Pricing strategies that protect your margins

When pricing decisions live in your reps' heads or deal-by-deal spreadsheets, profit margins erode in ways that are hard to unpack. Phocas gives your commercial and finance teams a live view of pricing, discounting and margin performance, so every decision is visible and defensible.

Why pricing strategy matters

Margin rarely disappears all at once, it erodes deal by deal

For businesses selling across trade accounts, branches and field reps; whether that's electrical supplies, automotive parts, building products or plumbing and HVAC, pricing pressure is constant and rarely simple. Product ranges run to thousands of SKUs, pricing agreements differ by customer, and competitive pricing can shift before the ink is dry on last quarter's budget. The gap between a deliberate distributor pricing strategy and a reactive one quietly compounds into margin you can't recover.

The problem isn't usually intent — it's visibility.

61%

of distributors are prioritizing stronger pricing strategies

19%

don't have clear visibility into how discounting impacts their overall performance

27%

of distributors discount 2–5% of stock; controlled but with margin impact that adds up

Source: Inventory Trends in Wholesale Distribution Report 2026

Connect pricing, planning and performance

When your pricing data lives in your ERP system, your discount decisions live with your reps, and your margin performance only surfaces at month-end, there's no practical way to connect them in time to act.

Phocas brings that data together in one place — so your commercial team can see margin by product, customer and rep in real time. This allows your sales team to understand the full cost of a discount before they offer it, and your finance team can see how pricing decisions are flowing through to gross margins as they happen.

Customer quote

"From a finance function, we're checking our margins every day. We have a report that is automatically emailed from Phocas daily to check for any low margins. We look for both negative or high margins to identify mistakes. Also, if there is a larger customer who buys a product that they wouldn't usually, without being given special pricing, we can address that."

— Craig Roberts, CFO at TotalEnergies NZ.

Six ways to build a smarter pricing strategy

A sound pricing strategy isn't about guessing, it's about having the right data to hand when decisions need to be made. Here's how Phocas put pricing analytics into practice.

Know your most and least profitable customers

Not all revenue is equal. With Phocas you can analyze gross profit margin by customer, product and region — so your sales team focuses effort where the return is real, not just where the invoice or sales volume is largest.

Understand the true cost of discounting

Every discount offer has a margin cost that compounds across hundreds of deals. Phocas Analytics shows reps the live profit margins on products or customers before they go into a negotiation. So they can see exactly what a discount offer costs before they offer it.

Set benchmarks, automate alerts

Once you know your margin floors, Phocas lets you set automated alerts as part of your price optimization process; firing the moment a product category or customer falls below them. Your team responds to margin erosion as it happens, not weeks later when it shows up in the P&L.

Re-engage lapsed customers

Customers don't always leave loudly; they just quietly stop ordering. In a few clicks, Phocas lets your sales team see exactly which customers have gone quiet, how long since their last order, what they used to buy and the margin those transactions delivered. So every re-engagement starts with insight, not a cold catch-up.

One price doesn't fit all

Different customer segments and channels respond differently to price — a building products wholesaler serving trade accounts operates on entirely different pricing to one serving eCommerce or retail channels. Phocas surfaces those patterns by seasonality, geography, rep or buying group, so data-driven pricing decisions reflect real demand.

Turn slow stock into pricing opportunities

Slow movers tie up cash but aren't always easy to spot. Using Flex Modes in Phocas Analytics, distributors can calculate a Turn and Earn Index to identify SKUs where the return doesn't justify the stock investment — and prioritize which products need a price point review, a revised markup or a stocking decision.

Customer quote

"We are actively using Phocas to help us analyze product lines and margins to identify opportunities at the lowest level of detail. When analyzed together, we saw new opportunities that produced immediate margin gains.”

— Chris Wallace, Systems Analyst at USESI.

Know which customer segments to prioritise

• Segment customers by value: identify loyal and high-value accounts so effort goes where your pricing model delivers the strongest return
• See what's driving performance: drill into transaction frequency and average sales value to spot accounts that may be more price-sensitive
• Filter by rep, territory or branch: pinpoint where competitive pricing is working, and where it needs addressed
• Act before revenue is lost: surface churn-risk accounts early enough to have a meaningful pricing conversation before they go elsewhere

From lapsed customers to live pipeline

Grahame Pond manages sales for Era Polymers in one of the most competitive pricing environments there is; industrial B2B, contract-based, where the ability to drill into data quickly and build a credible alternate offer is the difference between winning and losing. Here's how Phocas delivers the instant answers his team needs to compete.

Maximize rebate margins

Supplier rebates are a direct lever on your profit margins — but only if you can see them clearly. Phocas Rebates gives you near-miss analysis, target tracking and a before/after view of how rebates affect your true margin across products, customers and branches.

• Visibility: instantly see which products and vendors drive the most rebates
• Hit targets: use near-miss analysis to see exactly how close rebate targets are, adjust purchasing decisions before periods close
• Analyze: compare profit margins by customer, branch, product, supplier – before and after rebates
• Capitalize: track target accruals and explore 'what if' scenarios to uncover new earning opportunities
• Margin control: see true product costs after rebates to improve pricing and purchasing decisions

Customer quote

"One of our reps was using Phocas in real time in front of a customer. They saw immediately that he was just below another rebate break band, so he straight away upped his order by £2,000 to take him into that next rebate level. We wouldn’t have had that instant win without easy access to rebate data in Phocas!"

— Paul Whittaker, IT Manager at Ring Automotive.

Model the impact of pricing changes

A pricing decision made today shows up in your margin report next month – and when market conditions shift mid-year, a static budget has no way to respond. With Phocas Budgets & Forecasts, you can model the impact of pricing changes on revenue and profit margins in your forward financial plan, making your pricing process something your commercial team controls proactively.

• Run pricing scenarios: enter price and cost assumptions per product into the Phocas Lookup tab and the budget model automatically recalculates the impact across every affected row
• Adjust assumptions as conditions change: pricing assumptions sit in a separate tab, not embedded in formulas, making it simple to update a price or margin input mid-year and see the flow-on effect immediately
• Align sales and finance: give your teams the same forward view of margin impact before pricing decisions are agreed

Protect your margins with smarter pricing strategies

Pricing is a competitive advantage – if you can see it clearly