Pricing Strategies: #1 Nuances in Pricing

Pricing Strategies: #1 Nuances in Pricing

When Clara first opened her digital printing shop, pricing was simple. She sold handmade greeting cards, planners, business cards, and other physical items at fixed label prices, individually and in bulk. One SKU, one price, one bill, and that's all it took.


But as business grew, people started using digital signage and boards, and customers wanted more than just a one-time product from Clara. They needed event invites designed, corporate gift packages, annual print subscriptions, and even on-demand branding services for special occasions.

Suddenly, pricing wasn't simple anymore.

A business card might cost $2, but designing a wedding card set is a one-time creative service. Corporate print delivery repeats monthly, with many customisations. Branding projects take multiple stages before they're finalised. For Bulk orders, it requires a tiered or usage-based pricing slab. Clara had transformed into a mixed-model business that offers products, services, and subscriptions based on vendors and projects.

Clara realised that the pricing is no longer just numbers but a strategy to be well-crafted and executed.

Challenge with Evolving Business Models 

Most businesses eventually reach a point like Clara.

  • They sell physical/commercial goods at fixed pricing.

  • They offer one-time services with one-time service pricing.

  • They move to subscription revenue, where it is recurring or usage-based pricing.

  • They handle custom work under milestone or project-based pricing.

Every model has its own billing rhythm, revenue pattern, taxation logic, discount rules, and contract structure. And managing each manually in a spreadsheet or with individual tools for each invoicing model will be nothing but chaotic.


You need to be flexible with structure. You need a system that lets your pricing evolve without friction.

Zoho Billing is built for businesses that change, grow, experiment, and scale without burning time restructuring pricing.


Product/Physical Goods Pricing

For businesses that sell tangible items, pricing needs to be predefined and easily accessible at the point of sale. In Zoho Billing, you can configure each product as an item with its rate, unit, and tax preference, making invoicing a two-click process. Whether someone buys one note or 200, you don't need to remember pricing manually it;s already available and accurate. The convenience lies in setting it up once and using it multiple times across different invoices.


Idea
Tips: Turn pricing into a system that instantly recalls. The faster the invoice is generated, the faster the payment flows. Predefined product pricing reduces negotiation time, improves customer confidence, and supports sales growth without operational hiccups.


One-Time Service Pricing

When your service is delivered once, for instance, design work, installation, gardening, etc, you need a smooth way to charge for it without building a new billing structure every time. With Zoho Billing, one-time services can be created as items with fixed or variable billing units, making invoicing as simple as adding the service line. Instead of calculating cost per job repeatedly, pricing becomes standardised, repeatable and instant. You deliver value once, and billing follows instantly with clarity.


Idea
Tips: Productise service. When pricing is packaged, it becomes easier to pitch, scale and repeat. Billing isn't an afterthought; it becomes a part of your service proposition itself.

Subscription Ongoing Services Pricing

As a business scales, recurring revenue often becomes a significant source of income—through monthly retainers, annual supply contracts, maintenance services, SaaS offerings, etc. Zoho Billing allows you to convert services into subscription plans with predefined billing cycles, renewal trial options, and add-ons. Once configured, the system automates invoicing at scheduled intervals. All you need to do is define pricing once, and Zoho Billing bills on your behalf.


Idea
Tips: Build predictability. A subscription model isn't just about charging periodically. It's about removing effort from revenue collection. Once pricing is defined, the system manages recurring invoices while your focus shifts to delivery, retention, and scaling.

Project Pricing

Projects are dynamic, and the pricing varies based on time, milestones, and additional expenses. Zoho Billing helps manage these complexities by letting you bill based on hours worked, tasks completed, or pre-agreed stages. You can even link costs and convert them directly into a claimable invoice item. Instead of manually tracking across documents, everything feeds into one billing workflow. Project process, expense add-up, and invoice are reflected transparently, with pricing already defined and ready to deploy.


