Prices

About Pricing package

Functionality

The pricing management module is a high-tech solution for working with prices, in order to maximize profits, automate processes and reduce manual labour.

The pricing package offers users the following functionality:

Price optimization - designed to form the optimal price for each SKU, taking into account price elasticity and competitor prices. The price is calculated not only to maximize profits, but also to reduce food waste.

Price monitoring - designed for automatic scraping and monitoring of both regular and promotional prices from competitors for selected SKU lists on their websites.

Web catalogue monitoring - designed for scraping and monitoring prices and promotions from selected catalogues on competitors' websites.

EAN monitoring - designed for automatic scraping and monitoring of both regular and promotional prices from competitors' websites using unique products EAN-codes.

Price dynamics analytics - designed to create reports on the dynamics of price changes, to visually present changes in your prices (sorted by product groups or lists, price segments, competitors and time periods) relative to competitors' prices and distribution of your prices relative to market prices.

Price policy - designed to create and automatically ensure your pricing policies for every change in competitor prices.

Optimization

Overview & Use

Open

"Optimization" module is designed to automatically calculate the optimal price for each SKU to maximize profit or sales.

Using the optimization module allows you to:

• It is convenient to choose SKUs for which it is necessary to calculate the optimal price;

• Get information on current prices, competitors prices and price recommendations;

• View the forecast of changes in sales in volume, value and margin using the recommended price;

• Calculate the forecast for the selected SKUs based on the recommended price and see the price elasticity chart;

• To approve the recommended price for SKUs, for the chain or selected stores;

• View how price change for the one product impacts sales of other products in the group (cross elasticity);

• View price change history for the selected position.

The module is used to calculate the theoretically optimal prices for the selected positions. This allows the user to understand at what prices the sales forecast will be maximum in sales, money and margin, and also understand how changes in the price of some products will affect the sales of others.

For example, if you lower the price of one product in a group, this will most likely lead to an increase in its sales, but it can greatly reduce sales of other goods in this group and lead to a loss in money and a margin on total sales in the group.

The price optimization module allows you to avoid such errors and consider prices, taking into account the many factors that affect them. In more detail, how the system calculates prices is described in the section "How is the optimal price considered?"

How we work with calculated prices

The system calculates the optimal price for each selected position based on its price elasticity of demand. For more details about price elasticity go to the Price elasticity section.

The optimization module is designed as a first step towards automatic pricing based on price and cross elasticity.

When using price optimization, the user should follow the following rules:

• When using the module, user should apple prices change in the range of 10% relative to the price of competitors;

• It is advisable to take 50 or 100 top positions for the sample and start optimization both for increasing and reducing;

• When choosing a price increase, user should choose the optimization by sales value (the system selects preferred optimization by default);

• When choosing a price reduction, user should choose optimization by margin (the system selects preferred optimization by default);

• After completing the calculations, before accepting prices, the user must check the prices received - in case of a reduce, the difference from the prices of competitors should be no more than 5% for direct competitors (15% relative to hypermarkets and online stores);

• When reducing price, only take checked positions (for which there is an understanding of changes in demand when prices change), since lower prices can eat margins and sales of other products from the group.

After accepting suggested prices for the selected positions, it is advisable for some time to analyze how sales will change for the further more efficient use of the price optimization module.

Cross elasticity

Using the price optimization module, you can not only see the forecasted changes in demand when the price of a particular product changes, but also the effect of this change on other products in the group.

This allows users to understand how changes in the price of one product will entail changes in demand for other products in the group, which allows us to more accurately assess the overall changes in sales after changing the price of one product.

Responsiveness of the quantity demanded for a good to a change in the price of another good is called cross elasticity of demand. It is measured as the percentage change in quantity demanded for the first good that occurs in response to a percentage change in price of the second good. The system automatically calculates dependencies between the demand for some products and the change in prices for others and expresses them in a quantitative assessment of changes in sales.

