer uses more of [metric], do they get more value?"

- If yes → good value metric

- If no → price doesn't align with value

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## Tier Structure Overview

### Good-Better-Best Framework

**Good tier (Entry):** Core features, limited usage, low price

**Better tier (Recommended):** Full features, reasonable limits, anchor price

**Best tier (Premium):** Everything, advanced features, 2-3x Better price

### Tier Differentiation

- **Feature gating** — Basic vs. advanced features

- **Usage limits** — Same features, different limits

- **Support level** — Email → Priority → Dedicated

- **Access** — API, SSO, custom branding

**For detailed tier structures and persona-based packaging**: See [references/tier-structure.md](references/tier-structure.md)

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## Pricing Research

### Van Westendorp Method

Four questions that identify acceptable price range:

1. Too expensive (wouldn't consider)

2. Too cheap (question quality)

3. Expensive but might consider

4. A bargain

Analyze intersections to find optimal pricing zone.

### MaxDiff Analysis

Identifies which features customers value most:

- Show sets of features

- Ask: Most important? Least important?

- Results inform tier packaging

**For detailed research methods**: See [references/research-methods.md](references/research-methods.md)

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## When to Raise Prices

### Signs It's Time

**Market signals:**

- Competitors have raised prices

- Prospects don't flinch at price

- "It's so cheap!" feedback

**Business signals:**

- Very high conversion rates (>40%)

- Very low churn (<3% monthly)

- Strong unit economics

**Product signals:**

- Significant value added since last pricing

- Product more mature/stable

### Price Increase Strategies

1. **Grandfather existing** — New price for new customers only

2. **Delayed increase** — Announce 3-6 months out

3. **Tied to value** — Raise price but add features

4. **Plan restructure** — Change plans entirely

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## Pricing Page Best Practices

### Above the Fold

- Clear tier comparison table

- Recommended tier highlighted

- Monthly/annual toggle

- Primary CTA for each tier

### Common Elements

- FAQ section

- Annual discount callout (17-20%)

- Money-back guarantee

### Pricing Psychology

- **Anchoring:** Show higher-priced option first

- **Decoy effect:** Middle tier should be best value

- **Charm pricing:** $49 vs. $50 (for value-focused)

- **Round pricing:** $50 vs. $49 (for premium)

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## Pricing Page Teardown

When someone wants to audit an existing pricing *page* for **clarity, transparency, and AI-readability** (not the pricing strategy itself, and not conversion-rate optimization — that's `suede-site-alchemy`), run a **teardown** that scores it across two axes and returns prioritized fixes:

- **Human buyer experience** — value-prop clarity, plan differentiation, cognitive load, trust signals, pricing psychology, and price transparency.

- **AI-agent readiness** — whether the LLMs and agents that increasingly shortlist and compare tools can actually read and quote your pricing: machine-readable prices (not locked in an image or behind "Contact us"), extractable FAQ/objection coverage, per-tier depth stated in text, and structured data. Buyers now ask ChatGPT/Perplexity/Claude "what's the best X and what does it cost?" *before* visiting — a pricing page an agent can't parse loses deals you never see.

**Fast check — the "paste test":** give the pricing URL to a browsing-capable AI (Perplexity, ChatGPT with search, Claude with web) — or paste the rendered page text — and ask "what are the plans and prices?" A clean miss means agents fetching your page will struggle too (a heuristic, not proof every agent fails).

The AI-readiness fixes are usually high-impact, low-effort (put prices in text, add `Offer` schema). Hand implementation to **suede-seo-audit** (Product/Offer JSON-LD and supported-schema checks) and **suede-ai-seo** (extractability, AI-bot access, `llms.txt`).

**For the full 10-dimension rubric, scoring, and report template:** See [references/pricing-page-teardown.md](references/pricing-page-teardown.md). *(AI-agent-readiness lens adapted from Kyle Poyar / Growth Unhinged.)*

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## Boundaries

- Do not create or change billing products, prices, subscriptions, or customer

migrations without verified live state, a maximum-cost check, and explicit

approval.

- Do not present willingness-to-pay, conversion, churn, or revenue impact as

measured unless current research or product data supports it.

- Do not publish pricing copy, choose grandfathering policy, or commit the

business to a price; return a recommendation, assumptions, and validation

plan for the user to decide.

## Routing

- Use `suede-paywalls` for in-product upgrade and paywall experiences.

- Use `suede-offers` for bonuses, guarantees, and offer framing.

- Use `suede-ab-testing` to validate pricing-page or packaging hypotheses.

- Use `suede-revops` for approved deal-desk and pipeline implementation.