Idea
Tips: Balance freedom with financial clarity. When pricing models adapt to project scope without backtracking into manual recalculation, you win two battles at once: delivery agility and revenue accuracy. Every hour, every task, and every expense converts into billable value without delay or data loss.

What Pricing Flexibility Offers to Businesses 

Business growth introduces multiple revenue models, but with Zoho Billing, each can be priced, pre-configured, and billed effortlessly. Whether you're selling goods, delivering services, managing subscription contracts, or long-term projects, pricing remains consistent, organised, and, on top of it all, completely scalable.


As a business, pricing is not just what you charge; it's how effectively and smoothly you present it to the customer. 

Notes
Up Next: Plan your service offering with Plans. 

    Access your files securely from anywhere

        All-in-one knowledge management and training platform for your employees and customers.







                              Zoho Developer Community




                                                    • Desk Community Learning Series


                                                    • Digest


                                                    • Functions


                                                    • Meetups


                                                    • Kbase


                                                    • Resources


                                                    • Glossary


                                                    • Desk Marketplace


                                                    • MVP Corner


                                                    • Word of the Day


                                                    • Ask the Experts



                                                              • Sticky Posts

                                                              • Community Learning Series | Digest #5 — September 2020

                                                                Dear customers, We're happy to bring you the September edition of our #CommunityDigest! Keep track of your subscription KPIs right from your smartphone: Last month, we enhanced our Android mobile app to help our customers get daily updates on their business health. We got to know from a lot of customers that this has made their job much more easier because they no longer have to keep a reminder to manually check on the previous day's revenue or activations. If you have not downloaded it yet, here's
                                                              • Community Learning Series | Digest #4 - August 2020

                                                                Dear customers, We hope you're staying safe and healthy. I'm happy to bring you the fourth edition of our #CommunityDigest with some brand-new updates from us. 1. Daily Business Updates (for Android users) The Zoho Subscriptions Android app has got a cool new update: You can now get a push notification to your smartphone that lets you know how many activations and cancellations have taken place, and what's the net revenue for the previous day. The best part is, you can tell the app when exactly you
                                                              • Community Learning Series | Digest #3 - July 2020

                                                                Dear customers, We hope you're staying safe and healthy. We're glad to bring you the July edition of our #CommunityDigest. New community members can view our previous newsletters here. This time, we have two major updates and three interesting topics for you: 1. Zoho Subscriptions Developer Community Since the inception of Zoho Subscriptions, our team believed that the recurring billing platform we provide should be able to offer an extensive API library that empowers businesses to automate most
                                                              • Introducing: Community Learning Series | Digest #1 - May 2020

                                                                Dear customers, We hope you are staying safe and healthy. Helping businesses manage their customer subscriptions more efficiently has always been, and always will be, our goal at Zoho Subscriptions. We strongly believe this is possible if we grow together as a community and share what we know with each other. To nurture this shared learning experience, here is our brand-new Community Learning Series! ​ Welcome to the first edition of our digest! Each edition of our community digest includes guides


                                                              Manage your brands on social media



                                                                    Zoho TeamInbox Resources



                                                                        Zoho CRM Plus Resources

                                                                          Zoho Books Resources


                                                                            Zoho Subscriptions Resources

                                                                              Zoho Projects Resources


                                                                                Zoho Sprints Resources


                                                                                  Qntrl Resources


                                                                                    Zoho Creator Resources



                                                                                        Zoho CRM Resources

                                                                                        • CRM Community Learning Series

                                                                                          CRM Community Learning Series


                                                                                        • Kaizen

                                                                                          Kaizen

                                                                                        • Functions

                                                                                          Functions

                                                                                        • Meetups

                                                                                          Meetups

                                                                                        • Kbase

                                                                                          Kbase

                                                                                        • Resources

                                                                                          Resources

                                                                                        • Digest

                                                                                          Digest

                                                                                        • CRM Marketplace

                                                                                          CRM Marketplace

                                                                                        • MVP Corner

                                                                                          MVP Corner









                                                                                            Design. Discuss. Deliver.