Factors that affect cross elasticity are the natural properties of goods, their ability to replace each other in consumption. The cross elasticity of demand may be asymmetric: when the price of the first product decreases and demand for another product increases, but if the price of the second product rises and demand for the first product does not change.

Operation manual

The Optimization page is represented by two elements:

• The settings and filters area is used to select optimization parameters, as well as to select the items for which the calculation will be performed.

• Open

  

• The results display area is intended for displaying results and is described in detail in the section "Results area"

Settings and filters

The settings and filters area is used for optimization tuning and items filtering. It consists of two areas and a recalculation button.

Settings

The parameters are used for optimization tuning and include the following fields:

• Price change:

  • All - displaying all items, regardless of whether the optimal price is higher or lower than the current price;

  • Increase - displaying only those items for which the optimal price is higher than the current one;

  • Reduce - displaying only those items for which the optimal price is lower than the current one;

• Safe settlment - if enabled - displays only those items for which the evaluation error is less than the percentage of price change;

• Sales optimization - choosing the optimization criteria. There are two options:

  • By margin - the price is calculated for obtaining the maximum profit;

  • By sales - the price is calculated for maximum sales, while the maximum profit is not guaranteed.

Filters

Filters are designed to select the positions on which the calculation will be performed and include the following fields:

• Group - selection of groups;

• Lines - selection of lines;

• SKU - selection of SKUs;

• Supplier - selection of suppliers;

• Region - selection of regions.

By default, all items are selected. To select specific items, click the button ). The data selection field opens.

Data selection happens as follows:

• Using the search bar - the user enters the search data in a row and selects the desired results by clicking on ) near name (to select all the data you need to check "All");

• Using the "More..." field. After clicking, the window for selecting the required items opens (to confirm the selection, click "Select", to return back, press "Back").

To apply the selected parameters and filters, click the results recalculation button.

The settings and filters area can be hidden by clicking on <, and again open by pressing >.

Results area

The results display area is used for displaying results of the optimization process taking into account previously selected parameters and filters.

In order for the data to appear in the area, you must click either the calculation or recalculation button.

The results display area consists of a table in which the results are displayed, and the results management elements:

Table with results

The table consists of the following fields:

• # - SKU id;

• Name - SKU name;

• Stores - number of stores;

• Purch. price - purchase price;

• Comp. price - competitors price;

• Cur. price - current price;

• Rec. price - recommended optimal price;

• New price - new SKU price;

• Chg. % - price change in percen.

Control elements

Control elements include the following elements:

• - confirmation button for a new price for a particular SKU (when clicked it lights up in blue and sets values from the "New price" field as a new price for the corresponding SKU);

• - button opens chart with sales changes. On the chart, you can display sales as follows:Volume - display sales volume;Value - display sales value;Margin - display sales margin.

• The blue dot on the chart - displays the value of sales for the current price, red - for the recommended optimal price.;

• - cross elasticity window open button. How the system calculates cross elasticity and what it affects is described in the Cross Elasticity section.

• The following information is presented in the cross elasticity window:

  • List of SKUs from the group that will be affected by price changes and the following information about them:

• tech. Price - the price of SKU, which is affected by cross elasticity;

• Qty (pcs) - SKU sales forecast which is affected by cross elasticity in pieces;

• Δ Sales (pcs) - changes in sales in pieces for SKU which are affected by cross elasticity;

• Δ Sales (den) - changes in sales in money for SKU, which are affected by cross elasticity;

• Δ Margin - changes in sales in the margin for SKU, which are affected by cross elasticity.

• Changes in sales in volume, value and margin for SKU for which the price changes:

• Total changes in sales in volume, value and margin for SKUs affected by cross elasticity:

• - a button for building the SKU forecast (opens "Analyze" page in a new tab);

• - a button that opens prices history.

