How the right software is your key to gaining a competitive advantage
Successful retail pricing is dependent upon one guiding principle: Strategic flexibility. In today’s marketplaces, perhaps nothing is as valuable as the ability to adjust pricing in real-time and with purpose – a critical capability that is only possible with repricing solutions. These repricing solutions automatically adjust prices based on market movements while maintaining a pre-decided price-range to ensure profitability.
The importance of this capability, of course, increases tenfold for e-commerce sites and is why numerous eBay repricer tools have emerged. The goal is to provide online merchants with the competitive advantage they need in their increasingly fast-paced industries.
Let’s dive in, then, to what exactly this strategically flexible competitive advantage looks like.
Harness the power of dynamic pricing
As a first priority, it’s worth exploring the big-picture benefit of an eBay repricer strategy: Dynamic pricing.
A key cog of pricing models across industries, dynamic pricing, lets you fluctuate price listings in response to market changes, competitive shifts, personal preferences, and seasonal trends- all in real-time. For instance, if a competitor’s inventory is running low on an alternative to one of your products, dynamic pricing suggests raising the price to capitalize on the increased demand coming your way. Similarly, if you’re selling winter gear at the start of spring, this model advises you to lower prices to improve your stock turns. Whether marking up or down, dynamic pricing is all about maximizing your returns per each individual item.
That said, these price changes have to be within reason; if you increase your prices too much, your sales will suffer because of a lack of demand. This is why dynamic pricing depends on setting a price range – the overlap between what customers can afford and what you need to hit profit targets.
Beyond the overarching strategic importance of having dynamic pricing capability, there are a number of important benefits you can achieve with the right eBay repricer algorithms in place. Namely, as you will read in the next section, repricer algorithms can help you tailor your price standing within a predefined pricing range.
Tailor algorithms to work specifically for your business
What exactly does competitive real-time pricing look like? It sounds impressive enough, but how does it translate into a practical business plan? The short answer is: However you need it to.
The best eBay repricer tools let you make smart price adjustments by incorporating several distinct factors. For one, you can prescribe a formula that’ll account for competitors’ prices (i.e. by listing items at fixed percentages below that of your lowest-priced rivals’). Or you can set a formula that primarily accounts for your own product margins.
When this strategy incorporates some degree of competitor analysis – as it often does – you’re presented with a deceptively tricky task: Accurately identifying and monitoring your true competitors. Different software programs will tackle this from various angles, with some opting to track relevant keywords while others focusing on Universal Product Codes (UPCs) or European Article Numbers (EANs).
Some Smart eBay Repricer tools even go one step further with AI algorithms designed to reflect the subjective intricacies of human customer behavior. Some software even syncs your eBay prices with Amazon, allowing for cross-marketplace cohesion.
Achieve ‘Best Match’ product visibility
As most businesses know, Amazon’s “Buy Box” feature is mirrored on eBay with the Best Match suggestion. This is the item most prominently displayed on a product page; unsurprisingly, it sells at a dramatically increased clip. Getting featured on the Best Match is a huge leg but how do you achieve it?
Well, there are a number of ingredients to this recipe. As an eBay merchant, you need a steady flow of positive buyer feedback as well as a high-rated seller score. You also need a relatively high frequency of purchases and, most importantly, consistently competitive prices.
Often, gaining Best Match traction requires initially setting lower prices – as to display competitiveness and bump purchase frequency. Once you pick some steam, though, you have more room to play with eBay repricer functions. The price-change formulas discussed earlier can now get even more nuanced: You can seek to specifically beat competitors based on Best Match visibility, seller rating, feedback scores, or various combinations of eBay attributes. You can even target specific brands who you know you’re bumping shoulders with – all in real-time, with easy to deploy, easy to scale eBay repricer solutions.
The final word: It all circles back to efficiency
Automating these processes according to pre-configured rules saves you precious time. There’s no more need for wasting hours or even days scouring eBay listings – let your algorithms do it for you while you concentrate on strategic decision making.
Plus, your eBay repricer will squeeze the utmost value out of your products. Playing off of market trends, product inventory, and competitors’ supply and demand ensures a trim-down of stocking waste.
And, finally, you get the peace of mind of accuracy across the board. Less manual work translates to fewer manual errors. Instead, you get to play the managerial role, monitoring these accurate changes and ensuing projections, and utilizing them to maximize your ROI down the road.
