Pricing research: methods, example questions and how to choose

Pricing research is the work of finding out what to charge, what to charge for, and who has to agree to pay it. The main methods are buyer interviews, interviews with people who see many purchases in your market, price surveys (Van Westendorp, Gabor-Granger), choice experiments (monadic tests and conjoint analysis) and live price tests. Each answers a different question, so start by writing down which pricing decision you are trying to make.

A worked example

Suppose you are building maintenance-scheduling software for facilities teams that run several buildings. You have three open questions: should you charge per building or per technician, should there be one plan or two, and is the price closer to $50 or $200 a month per building? This example is hypothetical; we will use it throughout.

Name the pricing decision first

Most pricing questions fall into one of five groups. They need different evidence, and a price survey only helps with some of them.

Who pays and who approves? The facilities manager uses the tool, but a regional director or procurement may sign.
What unit do you charge on? Per building, per technician, per work order, or a flat fee. The unit should grow with the value the customer gets.
What goes in each package? Which features or service levels separate a basic plan from a larger one.
What price level? The number itself, relative to what buyers use today.
How will discounts work? Annual prepay, multi-site deals, pilots.

In the example, questions 1 and 2 come first. A survey about the monthly price is hard to read if half the respondents picture paying per building and half per technician.

Match each method to the question it answers

Method	Best for	Watch out for
Buyer interviews	Who approves, current spend, how they would compare options, which unit feels fair	Small samples; people are polite about price
Expert interviews	How the category is usually bought, typical budget lines, how competitors package	Experts describe patterns, not your buyers' decisions; respect confidentiality
Van Westendorp	A plausible price range for a new product without established prices	Measures perception, not purchase; no competitors in view
Gabor-Granger	How purchase intent drops as price rises for one offer	Respondents can tell it is a pricing game
Monadic test	Response to one price shown to each group, ideally next to competitors	Needs larger samples
Conjoint analysis	Trade-offs between features and price across many package designs	More time and cost to run well
Live price test	What buyers actually do at a given price	Only tests the offers you put in market

The survey method descriptions follow Sawtooth Software's overview of pricing research methods. A practical order for most B2B products is interviews first, then a survey if you need to size a pattern, then a live test.

Example questions for buyer interviews

Ask about what already happened before you mention your price. GOV.UK's interview guidance recommends stories and real examples over how things "should" work.

"Tell me about the last time you paid for something to fix scheduling. What did you buy, and what did it replace?"
"Who else was involved in that decision? What did they need to see?"
"How was it priced: per building, per user, a flat fee? Did that pricing cause any friction later?"
"What do you spend on this today, including staff time, if you are comfortable sharing a range?"
"If a tool like this cost more for a site with more technicians, would that seem fair or annoying? Why?"

Only after that, show a concrete offer with a price and ask what would happen next inside their company. How to research willingness to pay covers that step.

Example questions for expert interviews

Some pricing questions are about how a market works, not one buyer's experience. A procurement lead who has approved facilities software, a former salesperson in the category or a consultant who implements these tools may answer them faster.

"When facilities teams buy software, which budget line does it usually come from?"
"Above what annual amount does a purchase usually go to procurement or a formal review?"
"How do vendors in this category usually charge, and what do buyers push back on in negotiation?"
"What discounts are normal for multi-site or annual deals?"

Ask for patterns, not a former employer's confidential prices. What to do when an expert can't share confidential information covers how to phrase this.

Example survey questions

If interviews suggest the per-building unit makes sense and you want a price range, a survey can help. Standard wordings:

Van Westendorp: "At what price per building per month would this be so expensive that you would not consider it?" plus the too-cheap, bargain and getting-expensive questions. See the Van Westendorp guide for the full set and the analysis.
Gabor-Granger: "Would you buy this at $120 per building per month?" Move to a higher price after a yes and a lower one after a no, as Sawtooth describes.
Monadic: show each respondent one version of the offer at one price, next to the current alternative and a "none of these" option, and ask which they would choose.

Every one of these produces stated answers. Willingness to pay explains why stated prices tend to run high and how to reduce the bias.

Put the findings into a pricing decision

At the end of a round, write one line per decision: the answer, the evidence and what is still unknown. For the example that might read: "Charge per building: 7 of 8 buyers already think in buildings; unknown whether large campuses need a different unit." Then turn the open items into the next round or a live test. How to price a product walks through combining costs, alternatives and research into a number, and pricing strategy covers the larger choices.

To find facilities managers or procurement people in facilities management for interviews, search on Instant Expert. It finds people whose work matches your question, you review them, it sends your invitations, and you pay for each call that gets booked.