• It is displayed as a table with the following fields:

  • Status - price change status (accepted/declined);

  • Manager - user, who accepted or declined changes;

  • Date - status change date;

  • Prices - SKU prices, consists of:

    • Accepted - accepted price;

    • Recomended - recommended optimal price;

    • Actual - current price;

    • Purchase - purchase price;

    • Competitor's - competitors price;

  • Fcst. Volume - forecast in volume, consists of:

    • Accepted - sales volume with accepted price;

    • Recomended - sales volume with recommended price

    • Actual - sales volume with current price;

  • Fcst. Value - forecast in value, consists of:

    • Accepted - sales value with accepted price;

    • Recomended - sales value with recommended price

    • Actual - sales value with current price;

  • Fcst. Margin - forecast in margin, consists of:

    • Accepted - margin with accepted price;

    • Recomended - margin with recommended price

    • Actual - margin with current price;

Detailed study of SKU

To select a specific SKU for a detailed study, click on the row with its name.

It opens area that displays a detailed report on the selected SKU.

It includes the following elements:

• Price variation, % - trade points price variation;

• Valuation error, % - optimal price estimating percentage error;

• Prices - data about prices:

  • Old price - old SKU price;

  • New price - new SKU price;

  • Change abs - absolute price change in money;

  • Change % - price change in percent;

• Competitors prices - displays the prices of each competitor. If the competitor has a promo price, it is displayed near the current price (the current price, in this case, is shown as a crossed out).

• To manually update the price, you need to press the button . Button  Opens the history of prices for a competitor. To add a new competitor, you need to click  - Clicking will open the window for adding a new competitor. This process is described in detail in the "Monitoring" section.

• Sales volume - sales volume depending on the price:

  • Old price - sales volume with the old price;

  • New price - sales volume with the new price;

  • Change abs - absolute change in sales volume;

  • Change % - percentage change in sales volume;

• Sales value - sales value depending on the price:

  • Old price - sales value with the old price;

  • New price - sales value with the new price;

  • Change abs - absolute change in sales value;

  • Change % - percentage change in sales value;

• Sales margin - sales margin depending on the price:

  • Old price - sales margin with the old price;

  • New price - sales margin with the new price;

  • Change abs - absolute change in sales margin;

  • Change % - percentage change in sales margin.

Use cases

Section is under development.

Monitoring

Description

"Monitoring" created for automatic scraping and monitoring of prices and promotions on competitors' websites.

Using the price monitoring module allows you to:

• Set up price monitoring for selected SKUs in competitors' online stores;

• Display the regular price, promo price and type of promo of competitors;

• Download all products and prices from competitors in a file in a convenient format;

• Upload in convenient way lists of products whose price you need to monitor;

• Use filters to conveniently search and display the desired products.

The monitoring module can be applied both for all products and for selected lists of products. Using monitoring allows you to always be up to date with current prices and promos from competitors, as well as quickly respond to their changes.

Competitive prices obtained during monitoring are used in all other modules of the pricing package.

Operation manual

Displaying records

The list of records is displayed in the form of a table that has the following fields:

• Sku id – SKU number;

• Name – SKU name;

• Competitor – competitors name;

• Error - the name of error when parsing (if present);

• Comp. price – competitors price for SKU;

• Comp. promo – competitors promo price for SKU (if present);

• Promo - the type of competitors promo;

• Absent – tick if the position is not available from the competitor;

• Price date – date and time of the competitors price update;

• Valid from – the minimum price for finding price jumps;

• Valid to – the maximum price for finding price jumps.

Adding new

To add a new position, click the button for adding new monitoring:

After clicking the button, a modal window for adding new monitoring opens. It consists of the following fields:

• Group - Group name. If the user wants to skip the selection of the group and be able to choose from all SKUs in the system, not limited by the group, check the box next to "Not limited by group" (in this case the SKU list will be loaded longer than usual);

• Sku - SKU name;

• URL - link to the page with SKU on the competitor's site;

• Multiplier - enter if the competitor does not have the required SKU and add an analogue with a certain coefficient instead;

• Competitor - competitor's name;

• List of selectors - block with selectors data:

  • Reg. price - price selector;

  • Promo price - promo price selector;

  • Reg. price in promo - selector for the crossed out the regular price, if promo price is present;

  • Promotion - promo type selector;

  • Check for absent - the presence of goods from a competitor selector.

