One of my CPO coachees has a product team that recently made some major pricing and packaging changes – after a lot of research, experiments, and modeling. The first month has gone very well, and he is working on a board update. We looked at some draft slides, including this chart:
Predicted Actual
Avg Subscription Price +1.6% +1.7%
Annual vs. Monthly new subscribers +4% +4.2%
Free-to-paid conversion -2.4% -2.7%
That sparked a Money Stories conversation:
- “You’re showing that your team did good estimations, but I don’t think that’s what the Board cares about. And they may fixate on the lower conversion rate, which is much less important than the other two numbers. What do they need to hear from you?”
- “How this translates into top-line revenue?”
- “Yup. You know your ASP, but the Board probably doesn't. Do they know how much it’s worth to boost that by 1.7%? Do they remember from last meeting why shifting from monthly to annual subscriptions is so valuable? Or that it's a big win even with lower conversion rates?”
- “Right. We need to finish our sentences. Tell the money stories that get us from product OKRs to outcomes.”
Notice how adding one column tells the Board what they want to know:
Predicted Actual 2026 Impact
Avg Subscription Price +1.6% +1.7% +3M €
Annual vs. Monthly new subscribers +4% +4.2% +5M €
Free-to-paid conversion -2.4% -2.7% -0.6M €
Our CPO now has a chance to talk about how this contributes to the company’s growth, and explain the impact of each line. “We raised monthly prices, which increased the top line ASP by roughly 3M €, but hiking those monthly prices also shifted customers toward annual sign-ups… which boosts LTV and reduces churn substantially. You’ve been asking for that. The free-to-paid conversion drop was expected – because of the higher per-month pricing – but that’s much smaller than the positive impacts. So we're delivering a substantial part of the 2026 target.”
This shifts the discussion from complex non-financial OKRs and delivery dates to revenue. Which is what the Board is really interested in. And it builds trust: if the product team was able to drive pricing and packaging changes that improved results, then their other work gains credibility.
Sound Byte
It’s unreasonable to expect execs and board members to remember product complexities or easily connect OKRs to revenue outcomes. We need to connect the dots for them… do the math… finish our money sentences.