                                                                                            Create visually engaging stories with Zoho Show.

                                                                                            Get Started Now


                                                                                              Zoho Show Resources

                                                                                                Zoho Writer

                                                                                                Get Started. Write Away!

                                                                                                Writer is a powerful online word processor, designed for collaborative work.

                                                                                                  Zoho CRM コンテンツ




                                                                                                    Nederlandse Hulpbronnen


                                                                                                        ご検討中の方




                                                                                                                • Recent Topics

                                                                                                                • DUNS & Bradstreet and Credit risk monitoring integration with Zoho books

                                                                                                                  Small businesses not being paid by bigger clients and clients of all sizes is a huge problem. It will be nice if Zoho develops integration with DUNS & Bradstreet(D&B) and Credit risk monitoring integration with Zoho books. That have small businesses can
                                                                                                                • Zoho Forms - Form Rules based on attachment fields

                                                                                                                  Many businesses use forms to collect documents and images from customers. In many cases, you may want to trigger a notification or other automation based on whether or not an attachment was added. I've noticed that attachment fields do not appear in Rules
                                                                                                                • Can't open draft email for editing

                                                                                                                  Last night I started composing an email and I let it save in drafts. This morning I want to continue working on the email. It is in my Drafts folder but it will not open. The only option there is to delete it. This is not the first time it has happened. On previous occasions I have just deleted the draft and started afresh, but I really want this one back. Windows 10 with Pale Moon 28.10.0 browser.
                                                                                                                • Open filtered deals from campaign

                                                                                                                  Do you think a feature like this would be feasible? Say you are seeing campaign "XYZ" in CRM. The campaign has a related list of deals. If you want to see the related deals in a deal view, you should navigate to the Deals module, open the campaign filter,
                                                                                                                • Change scheduling emails time

                                                                                                                  When sending an individual email there is a great feature to schedule them to send later. I could only use the one time that is suggested. Is there a way to select another time? Regards, Glenn
                                                                                                                • Zoho CRM: how can I control which contacts to sync with Outlook?

                                                                                                                  I was just playing around syncing contacts from Zoho to MS Outlook (MS365 account.) The problem is our firm has hundreds of thousands of contacts and I don't want to bury my contacts list in outlook. Any help with this is greatly appreciated.
                                                                                                                • How to overcome limitations in meetings

                                                                                                                  As a company, one of our deliverables is a meeting between two other companies, where we act as facilitators. So, if we recorded this meeting  in Zoho CRM, it should be connected to 2 accounts, 2 contacts, and 1 campaign (a campaign, in our use, is the
                                                                                                                • Add a 'Log a Call' link to three dot icon in Canvas

                                                                                                                  Hi, There's a three dot element when creating a canvas called 'More'. I would like to modify this to add a link that says 'Log a Call' in order to quickly record the details of a cellphone call. I'd also like this to be a simple 'contact' selection and
                                                                                                                • Syncing Zoho Forms with Bigin - Embedding issue?

                                                                                                                  Hello everyone, I created a Zoho Form for a page on my GoDaddy website to collect leads, which then transfers the data to Bigin. However, I'm facing an issue where it doesn't seem to work properly. I've integrated Zoho Forms with Bigin and tried embedding
                                                                                                                • Can not add fields to a Section

                                                                                                                  I feel like I'm missing something obvious: I can add new Sections to my form but I can not add fields to the Sections. I've tried fields already on the form as well as dragging and dropping new fields into the Section but nothing will go into it. What
                                                                                                                • Record Logged in User while using CRM lookup field

                                                                                                                  Is it possible, while using the Zoho CRM lookup field, to automatically use the user account logged into Zoho CRM in a hidden field? I was hoping to add employee accounts to my current plan. But would like a record on the Form submission of who submitted
                                                                                                                • Form Rules for Suburb Categories to alternate landing pages or Making a Fields Contents ALL CAPS

