“If we charged based on just one thing, what should it be?”
From Kyle Poyar · Operating Partner at OpenView; product-led growth and SaaS pricing
Why it works
Poyar's pricing work centers on the value metric: the unit of consumption by which your customer gets value, and the basis for what they pay. The best pricing metric tracks that value metric — it strongly correlates with the value different customers see, shares in the customer's success rather than discouraging adoption, lets people start small and scale over time, and grows month over month for the average account. Forcing the answer down to one thing is the point: it strips away the metrics that are merely easy to bill (seats, because they're countable) and surfaces the one the customer's own success rides on. When the value metric and the pricing metric are the same unit, price rises as the customer wins — the rare arrangement where charging more and delivering more move together.
When to ask
When you're choosing or rethinking how you charge — packaging, the move to usage-based, a pricing reset. Ask customers who've gotten real value, because the right metric is the one their value grows along.
Good follow-ups
- Why that one — how does it track what you actually get out of this?
- If that number doubled next month, did your value double too?
- What would feel unfair to be charged for, even if it's easy to count?
Watch out for
Picking the metric that's easiest to meter instead of the one tied to value — seats are simple to count and a poor proxy for value in most usage-driven products, which is exactly how pricing decouples from worth. Beware metrics that punish adoption: if every action the customer takes to get value also runs up the bill, you've built a reason to use the product less. And a metric the customer can't see or predict breeds bill shock; the right one is legible to them, so they can feel the trade as fair while they grow.
Where to ask
- User interviewgreat
Native habitat — live, you can ask 'why that?' and watch whether the unit they name actually tracks the value they get, or just the thing that's easy to count.
- Sales callworkable
Useful on a deal or expansion call to hear how the buyer frames their own usage; mind that they may name the metric that bills them least, not the one tied to value.
- In-product surveyworkable
Works async if you constrain it — offer the candidate metrics you're weighing plus an open 'something else,' so the answer is comparable across respondents.
Reworded for this context: “Which of these best matches the value you get: seats, usage, results — or something else?”
- Long-form surveypoor
Open-ended and abstract, it draws blank or scattered answers; without a moderator you can't tell a value metric from a billing convenience.
Stage: Engagement · A question popularized by Kyle Poyar
Source: https://openviewpartners.com/blog/usage-based-pricing-2-0/