COMPASS Framework: Rethinking Pricing Metrics in the Age of AI with Steven Forth and Michael Mansard
Release Date: 07/28/2025
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This is an Impact Pricing Blog published on June 9, 2025, turned into an audio podcast so you can listen on the go. Read Full Article Here: If you have any feedback, definitely send it. You can reach us at [email protected]. Now, go make an impact. Connect with Mark Stiving: Email: LinkedIn:
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COMPASS Framework: Rethinking Pricing Metrics in the Age of AI with Steven Forth and Michael Mansard
Impact Pricing
Steven Forth has been a frequent guest on Impact Pricing and is a co-creator of the COMPASS framework. Michael Mansard is the Principal Director of Subscription Strategy at Zora. He's an investor in and mentor to several startups, and he started his career in consulting at companies like Deloitte and SAP, so he knows a lot. In this episode, Steven and Michael dive deep into the COMPASS framework for evaluating pricing metrics in the age of AI and agentic systems, exploring how traditional SaaS economics are being turned upside down and why companies need to move away from user-based pricing...
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Steven Forth is the Co-founder and Chief Value Officer at Ibbaka, a leading value and pricing consulting firm. With deep expertise in AI applications for pricing and value modeling, Steven is at the forefront of developing intelligent agents that help businesses understand and communicate value more effectively. His work focuses on the intersection of artificial intelligence, pricing strategy, and value creation, making him a pioneer in applying AI to solve complex pricing challenges. In this episode, Steven shares his insights on how benchmarking is revolutionizing both AI development and...
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Alan Hollander, VP of Offer Packaging and Pricing Strategy at Blackbaud, has led pricing initiatives for six years. With nearly three decades in pricing, his impressive career began in 1994 when Tom Nagle hired him after Alan excelled in Nagle's "Strategy and Tactics of Pricing" course. He also held key roles at Ellucian and Simon-Kucher & Partners, bringing deep expertise in large-scale pricing transformations. In this episode, Alan addresses a major challenge for SaaS companies: how AI disrupts traditional per-user pricing. Drawing on his experience at Blackbaud (serving nonprofits with...
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Gary Bailey is the founder at The Talent Capitalist, where he teaches monetization as a discipline, and serves as a finance and monetization consultant at FinTech Strategic Advisors. With a background that spans from banking and derivatives pricing in the 1990s to coaching the rise of AI monetization product managers today, Gary brings a unique perspective to value capture and pricing strategy. In this episode, Gary shares his insights on the distinction between pricing and monetization, drawing from his experience pricing hundreds of thousands of different financial instruments to...
info_outlineSteven Forth has been a frequent guest on Impact Pricing and is a co-creator of the COMPASS framework. Michael Mansard is the Principal Director of Subscription Strategy at Zora. He's an investor in and mentor to several startups, and he started his career in consulting at companies like Deloitte and SAP, so he knows a lot.
In this episode, Steven and Michael dive deep into the COMPASS framework for evaluating pricing metrics in the age of AI and agentic systems, exploring how traditional SaaS economics are being turned upside down and why companies need to move away from user-based pricing models.
Why you have to check out today's podcast:
- Learn why AI pricing fundamentally breaks the traditional SaaS model of "expensive to build, cheap to run".
- Understand the COMPASS framework's 14-question assessment for selecting optimal pricing metrics.
- Explore the accelerating cycles of pricing complexity and simplification across technology waves.
"I think that most people are clueless and do not want to admit that they're clueless. And I think admission is key because admission leads you to a scientific approach to pricing and enables you to accept, to try smaller samples, especially in the age of AI."
– Michael Mansard
Topics Covered:
02:08 – How Michael got into pricing
03:12 – Defining business models vs. pricing models vs. pricing metrics
06:22 – Introduction to the COMPASS framework and why it exists
07:25 – How AI flips traditional SaaS economics on its head
08:03 – The gym membership paradox in AI pricing
11:05 – Steven's perspective on whether pricing fundamentals have changed
24:20 – Pricing evolution cycles and their accelerating speed
27:39 – How COMPASS captures competitive differentiation
34:28 – Michael's pricing advice on embracing iteration and admitting uncertainty
Key Takeaways:
"I've seen more change in my part of the technology world in the last six months than I've seen in my entire lifetime." – Steven Forth
“If you price it per user, the more a user uses it, the worse margin it would yield. And that's a problem, right? So I call that the gym membership paradox." – Michael Mansard
"We need to change the metric. Now the billion dollar question is what metric? And the raison d'être of that framework is exactly that. It's to help people navigate, hence the notion of COMPASS." – Michael Mansard
People / Resources Mentioned:
- COMPASS Framework: 14-question assessment for pricing metrics: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/compass-agentic-ai-pricing-metric-framework-your-2-part-mansard-f9qqe
- Roger Martin Strategic Choice Cascade: Framework for aligning pricing with business strategy: https://rogermartin.medium.com/decoding-the-strategy-choice-cascade-475d40555eb1
- John Maeda's "The Laws of Simplicity": Design principles applicable to pricing models: https://lawsofsimplicity.com/
- Karan Sood: https://www.linkedin.com/in/soodkaran/
- PriceFX: Company introducing 125 agents: https://www.pricefx.com/ and https://lp.pricefx.com/agents_trial.html
Connect with Steven Forth:
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevenforth/
- Email: [email protected]
Connect with Michael Mansard:
Connect with Mark Stiving:
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/
- Email: mailto:[email protected]