• Test competitor - block for testing how selectors work:

  • Error - data parsing error name, if present;

  • Reg. price - received price;

  • Promo price - received promo price;

  • Absent - absence of goods in stock indicator;

  • Promotion - competitor's promotion type;

  • Valid from – minimum price for finding price jumps (by default is 3 times less than the regular price);

  • Valid to – the maximum price for finding price jumps (by default is 3 times more than the regular price).

To start the test, click the button "Test":

To add, click the button "Add new record", to return click "Back".

Editing and deleting

To delete the record, press the button  in the record line.

To edit the record, press the button  in the record line. After clicking the button, a modal window for editing the record opens. This window repeats the window of adding an entry and allows you to change all fields.

To apply changes, click the button "Edit record", to return click "Back".

Filters

For more handy records displaying and searching page "Monitoring" has the following filters:

• Competitor. Selecting a specific competitor from the list, to display all records associated with it;

• Error. Filtering of fields by the criteria "with error" / "without error" / "all";

• SKU search string.

Work with files

"Monitoring" page has functional that allows you to download records for monitoring from a file and uploading monitoring data into a file.

To download records from a file, select a file by clicking on the "Select file" button. After selecting a file, click on the button .

The page supports downloading 3 types of files:

• tsv with Tab separator;

• txt with Tab separator;

• csv with ";" seperator.

The file should look like this:

• Required fields:

  • SKU_ID - SKU id number;

  • URL - full address of the website with the right SKU from a competitor;

• Additional fields:

  • SELECTOR - price selector for competitors website page with SKU;

  • SELECTOR_PROMO - promo price selector;

  • SELECTOR_PROMO_OLD - regular price selector (while promo is present);

  • SELECTOR_MMK - MMK promo selector;

  • SELECTOR_ABSENT - selector for checking if SKU is out of stock;

  • COEFFICIENT - coefficient of conformity of the goods from the competitor, if a similar product is used (when competitor does not have identical SKU).

Example of a file with required fields:To download records from a file, select a file by clicking on the "Select file" button. After selecting a file, click on the button .

The page supports downloading 3 types of files:

• tsv with Tab separator;

• txt with Tab separator;

• csv with ";" seperator.

The file should look like this:

• Required fields:

  • SKU_ID - SKU id number;

  • URL - full address of the website with the right SKU from a competitor;

• Additional fields:

  • SELECTOR - price selector for competitors website page with SKU;

  • SELECTOR_PROMO - promo price selector;

  • SELECTOR_PROMO_OLD - regular price selector (while promo is present);

  • SELECTOR_MMK - MMK promo selector;

  • SELECTOR_ABSENT - selector for checking if SKU is out of stock;

  • COEFFICIENT - coefficient of conformity of the goods from the competitor, if a similar product is used (when competitor does not have identical SKU).

Example of a file with required fields:

Example of a file with all fields:

To upload monitoring data to a file, click the  button. After clicking, the process of generating a monitoring data report will start and the file will be automatically downloaded within a minute.

Example of a file with monitoring data:

File has the next fields:

• SKU_ID - SKU number;

• Group_ID - Group number;

• Group - Group name;

• SKU - SKU name;

• Purchase_Price - purchase price;

Next are the fields that are opened separately for each competitor by clicking on the plus sign in the line above the competitor

• URL - full address of the website with the right SKU from a competitor;

• PRICE_CONSUMER - competitors price;

• PROMO_VALUE - promo price, if present;

• ABSENT - 0 value, if position is absent; 1 value, if position is availiable;

• SDATE - monitoring date;

Catalogues

Overview & Description

The "Catalogues" module designed for automatic scraping and monitoring prices for groups of SKUs from catalogs in competitors online stores.

Catalogues are pages on competitors' websites that groups of different SKUs. For example, directories are pages with promotional products, pages of a particular type of product (yoghurts or milk), etc.

