Prissättningsstrukturer för Software-as-a-Service inom digital annonsering under olika faser av företags tllväxt

The growing adoption of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions in industries like digital advertising has led to new opportunities and challenges, particularly in pricing structures. Despite its increasing importance, existing academic research provides limited guidance on how SaaS pricing models should evolve across various growth stages. This research addresses this gap by exploring the pricing strategies, models, and approaches that SaaS companies in the B2B digital advertising sector can implement during three key stages of growth: Market Entry, Growth, and Maturity. Moreover, a mixed-methods approach was used to gather data. The qualitative phase involved interviews with industry experts, including academics, SaaS professionals, and key figures from advertising agencies, providing deep insights into the challenges and practices of pricing in the sector. Complementarily, the quantitative phase presents an analysis of the pricing models of 57 market players: 27 SEM/Media agencies and 30 SaaS companies, to identify industry norms and benchmarks. Insights from the partner company with hands-on experience in SaaS advertising further contextualized the findings. The findings led to the development of a stage-specific pricing framework aligned with key focus areas of the Business Model Canvas. At Market Entry, low-barrier pricing principles such as penetration strategies, flat-rate models, and cost-based approaches are recommended to attract early adopters. During the Growth phase, companies benefit from competitive, market-based pricing aligned with industry norms to enable scalability. In the Maturity stage, pricing evolves into a strategic differentiator, incorporating premium and dynamic models that reflect added customer value.