Engagement: Product Profitability – Software

Client

A leading technical software vendor.

Challenge

Consider product profitability in resource decisions for development and marketing of products. Define the proper roles of product profitability and long-term investment in resource decisions. Estimate profitability of products.

Solution

Compute product profitability based on revenue, development costs, support calls, and dedicated marketing and selling costs. Combine product profitability metrics with management judgment in investment decisions in ways that reflect strategies of business units.

Client Impact

Product profitability became a key metric for headcount decisions, but only when appropriate. Helped build consensus around potentially contentious resource decisions.

Related Product

A ModelSheet application on our website implements the basic product profitability model. It includes revenues and costs of product development, product support calls, and marketing that is directly attributable to products.

prodprofit