Using the catalogue monitoring module allows you to:

Использование модуля мониторинга каталогов позволяет:

• Set up price monitoring for competitors catalogues, instead of individual SKUs;

• Monitor prices in catalogues without reference to individual SKUs in your chain;

• Bind products from the catalog to your products (in the future, the system will automatically add a competitor price to the attached products);

• Use filters to conveniently search and display results;

• Upload all products and prices from competitors' catalogs to a file in a convenient format.

The catalogue monitoring module is used to automatically scrap prices and promos not at

         individual positions, but in groups. Commonly used for scraping promotional catalogs or same groups of goods on the competitor’s website.

Operating manual

Displaying records

The list of records is provided in the form of a table that has the following fields:

• Catalogue name - Catalogue name;

• Category - classification products;

• Brand - name of a product brand;

• Article Name - the name of the product;

• Volume - packing volume of the product;

• Price - the price of the item found in the search;

• Promotional price - the promotional price found when searching for goods;

• Promotion - the presence of promotions;

• SKU - link found the product by EAN code;

• N/A - the product is not available. The sign  marks products that are not available;

• Last updated - time of last product search

To open a previously saved catalogue, click on the “Catalogues” drop-down menu. A list of previously saved catalogues appears. Choose which interests you.

Adding catalogues search

To add a new search, click the button “Add new catalogue”:

After clicking the button, the window for adding a new search is open, which consists of the fields:

• Competitor - a field for selecting competitors' sites for search, where the search will take place;

• Catalogue type - field for input of catalogue type. Some sites have several types of directories, if it is one, skip this field;

• Catalogue name - field of the catalogue name, for later saving;

• URL - field with the URL of the catalogue (go to the site - find the desired category - copy the link)

After filling, click “Add new catalogue”, to cancel, click “Back”.

Search result:

Binding found products to SKUs

To bind founded items to the monitoring, click on the button  in the row with chosen SKU.

Next, the “Add position to SKU” window will open.

• Restrict SKU list by group - field in which the user selects a group from the drop-down list;

• Start typing sku id or name - filtering field by name or id SKU;

• SKU list - list of filtered SKUs. To select the necessary one, click on the circle in the row with the necessary SKU in the "Select" column.

Select the desired item from the list.

Click “Link SKU” button, to cancel, click “Back”

After that, a window will appear with the already link SKU

Editing & Deleting

To view a competitor’s website, click on the button .

To update the search, click .

To edit the search, click on the button .

Then a window for editing data will appear:

Click the "Edit Catalogue" button to apply the changes, click "Back" to return.

To delete a search, press the button , after selecting from the drop-down menu “Catalog” the list to be deleted.

После нажатия подтвердите свои действия, “ОК” - если хотите удалить, “Отмена” - вернутся назад.

For automatic multiple SKU binding click the button .

After that, confirm your actions by clicking “ОК”, to cancel, click “Back”.

Filters

To open the filter menu, press:

From the pop-up menu, select the type of filtering:

• Linked sku

• Not linked sku

• Display all

SKU search results:

Search in the list of found products can be done in the field above the table of data.

To cancel the search, press  в конце строки поиска.

Export to Excel

To export data to Excel format and save search results, click on the button .

For export, fill in the fields:

Competitor - link to competitor's site;

Catalogue name - catalogue name (select from the list);

After filling press button "Start export", to cancel press “Back”

Use cases

Section is under development.

EAN code

Overview & Use

"EAN codes" module created for automated scraping and monitoring of prices and promotions using unique products EAN codes on competitors web sites that support products search using EAN code.

Using the EAN codes monitoring module allows you to:

• Search for prices, promotions and special offers from competitors using EAN code;

• Setup search options:

  • Enter products EAN codes for which prices must be found in convenient way;

  • Choose one, several or all competitors for which you need to conduct a search.

• Use filters for convenient search and display of EAN search results;

• Receive information about the availability of selected products in competitors stores;

• Add products to automatic monitoring in the future (in the Price monitoring module).

