Introducing Outcome-Based Pricing: Pay for Results, Not Messages
Most conversational AI platforms charge you for every message sent, every API call made, or every user who talks to your bot. But here's the problem: not all conversations create value.
When someone opens a chat and immediately closes it, you get charged. When a bot sends 50 messages to answer a simple question that could have been answered in 3, you pay for all 50. When conversations fail to help users achieve their goals, you still pay the bill.
We think that's backwards.
How Traditional Pricing Fails
Traditional per-message or per-user pricing creates misaligned incentives:
- Vendors benefit from MORE messages, not better outcomes
- You pay for bot mistakes and inefficiencies
- Failed conversations cost the same as successful ones
- No visibility into ROI - just usage metrics
- Tool calls made: Did it retrieve data, send emails, update records?
- External actions: Did it integrate with your CRM, payment processor, calendar?
- Payment events: Did money change hands?
- User behavior: Did they complete a goal or drop off?
- 10,000 conversations/month
- 7,200 were free (browse-only or simple info lookups)
- 2,100 were $0.50 (general enquiries) = $1,050
- 520 were $0.99 (qualified leads) = $515
- 180 were $1.99 (completed sales) = $358
This means you're optimizing for the wrong thing. You end up trying to reduce costs by limiting conversations, when you should be focusing on maximizing successful outcomes.
Introducing Outcome-Based Pricing
We've built a new model where you only pay based on the outcome of each conversation:
$0.00 - No Interaction
Session opened but user sent no messages. Zero cost.
$0.50 - General Enquiry
User asked questions and got answers from your knowledge base. Simple, informational.
$0.99 - Useful Outcome
The conversation took action: captured a lead, sent a follow-up, updated settings, scheduled something.
###$1.99 - Booking or Sale**
Revenue event: completed checkout, confirmed booking, payment authorized.
Why This Works Better
1. Aligned Incentives
We only succeed when your conversations succeed. If users aren't getting value, we don't get paid either.
2. Predictable ROI
A $1.99 charge means you made a sale. A $0.99 charge means you captured a qualified lead. The value is clear.
3. No Penalty for Efficiency
If we can solve a user's problem in 2 messages instead of 20, we don't charge you more. Better experience = same price.
4. Risk-Free Exploration
Users can browse, ask questions, and explore without racking up charges. Only meaningful interactions cost money.
How We Determine Outcomes
Each conversation is analyzed for:
The highest outcome band reached determines the charge. Simple and transparent.
Real Customer Example
One of our customers replaced their traditional chatbot (which cost $2,500/month for unlimited usage) with our outcome-based model.
Their results:
Total monthly cost: $1,923
The difference: They saved $577/month (~23%) AND gained complete visibility into ROI. Those 180 sales generated $43,200 in revenue, giving them a crystal-clear 22:1 return on their conversation investment.
With their previous system, they had no idea which conversations contributed to sales. They were paying $2,500 whether their chatbot generated 1 sale or 100.
What About High-Volume Use?
We offer volume discounts for high-traffic applications. And remember: most conversations are free because users often just browse or ask quick questions without triggering any actions.
For enterprise needs, we can work with you on custom pricing that makes sense for your business model.
Getting Started
Ready to pay for outcomes instead of messages?
Questions? Talk to us →
---
*Want to learn more about how we built this? Read our engineering post: "The Architecture Behind Outcome Detection at Scale"*