As a consultant, coach, and 6-time executive, Amanda Northcutt has launched, grown, and scaled online businesses with fantastic results on both the individual and organizational level, while creating extraordinary, frictionless, and successful journeys for their customers.  In this episode, Amanda delves on the importance of focusing on customer retention and expansion to maximize recurring revenue. And  leveraging foundational desires and social proof to enhance one's marketing efforts. She also highlights the value of dynamic and continuous pricing strategies and the need for personalized connections in sales and the impact of showing proven value to customers.   Why you have to check out today’s podcast: Learn to prioritize expansion, not just acquiring and retaining customers, to maximize lifetime value Discover why it's crucial to avoid static pricing and the importance of regularly testing and adjusting your pricing Gain a deep understanding of your customers' core desires and master the art of leveraging social proof to create highly effective marketing strategies   "Always be testing your pricing. Your pricing should not be static. That is such a rookie mistake to think that you've nailed it the first time, or at any time really." - Amanda Northcutt   Topics Covered: 01:39 - An accidental entry into recurring revenue 03:20 - Talking about the time of Salesforce' rise in the SaaS industry 04:46 - Sharing her journey into the subscription-based business model 05:57 - The challenges and importance of marketing and delivering value in subscription-based businesses 08:25 - An added challenge for SaaS businesses of needing a product that continuously delivers value to retain customers 10:46 - The need to create expansion opportunities with tailored solutions and the need to leverage social proof to strengthen the value proposition to potential and existing customers 13:31 - Understanding and leveraging consumer psychology and desires to drive value perception and retention in both B2B and B2C contexts. 15:46 - Expanding on customer's foundational desires as effective marketing strategies 17:21 - Helping customers achieve their goals and meet their needs rather than simply trying to make a sale. 20:06 - Describing her current work and her pricing approach for her clients' customers.  25:52 - Amanda's best pricing advice 26:57 - What it means to be always testing your pricing   Key Takeaways: "...the whole deal with recurring revenue: If your marketing sucks, one, people aren't going to sign up. Two, if you're not delivering value over and over and over and over and over again, people are going to churn." - Amanda Northcutt "If you truly actually care about someone and you want to help match them with a solution that is actually going to help them not only reach their foundational desires, but the real business needs that they have, that's where the most sales are going to be made." - Amanda Northcutt "Desperation is the enemy of all sales, ever." - Amanda Northcutt "Another element of closing the deal in an automated sales funnel is that guarantee is very, very, very important. It's right up there with social proof." - Amanda Northcutt   People/Resources Mentioned: Texas A&M University: https://www.tamu.edu/ TexAgs.com: https://texags.com Marc Benioff: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Benioff Salesforce: https://www.salesforce.com/ap/ Alan Weiss: https://alanweiss.com/about-alan-weiss/ Convertkit: https://convertkit.com Active Campaign: https://www.activecampaign.com/ Amazon Prime Video: https://www.primevideo.com/   Connect with Amanda Northcutt: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/northcuttamanda/ Email: amanda@welevelupcreators.com   Connect with Mark Stiving: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stiving/ Email: mark@impactpricing.com