Pricing and Retail Strategy of Intuit
An organization’s pricing strategy will vary depending on multiple factors. An organization needs to understand their competition and market share, the distribution chain, and ultimate goal of customer retention. This paper will review the pricing strategies of Intuit.
Intuit
Intuit is a multinational corporation that provides products and services for both business and personal financial solutions. The Intuit name is well known throughout the Americas and continues to grow throughout the world, primarily due to their brand name products; such as TurboTax and QuickBooks, that are provided through multiple sources; direct from the manufacturer, resold by independent distributors or accountant, and in retail stores. The longstanding quality brand names combined with competitive cost has allowed Intuit to gain a 90% market share in the self-prepared tax and small to medium sized business finance solutions market (Lange, 2013). With such a large network of varied methods a consumer can purchase one of Intuit’s products or services pricing strategies may vary from one product to another, or from one seller to another.
TurboTax
TurboTax is the leading do-it-yourself tax preparation software or online service in America with a considerable depth of products. TurboTax software is sold directly from Intuit and from most large retailers like Best Buy, Walmart, Amazon, and many others. Intuit uses a value-based pricing strategy combined with multidimensional pricing.
Value-based pricing. The value-based pricing is reflected in the TurboTax advertising that implies that a potential buyer shouldn’t pay more to a tax preparer when the tax filer knows all the information they will need and merely needs to...
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Lange, A. (2013). A wide moat leaves Intuit well positioned to compete with contenders. Retrieved from http://analysisreport.morningstar.com/stock/research?t=
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Business Journal. Retrieved from http://www.lanepowell.com/wp- content/uploads/2009/04/petranovichm_007.pdf Sotgiu, F., & Ancarani, F. (2004). Exploiting the opportunities of internet and multi-channel pricing: An exploratory research. The Journal of Product and Brand Management, 13(2),
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A couple of Squares has a limited capacity for which to produce their products and smaller companies tend to have larger fixed costs than bigger companies. Therefore, A Couple of Squares must maximize profits in order to ensure that they will stay in business. A profit-oriented pricing objective is also useful because of A Couple of Squares’ increased sales goals. A Couple of Squares increased their sales goals due to recent financial troubles. Maximizing profits is the easiest way to meet these sales goals due to the fact that A Couple of Squares has limited production capacity. The last key consideration favors a profit-oriented pricing objective because A Couple of Squares offers a specialty product. A specialty product often has limited competition, therefore can be priced on customer value. Pricing at customer value will maximize profits as well as customer satisfaction. A Couple of Squares’ lack of production capacity, increased sales goals, and specialty product favor a profit-oriented pricing
Pricing Strategy: We are going to take into consideration inflation, benchmarking and customer trade off. The pricing strategy for the new products/line extensions will be a penetration-pricing strategy to gain customers from other competitors and increase market share. Further, the volume discounts are going to be in the range of 25-40%. Taking into consideration Product lifecycle, those will be raised in the time where new products/line extension are launched.
As we learned from Chapter 12, price must be carefully determined and match with firm’s product, distribution, and communication strategies. (Hutt & Speh, 2012, p. 300) Therefore, there should be a strong market perspective in pricing. In order to build an effective pricing policy, marketers should focus on the value a customer places on a product or service. One of the most effective ways to do so is differentiating through value creation.
Atlantic Computer is a large manufacturer of servers and other high-tech products. They are known for providing premium high end servers. Atlantic Computer’s is in the process of introducing Tronn, a new basic server, which includes Performance Enhancing Server Accelerator (PESA) software. This software will allow Tronn to perform up to four times faster than its standard speed. Therefore these two new products were specifically designed to sell as a bundle or “Atlantic Bundle.” Jason Jowers, fresh off of his MBA degree is responsible for developing the pricing strategy for the “Atlantic Bundle. After much research Jowers narrowed down to four different routes on how the bundle can be priced: status quo, competitive, cost-plus, or value-in.
Setting prices too high would discourage purchasing and setting prices too low negatively affects revenue. While several pricing strategies exist, the use of a value-based pricing system, as implemented at Cabela’s, offers an optimal strategy that meet both customer expectations and company requirements.
Noda, Tomo. “Sharp Corporation: Technology Strategy.” Harvard Business School Boston: Harvard Business School Publishing, 1993. Print.
The company is grounded on the assumption of “rational self-interest.” In other words, since individuals make rational decisions to achieve the greatest satisfaction or the maximum fulfillment of their goals, Priceline.com has now revolutionized the market industry. By their ‘name and lock your price” strategy, more and more consumers have been able to maximize their satisfaction on differentiated products. The consumers want to spend their incomes to get the greatest benefit from the goods and services they can afford. Priceline.com helps them to achieve their goals. Since the inception of this internet-based company, millions of consumers were able to afford more with less expenditure on their goods. In addition, rational behavior varies among every individual because individual preferences, circumstances, and available information differ. Priceline.com offers various or “differentiated goods and services” in a broad range of products to purchase from.