                                                                                                                  I need to send differentform submissions to two to three different thank-you URLs (for Meta/Google pixels) depending on which suburb a user selects in a form. I have ~400 suburbs split into two categories (A and B, based on business value). Current challenges:
                                                                                                                • Collaps Notes

                                                                                                                  There are times when long/large notes are added to a record i.e. Accounts or Deals etc. Currently, the full note is displayed in the notes related list section. It would be great if by default only 5 to 10 rows of the note are displayed when the note
                                                                                                                • Zoho Down

                                                                                                                  I have a drop in my Zoho One services.
                                                                                                                • Runing RPA Agents on Headless Windows 11 Machines

                                                                                                                  Has anyone tried this? Anything to be aware of regarding screen resolution?
                                                                                                                • Problem for EU users connecting Zoho CRM through Google Ads for Enhanced conversions

                                                                                                                  Has anyone else experienced this problem when trying to connect Zoho CRM through Google Ads interface to setup enhanced conversions? Did you guys get it fixed somehow? The Problem: The current Google Ads integration is hardcoded to use Zoho's US authentication
                                                                                                                • Why am I getting event Pop-up Notification for events that have been cancelled?

                                                                                                                  Why is Calendar Notification still popping up for events that have been cancelled or changed? Each time events are cancelled or changed, I have observed that I am still getting notifications for them. Below is a sample pop-up notification for one of the
                                                                                                                • Create a draft in reply to an email via Emails API

                                                                                                                  Hi, I’d like to use the outgoing webhook to automatically create a draft reply to incoming mail. How can I use the Emails API to create a draft reply that is linked to an existing email thread? I couldn’t find the relevant method in the documentation.
                                                                                                                • India Tech Support

                                                                                                                  Is there no phone tech support number for India? And no chat facility either?
                                                                                                                • Billing Management: #1 Billing a Universal Business Routine

                                                                                                                  Hello, As the saying goes, "Do the hardest job first." We started with the complex subject of finance and revenue management, which is considered the backbone of any business. Now, let's shift our focus and take a deep dive into this Billing Management,
                                                                                                                • What is a a valid JavaScript Domain URI when creating a client-based application using the Zoho API console?

                                                                                                                  No idea what this is. Can't see what it is explained anywhere.
                                                                                                                • 5名限定 課題解決型ワークショップイベント Zoho ワークアウト開催のお知らせ (9/25)

                                                                                                                  ユーザーの皆さま、こんにちは。Zoho ユーザーコミュニティチームの藤澤です。 9月開催のZoho ワークアウトについてお知らせします。 今回はZoomにて、オンライン開催します。 諸事情につき、今月の開催回は中止となりました。 次回は10/31(金)14時からの開催を予定しています。 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Zoho ワークアウトとは? Zoho ユーザー同士で交流しながら、サービスに関する疑問や不明点の解消を目的とした「Zoho ワークアウト」を開催します。 Zoho
                                                                                                                • Workdrive 5.0 / API Documentation Workflows

                                                                                                                  Hi Zoho, When will the API documentation of the workflows be published? We are interested in using it to trigger manual workflows from an external application. Greetings, Justin
                                                                                                                • How many ZOHO-Sites does the ZOHO-One Suite allow for?

                                                                                                                  The free version of ZOHO-Sites allows for two sites, but it seems that the professional version (which is included in the ZOHO-One Suite) only allows for two websites. Is that correct? How many sites can I have within one ZOHO-One account?
                                                                                                                • Webhook from Zobot to Zoho Flow fails

                                                                                                                  I'm trying to connect from zobot to zoho flow. When testing in zflow, I am receiving all entered data from the connector correctly. The SalesIQ connector's "outputreaction" is {} (is this normal or is there a problem?). But as soon as I try my chat bot
                                                                                                                • Transition from Sole Proprietorship to GmbH (Limited Liability Company) – Best Approach in Zoho Books / Zoho One

