Value drivers and equations

The driver card

Open a product and stay on the Value Model tab. Drivers are grouped by category, and the section header shows how many there are, for example Value Drivers (11). Each card gives you:

• Title. The name of the driver, for example "Eliminate DMS Third-Party Data Access Fees via Vendor-Neutral Syndication".
• Category. The value type the driver belongs to, such as Cost Reduction. Categories and subcategories are generated for your product rather than drawn from a fixed list.
• Core tag. Marks the driver as a core part of the model rather than a secondary or optional one.
• Summary. A plain-language description of what the driver does.
• Mechanism. How the value is created, so a reader understands the logic and not just the label.
• Equation. The formula that calculates the value.
• Criteria. Which customers the driver applies to, and what it does and does not cover.
• Include in new deals. A toggle that controls whether the driver is applied to future deals.

Each driver also carries a key category metric with its own equation. This is the post-improvement KPI the driver moves, and it is the basis for tracking whether the value was realised after the sale.

Renaming a driver or variable

Drivers are written in valueIQ's language. Your team and your buyers may describe the same thing differently, so you can rename any driver or variable to match the wording you already use.

1. Hover over the driver name.
2. Click the pencil icon that appears next to it.
3. Type the display name you want and save.

Renaming changes only what is displayed. The equation and the logic underneath are untouched. The same pencil icon works on variable names, and the banner at the top of the Value Model tab is a reminder: "Hover over a driver or variable name and click the pencil icon to customize its display name."

Including or excluding a driver from new deals

Not every driver fits every product or every sales motion. If a driver is not relevant, or does not reflect how you sell, switch it off.

Each driver card has an Include in new deals toggle:

• On (orange). The driver is active and will be applied to new deals built from this model.
• Off. The driver is excluded from new deals. It is also left out of sensitivity analysis and overlap detection for this product.

Switching a driver off does not delete it. It removes the driver from the working set for future deals, and you can turn it back on later if your positioning changes. This toggle acts on the product. To exclude a driver from one deal only, use the Applicable switch on that deal's Customer Model, covered in Model Insights and sensitivity.

Reading an equation

Every driver is backed by an equation that shows exactly how its value is calculated. For example:

Annual DMS Data Access Fees × Fee Elimination Rate

Each element in the equation is a variable. Hover over any variable to open a pop-up with:

• The variable's name and type, for example Customer Variable.
• A description of what it represents and how it is typically sourced.
• The current median value.
• A link to view the full entry, which takes you to that variable's complete market estimate.

This lets you pressure-test any number in your model without leaving the equation.

The criteria block

Each driver includes a Criteria block. This is the qualification logic for the driver: the kind of organisation it applies to, who the relevant stakeholders are, the specific economic pain being addressed, and what the driver does not cover.

Criteria keep the model honest. When a driver notes that a related cost is "addressed by a separate driver", you know that value is not being counted twice. When you build a deal, valueIQ uses these criteria to decide whether each driver applies to that prospect.

The four variable types

A value driver variable is a value in a driver equation, usually specific to a customer and configuration. The glossary names four types: Solution Variable, Customer Variable, External Variable and Improvement Claim. Three of them do most of the work in a generated model.

• Customer Variable. Something the customer measures or knows, such as headcount or current cost. Defaults come from research, and a value the seller or customer enters is authoritative.
• Improvement Claim. A claim about the magnitude of change your product causes, such as a 25 percent reduction in onboarding time. Defaults come from market research, and per-deal estimates in the customer model refine them.
• Solution Variable. Vendor-side inputs the seller controls, such as a licence unit price or a packaged capability. In a shared business case these appear under their own Solution Variables group, and vendor-side values are hidden on surfaces the customer sees.
• External Variable. Listed in the glossary as the fourth type of value driver variable.

TIP

The confidence percentage on a variable is a cue for discovery. A low-confidence Improvement Claim is one to validate with the prospect before it carries a large share of the business case.

Related

• How a value model is built
• Customer variables and provenance
• Model Insights and sensitivity