Pricing Data Fuels Conversions, Revenues and Margins

Alexander Rink, CEO of price intelligence solutions provider 360pi, recently spoke with Chain Store Age to discuss the importance of accurate pricing data to retail success. By obtaining timely internal and external pricing information, retailers can ensure a consistent omnichannel customer experience and also prevent the loss of sales to lower-priced competitors.

What are the advantages of having up-to-date pricing information on your competitors?

The reality of price transparency, promulgated by comparison-shopping engines and mobile devices, means that retailers must now assume that a large percentage of their shoppers are checking their top competitors’ prices before making a purchase. Consequently, a price difference of even a few dollars can, and often does, translate into a lost sale.

It is essential that retailers know where they stand with respect to competitors’ prices in order to successfully execute any pricing strategy. Up-to-date pricing information gives retailers the price intelligence they need to “right-price” their offering in order to maximize conversions, revenues and margins.

How has the advent of omnichannel commerce affected retailers’ pricing strategies?

While many retailers may still be formulating or experimenting with their omnichannel pricing policy, shoppers are increasingly demanding a consistent experience across channels, and that experience includes the price they pay.

All retailers need to consider their and their competitors’ online pricing when formulating an omnichannel pricing strategy. It is imperative for retailers to leverage online price intelligence, regardless of the extent of their own e-commerce presence.

How can retailers use pricing technology to combat “showrooming”?

With the ubiquity of mobile devices and price comparison engines and applications, brick-and-mortar retailers must be right-priced at the point of purchase or risk having their in-store shoppers leave empty-handed and purchase the items from competitors.

What types of decisions can retailers fine-tune with pricing data?

Retailers can use price intelligence to fine-tune their pricing strategies and day-to-day pricing decisions. These include reducing overpriced products that are damaging the retailer’s price reputation, increasing the prices of underpriced products that are unnecessarily leaving margin on the table, strategically ensuring the retailer’s pricing is in line with their brand messaging, and tactically responding to new competitor price moves in hours instead of days or weeks.

Retailers can also use competitive pricing data to go on the offensive in the market, such as by dynamically highlighting products where they are priced most competitively, or by powering comparison shopping on their own websites through “Compare at [higher competitor price]” banners, which helps to increase site conversion rates.

What specific capabilities is 360pi providing its users via pricing tools?

360pi delivers continuous price intelligence for identical and comparable products along with supporting product information, such as shipping fees and product availability. Our proprietary platform enables retailers to access this product and price intelligence online and in-store, and provides easy integration into back-office systems.

The 360pi Competitive Intelligence solution suite includes capabilities for real-time price comparisons of exact and “like” products, evaluation of competitive assortments to identify gaps and opportunities, support for dynamic rules-based pricing, and other features.