The EAN code monitoring module is used to automatically scrap prices and promotions using the database of EAN codes for products in your chain. The system automatically downloads your EAN codes, and starts searching for prices on competitors' websites. After the search is completed, there is no need to link your products to products from competitors' websites, since the system does this automatically by EAN codes.

Operating manual

Displaying records

The data list is provided in the form of the table that has the following fields:

• Competitor - the name of the competitor;

• EAN - EAN code;

• Status - the status of search results:

  • Product not found:

  • Search successful:

  • Product not found now, but there is a record from last search:

  • Problem with adding EAN code:

  • Connection lost during the search:

  • Waiting for search completion:

  • Search was manually stopped by user:

  • Search error:

• Name - the name of the product found in the search;

• Price - the price of the item found in the search;

• Promotional price - the promotional price found when searching for the product;

• Promo - presence of promotions;

• Error - error explanation (if any occured). Empty field - no error;

• N/A - Product is not availiable. The sign  marks products that are not available;

• Last updated - time of last product search.

Adding EAN monitoring

To add new search press “New search” button:

After clicking the button, the window for adding a new search is open, which consists of the following fields:

• Search - search name field.

• Competitors - a field for selecting competitors' sites for search, where the search will take place.

• EAN codes - field for entering EAN codes. To search for more than one EAN code, you need to put a comma after each EAN code.

After filling press button “Launch Search”, to cancel press “Back”.

After that, the data transfer for searching starts and the window will automatically close.

Search results:

Binding found products to monitoring

To bind found products by EAN code search to monitoring press  button in the row with product.

Next “Add position to monitor” window opens

• Group - the name of the group. If you want to choose from all SKUs in the system, you need to put a tick next to "Unlimited by the group" (in this case, loading the entire list of SKUs will take longer)

• SKU - link to the page with the SKU on the competitor's site (selected from the list)

• URL - link to the product in the online store (filled automatically)

• Multiplier - taken into account if the competitor does not have the desired SKU and an analog with a certain coefficient is added instead;

• Competitor - competitor's site (filled automatically)

• Name - the name of the product found by EAN code (automatically filled in)

• Article - Article of the product

• Reg.price - price from the competitor

• Promotional price - promotional price from a competitor (if present)

• N / A - availability of goods;

• Promotion - a type of promotion from a competitor;

• Valid from - the minimum price for finding price jumps;

• Valid to - the maximum price for finding price jumps.

Press “Set Monitoring” to add position, to cancel - click “Back”.

After that, the window will open with an already binded SKUs.

Редактирование и удаление

To open a previously saved search, click on the “Search” drop-down menu. A list of previously saved catalogues appears. Choose which interests you.

To delete search press button , previously selected search which you want to delete from "Search" drop-down menu.

To confirm the deletion press “ОК”, or “Cancel” to cancel deleting.

To edit the search list press button.

After pressing the window will open to edit the data.

To confirm changes press "Edit Search" button, to return click "Back".

To refresh the search press “Refresh Search” button.

Deletion of found product

To delete SKU from the list press  in the row with product.

After pressing, confirm deletion%

Search force stop

To force stop the search press

Filters

Filtering the list by search status

You can also filter by following fields: :

• Error

• SKU.

Search in the list of found products can be done in the field above the table of data.

For the search, you can use both EAN code or product name.

To drop search by name press  at the end of the line.

Working with files

To export data into Excel file and save search results press  button.

Use cases

Section is under development.

Dynamics

Overview & Use

"Dynamics" module is designed to generate reports on the dynamics of price changes for products in your chain relative to price changes for the same products from competitors. Reports visualize how prices have changed at selected time intervals for selected products relative to price changes for same products from selected competitors, as well as the market prices distribution. The system automatically scrap competitors' prices for selected products, calculates the price index and provides the result in the form of charts and tables.

Reports are used to understand the competitiveness of prices in your chain relative to market prices. Also, reports clearly show the differences between your prices and those of your competitors, both during regular and promotional periods.

