Price Intelligence Software: 3 Steps to Getting Started

By Lokesh Aryan

Price intelligence involves monitoring, tracking and analyzing price trends to understand the market and make informed pricing decisions across various product categories efficiently. And since product prices change constantly, you need to keep a check on your prices in relation to the price trends in the market. Based on which you have to change your prices across your product categories to offer the best prices in the market using a dynamic pricing strategy. 

There are three principal steps to getting started; putting them into practice can help you grow your margins and scale quickly.

Steps 1: Automate your Pricing Process

To get accurate pricing estimations in a timely manner, the best thing to do is automate competitive pricing analysis. This saves time, leaves no room for human error. Another essential aspect is having a solution with zero integration requirement. This not only helps you save time with instant deployment but it also saves a considerable amount of cost and resources. A plug ‘n’ play pricing solution is your best bet for efficient pricing. What also needs to be considered is the accuracy of the data. While there are many solutions out there that give you pricing data, a solution that focuses on data quality and integrity should be preferred. Moreover, if the solution is able to standardize the data as per your language, currency and taxonomy preferences, it is a huge plus in saving time and effort for your resources in unlearning and relearning.

Step 2: Review and Refine your Pricing Strategy

Firstly, you need to recognize your direct competitors offering similar products and indirect competitors offering similar product categories. Having the right AI-based price intelligence solution will make this process fast and easy.

Second, discover verifiable pricing patterns by looking at historical pricing for the products. Eventually, you will be able to identify pricing curves and recurring trends in the market among your competitors. Look for trends like - how frequently your competitors offer deals and promotions? When do back-to-class promos commonly start? Do costs rise or fall around significant shopping occasions? 

By identifying these patterns and practices in the market, you can make much better decisions that are data-driven.  Set up new pricing rules based on your revised pricing strategy.

Step 3: Take Action

There’s no point of price intelligence if you don’t immediately take action. Unfortunately, many retailers collect and analyze their pricing data, but fail to complete the task and take actionable steps to implement their new rules. It is critical to have a proactive approach to pricing than a reactive one that always lags behind the competition.

Information that sits with no comparing strategy rapidly gets immaterial. Which is why it’s important to implement price changes immediately depending on the data you receive. 

To immediately act on a pricing strategy based on the pricing data you collect and analyze can mean a boost in sales and leads. The best way to do this is to integrate the AI-based pricing tool with your internal business strategies on pricing. This will enable you to set and change prices on the fly way before your competition is able to take action. Once you do this, all you need to do is a periodic review, perhaps weekly, and you will always be on top of the pricing trends.

Why Retailers Should Use Price Intelligence Software

In order to understand your product positioning and its performance in the market, data on competitor’s costs become important. . With price intelligence software you can stay updated on market pricing trends and make pricing decisions driven by accurate data which will help you stay ahead of your competitors. 

The product price is considered as one of the most significant criteria for online customers with over 60% of these buyers stating that they look at the product price first before evaluating any other feature.  Even more significantly, over 90% of online customers state they compare prices before they settle on a particular product from a particular brand or online store. 

According to eCommerce pricing facts, on average, when a customer shops online, they visit at least 3 websites looking for the best deal they can find. Taking into account how significant 'cost' is in the buy choice, it is obvious that numerous organizations are depending on price intelligence software to offer the best prices for their products. 

According to a study by McKinsey report, Amazon and other top eCommerce companies reprice their trending products up to 12 times each day and effectively respond to changes in competitors' costs within minutes. 

Price intelligence software encourages you to be proactive and productive in changing costs and make the most out of the pricing information you receive. 

Final Thoughts

Your customers are constantly comparing you and your prices, both online and offline. If you don’t have the right price when the customer is in the store or on your website, you probably lose him forever and no amount of discounts or promos offered subsequently will have the same effect as offering them an attractive price at an opportune time.  

The right price intelligence software can help you improve your sales and give you an edge over your competitors in an automated and easy-to-integrate way.  For the competitive eCommerce retailer, now is the time to invest in price intelligence software so you can grow using a profitable pricing strategy. 

Author Bio:

Hi, my name is Lokesh Aryan. I am Associate SEO Analyst at Intelligence Node. Intelligence Node is a real-time retail price intelligence platform that empowers retailers and brands to grow profitability and margins using AI and ML data-driven competitive insights. Please visit our website and follow us on Twitter @bigdataNODE.