In a recent YouTube video titled "5 Ways You Are Leaving Money On The Table" from the "AI, SaaS & Agentic Pricing with Monetizely" channel, SaaS pricing expert Ajit Pal Ghuman shares critical insights about how software companies frequently undervalue their offerings. Based on his experience working with $100M+ ARR companies (as mentioned in his book "Price to Scale"), Ghuman identifies five key areas where revenue is consistently being leaked.
The Silent Warning Sign of Minimal Discounting
One of the most counterintuitive signs of underpricing is when customers aren't pushing back on your prices. As Ghuman points out, "If discounting is zero… like nobody's asking for a discount, there might definitely be room to move up."
This insight challenges conventional thinking. Many SaaS executives celebrate when deals close without discount requests, but this could actually indicate a pricing strategy that's leaving significant revenue on the table.
Even more revealing is when minimal discounting occurs without escalation. As Ghuman explains, "Sometimes 10 to 15% discounts are just expected, right? And if the customer isn't pushing for more, you have to wonder why there are no escalations."
The most troubling indicator is what Ghuman calls "negative discounting," where "sales reps think that the list price is so low for them to make money, they start to raise prices themselves." This represents a complete breakdown in pricing strategy, where frontline sales teams are compensating for what they perceive as undervalued offerings.
The Enterprise Value Gap
The second major revenue leak occurs when enterprise deals barely exceed mid-market deals in value. According to Ghuman, "Enterprise customer deal values could range anywhere from 1.5x to 10 times more your lower end customer segments. Hear that again, 10 times more."
If your enterprise deals are only commanding a small premium over mid-market customers, something is fundamentally wrong with either your segmentation or your enterprise pricing strategy. Ghuman suggests that when "your enterprise is only 30-40% more, you have to wonder are you segmenting correctly or are you charging is the list price appropriate for that segment?"
Hidden Services Revenue
Many SaaS companies overlook a substantial revenue stream by not properly monetizing their professional services. Ghuman shares a compelling case study: "I recently finished a pricing product with a premier 100 million plus ARR company where the original product was only sold for 20-30k ARR, but the associated service could go as high as half a million dollar."
This represents an enormous missed opportunity. Services that address gaps in customer capabilities can command premium prices, as Ghuman notes: "The custom service that you offer for clients will do work that the company does not, your customers do not staff for, and they are willing to pay a lot of money for getting those services through an expert such as yourself."
The "Thin Sliver Whales" Phenomenon
Most SaaS companies exhibit an exponential revenue distribution where a small number of high-value customers contribute disproportionately to overall revenue. Ghuman describes these as "thin sliver whales" – customers with unique needs who are willing to pay substantially more.
"What tends to happen is the pricing curve for most companies is more of an exponential pattern where a few small customers tend to really make or break your company," he explains.
These high-value customers often have specific requirements that fall outside standard offerings: "We find specific key complex use cases, compliance based use cases, regulatory use cases, high critical industry use cases such as airlines, where you cannot go wrong and suddenly the willingness to pay increases quite a lot."
Failing to identify and target these high-value segments means missing out on customers willing to pay multiples of your standard pricing.
Undervaluing Critical Features
The final revenue leak occurs when companies fail to monetize high-value features appropriately. Ghuman observes that product managers, "not being confident enough to price and they're not being owner for pricing tend to include a feature in their larger feature set."
While bundling features can make sense for standard capabilities, premium features often warrant additional charges: "There are going to be critical features such as a Gen AI capability or even complex workflow engine that is better suited for an enterprise customer, and you should have charged extra for it."
By properly monetizing these premium features, companies can not only increase initial deal values but also improve retention: "It could have resulted in higher deal values. It could have also resulted in a higher net retention rate."
Taking Action to Capture Lost Revenue
Addressing these revenue leaks requires a strategic approach to pricing that considers the full value of your offerings across different customer segments. It may be uncomfortable to raise prices or implement more aggressive negotiation strategies, but the alternative is leaving substantial revenue uncaptured.
As Ghuman concludes, "These are the five common ways that I've seen companies leave money on the table. And I hope you have a little bit of an idea on where to go and investigate to get that extra change."
For SaaS executives concerned about maximizing revenue potential, examining these five areas could reveal significant opportunities to capture value that's currently being left behind.