                                                                                                                  Hello everyone, I am currently operating under a Zoho One plan with a sole proprietorship in Switzerland. As of January 1st, 2026, I will be incorporating a new legal entity – a GmbH (Swiss equivalent of a Limited Liability Company). While the business
                                                                                                                • Issue Connecting My Domain to Zoho Sites Despite Purchasing It from Zoho

                                                                                                                  Hello, I am facing an issue connecting my domain to my website on Zoho Sites. Details of the issue: I purchased the domain directly from Zoho. I am already using the same domain successfully with Zoho Mail. However, when I try to assign this domain to
                                                                                                                • Insert auto number from main form into subform rows

                                                                                                                  Hello. I'm trying to take from my main form "order number" which i have setup as an auto generated number into every line created in my subform. So when a row is created in my subform i want the "order number " from the main form to be inserted automatically.
                                                                                                                • Dark Mode - Font Colors Don't Work

                                                                                                                  When editing a document in Dark Mode and selecting font colors, they don't show up on screen.  Viewing/editing the same document in Light Mode shows them just fine.
                                                                                                                • Integrate Bunq with ZOHO Bookes

                                                                                                                  We are new users of ZOHO Books, and our bank (BUNQ, in the Netherlands) isn't listed on the bank integrations. Is there a way to handle this?
                                                                                                                • Access Denied

                                                                                                                  I am iOS Developer and updating our clients project and shifted ZohoDeskPortalCore SDKs from cocoapods to SPM and changed few lines of code but now i am get access denied, the help center app is unavailable. please contact administrator.
                                                                                                                • Using Zoho Desk to support ISMS process

                                                                                                                  Hi, I am evaluating using Zoho Desk for security incident management. This seems to be aligned with Zoho Desk purpose as its just another type of incident. However in security incident management, ideally I can link incidents (tickets) with a risk from
                                                                                                                • TaxJar vs Avalara

                                                                                                                  Hi, I'm evaluating adoption of a sales-tax service for US based business. Anyone else have experience with TaxJar and Zoho Books? I am a Zoho One subscriber so anticipate needing to use Flow to make this work. It seems like Avalara are simply too expensive
                                                                                                                • How to check Leads with no Task (open activity)

                                                                                                                  Hi everyone, I was wondering if there’s a way to view leads that don’t have any tasks assigned or open activities linked to them.
                                                                                                                • What can we do on our end to improve the Answer bot answers?

                                                                                                                  Hi, I'm using the Answer bot card in the Codeless bot builder. I've input several questions and their answers in the FAQ section to feed the Answer bot. The text is all in French, as this is the language our customers communicate in. I've tried testing
                                                                                                                • How to upload file to Connect using API?

                                                                                                                  Hi there. I looked at the API documentation and nowhere did it mention how to use the API method to upload a file even though it is mentioned that it is possible to be done so. Please help.
                                                                                                                • Group Tax in Service Line Items

                                                                                                                  Hi FSM Team! I noticed that when you update a tax in the service line item the group tax is not showing up as an option. Let me know what can be done thank you!
                                                                                                                • OAUTH_SCOPE_MISMATCH Error for Marketing Automation APIs with CRM Plus Account

                                                                                                                  I'm trying to integrate Marketing Automation journey triggering via API but getting OAUTH_SCOPE_MISMATCH errors. I need clarification on API access for CRM Plus users.
                                                                                                                • Function #4: Schedule Customer Statements

                                                                                                                  Regularly sending statements to customers is an imperative part of many business processes as it helps foster strong customer relationships and provides timely guidance on payments. While you can generate the statement of accounts and have it sent over
                                                                                                                • Limiting search or dependencies with an asterisk "*".

                                                                                                                  I have a form with several dependency fields with options still developing for each field. Since these options were developing and not yet ready to be a selection in the field, I placed a filter for the dropdown field. In this filter, I selected fields
                                                                                                                • Next Page