QuickBooks is an accounting software package which is developed by Intuit, Inc. It was launched in the 90's and since than it is one of the market leaders in accounting software. The software was designed to help the small business owners who had no formal accounting training. Very shortly after the introduction, there was no doubt that the product is going to be a hit. With a deep focus for the non-accountant, and a lower price than the competitor's products, it outsmarted its competitions. Intuit states that the company's mission is to create new ways to manage personal finances and small businesses that are so profound and simple, customers cannot i...
- The pricing strategy is a way to recoup initial investments, competition with other companies, and the factor that volume will bring down production costs. A company may also look at the benefits to earn profits on their goods when looking at their pricing. A good example of this is my teacher Dr. Fishbeck and his IT consulting business. He offers very low rates due to his competition having better benefits with their size and customer
You would not buy a home, car or other large purchases without researching what product offered you the most for your money. The same is true when investing in a company. Investors do avid research on multiple companies to find what company matches the investors' criteria. In this paper Team C will research both AT&T and Verizon's financial documents. Team C will compare selected ratios, cash flow and make recommendations how both companies can manage cash flow for the future.
Pricing is an important aspect of every business. Chief Financial Officer’s (CFO) use pricing to create financial projections, establish a break-even point, and calculate profit and loss margins (Power Point, 2005). It is the only element in the marketing mix that produces revenue. Price is also one of the most flexible elements of the marketing mix as it can be changed very quickly. This is usually done to beat competitor prices in an attempt to fix the product’s market value position very low (Anderson & Bailey, 1998). After all, high prices make it difficult to become the market share leader. The leading US retailer, Wal-Mart, is an expert at low product pricing as evident in 2004 with $250 billion dollars in sales to their 138 million weekly shoppers. However, they are also responsible for reducing prices so low that it drives specialty stores out of business. This is the effect Wal-mart has had on many toy stores and has almost closed the doors of the famous toy store Toys “R” Us Inc.
The underlying drivers of Porter’s Five forces are the root causes of profitability within the tax software industry, however; particular drivers in each force make the industry unique. Two barriers to entry, economies of scale and government policies, generate the majority of profitability in the industry. Firms with the largest market share have little unit cost after software development and implementation. These large economies of scale decrease unit costs for a firm, and increase start-up costs for entrants. Firms that have electronic servers of scale limit the ability for entrants to compete, as the costs to create and maintain nationwide servers are exorbitant. In addition, the changing governmental policies and initiatives for e-filing also increases barrier to entry. In recent years the IRS has eased the ability for residents to e-file, causing an annual increase of 6% in e-files over the last few years.[11] Additionally, companies that can access IRS servers, create software that incorporates the complexities of the IRS code, and produce software that updates annually, sustain a competitive advantage over new entrants. Concurrently, suppliers of computing and programming threaten forward integration due to the small size of software development projects compared to a firms overall business. Suppliers create the necessary technology to process tax returns making forward integration relatively cheap. Forward integration also provides additional revenue streams, such as when Intuit purchased TurboTax and Lacrete to increase Intuits product differentiation. [12] Conversely, buyer power is minimal. Buyers that integrate backwards and consume tax software companies do not profit directly because tax filing is a periodi...
At first sight the equation appears to reverse the familiar cost plus price equal profit that many firms use. However, behind the inversion of the equation are two very powerful ideas; (1) market price and profit margins are exogenous variables beyond the control of an organization’s management; and (2) customer and financial markets drive cost planning and not the other way around. Target costing, therefore, is a market driven system in which the needs of the customer and the likely reaction of competitors drive product and profit planning.
Intuit, Inc. is a provider of small business, tax preparation and personal finance software products and Web-based services that simplify complex financial tasks for consumers, small businesses and accounting professionals. The Company's principal products and services include Quicken, QuickBooks, Quicken TurboTax, ProSeries, Lacerte and Quicken Loans. Intuit offers products and services in five principal business divisions which include Small Business, Tax, Personal Finance, Quicken Loans and Global Business (Market Guide).
In an unpredictable market customer perception is often the most viable source of information. It is difficult to directly benchmark the CAR prototype against other market offerings and therefore a value based approach could provide a better understanding of the price ceiling. Andy and Marc point out that value-informed pricing techniques are superior for products with a high relative advantage. With the current climate debate heating up, the CAR’s zero harmful emissions and low fuel costs boost its competitive advantage over petrol based cars. Yet risk per se cannot simply be av...