Salesforce has introduced new ways to pay for Agentforce in yet another change to the AI suite’s pricing.
The cloud giant says the move will lower barriers to entry and offer more flexibility for customers looking to work with Salesforce.
New Agentforce Pricing Explained
Salesforce had introduced a new consumption-based pricing model earlier this year, which garnered a largely positive response from top ecosystem voices.
The newer model was intended to introduce an element of flexibility to the way customers pay, with “Flex Credits” being spent on specific actions performed by agents.
New user licenses with Agentforce usage included were also introduced, along with a “Flex Agreement” which lets customers convert licenses into credits.
In an announcement on August 19, Salesforce revealed an expansion to its payment options, with three ways to pay for Agentforce usage.
Pay-as-You-Go (NEW)
This model requires no up-front commitment. Customers pay monthly for Flex Credits used.
Pay-as-you-go pricing is generally available starting today. Salesforce says this means customers can get started with Agentforce “quickly and easily, with no up-front commitment”, and pay monthly based on the number of Flex Credits used.
“This flexible option is ideal for running pilots, testing new use cases, and managing unpredictable workloads,” Salesforce said in a statement.
Pre-Commit (NEW)
Salesforce is also introducing a new pre-commit option in limited release, which lets customers unlock “more favorable pricing” when they make an up-front commitment.
A bigger commitment means bigger savings, so ROI should improve as customers scale Agentforce usage across their organizations.
Customers pay monthly for Flex Credits used.
Pre-commit will be “more widely available later this year”, Salesforce says.
Pre-Purchase
Customers “save the most by paying up front”, Salesforce says, making this option ideal for businesses with “predictable, consistent usage”.
This existing pre-purchase option lets customers pay up front for a set amount of usage over their contract term – and draw from that balance as they go.
This is how most customers pay today, and it appears to be a good option for businesses with predictable workloads and consistent demand.
Bill Patterson, EVP of Corporate Strategy, said: “There’s incredible demand from businesses of all sizes to experiment with and deploy agentic AI as we infuse all of our apps with dynamic, conversational, and context-aware agentic capabilities.”
Salesforce stresses that, no matter how customers choose to pay, Agentforce usage can be monitored, managed, and optimized through the use of Digital Wallet, which gives businesses near-real-time data, proactive usage alerts, and trend analysis for consumption-based products.
To sign up for pay-as-you-go or pre-purchase, contact your account representative.
Final Thoughts
Earlier this year, when we reached out to ecosystem voices asking about Agentforce’s pricing model, Chief Executive Officer at Attentis Consulting, Steve Snell, said it reminded him of his “1991 cell phone data plan where every month’s bill was an adventure into the great unknown”.
The introduction of a pay-as-you-go model certainly feels reminiscent of those heady teenage years when sending a text message cost a fixed amount and we would run low on ‘credit’, but despite the naming parallels, this latest move by Salesforce appears to be a step away from the perils of the “great unknown”, as Steve put it.
Flexibility is very much a concept that appears to be on the cloud giant’s mind at the moment, so we can likely expect yet more moves like this further down the line – potentially with other products too.