Price index visualization tab allows the user to estimate the price levels in his chain relative to competitor price levels.

The system automatically calculates price indices for the selected positions for the selected time period and visualizes them on the chart. On the chart you can see how the price index for each selected competitor changes.

Price dynamics visualization tab allows the user to estimate the level of prices in his chain relative to market prices. The system automatically calculates distribution of all prices (both yours and your competitors) for all positions and divides it into three categories (the user sees the distribution for both his goods and competitors):

• Above the market - for products whose prices will be higher than the market average;

• Within the market - for products whose prices are average in the market;

• Below the market - for goods whose prices are below the market average.

How we calculate price index

The price index is calculated automatically and is based on existing pricing information from both your network and competitors.

The price index is considered as the ratio of the price of a product in your chain to price for the same product from a competitor. If the system does not have a price for a product from a competitor, then the price index will not be calculated.

Operating manual

Setting parameters for report

Use the "Report details" area to select report parameters :

You select the following report options:

• Competitors - selecting competitors for whom price indices will be calculated and visualized;

• Groups - selecting product groups for report (if there is a need to calculate the index not for individual SKUs but for complete groups);

• Product lists - selecting SKUs for report. You can either select already created product lists from the drop-down menu or create a new product list. Press  button to create a new list. When clicked, a window will open to add a new list with the following fields:You select the following report options:

  • Competitors - selecting competitors for whom price indices will be calculated and visualized;

  • Groups - selecting product groups for report (if there is a need to calculate the index not for individual SKUs but for complete groups);

  • Product lists - selecting SKUs for report. You can either select already created product lists from the drop-down menu or create a new product list. Press  button to create a new list. When clicked, a window will open to add a new list with the following fields:

• Product list name - name of new product list;

• Group - field for selecting product group from drop down list (to sleect all groups - leave this field empty);

• - select sku from reference - the SKU selection field. Pressing opens the SKU selection window (either from all groups, or from a previously selected one);

• SKU - field for manual input of SKUs ID;

• Filter by name - field for manual filtering by name from selected SKUs. To apply, enter the names or part of the name by which you need to filter in the field;

• To save the list, press the "Create" button.

• Price lines - selection of price lines that are automatically loaded from the system;

• Min SKUs per day - minimum number of SKUs for which there is a price index;

• Include promo - if you want to calculate price indexes for report using promotional prices from competitors - check the box. If only regular prices - uncheck the box;

• Date from - selection of the starting date from which the system calculates the dynamics of the price index;

• Date to - selection of the end date until which the system calculates the dynamics of the price index;

After selecting all the data of interest, click the "Run" button to start building the report.

Working with price index tab

The Price Index tab opens by default when you open the Dynamics page.

After the completion of the report creation process, the generated report will appear on the tab:

The report is a chart with price index changes data and a table with the data from the chart.

On chart, user can see the values of the price index relative to different competitors for a selected period of time.

The table shows the numerical values of the price index relative to each selected competitor. The user has the opportunity to see a breakdown of each index by SKU by clicking on the interested value. After clicking, a window will open with detailed information about all SKUs selected earlier:

The following information is presented in the window:

• Aggregated price index - the average price index for all selected SKUs relative to a competitor;

• Number of SKUs - the number of selected SKUs for which there is a competitor price;

• A table with detailed information about each SKU:

  • SKU - selected SKU identifier;

  • Name - selected SKU name;

  • Priceline ID - selected SKU priceline;

  • Competitor's price - price for SKU from the selected competitor;

  • Your price - price for SKU in your chain;

  • Price index - price index value (the ratio of the price in your network to the competitor's price);

  • Avg sales - average sales for the selected SKU.

• Excel - button for downloading data from a table to a excel-file.

Working with price distribution tab

To open the tab “Price distribution dynamics”, click on “Price distribution”:

After clicking the button, the report "Dynamics of Price Distribution" opens for the previously set report parameters:

The report is a chart with price distribution data for selected products relative to the market and a table with data from the chart.

On chart, user can see the percentage distribution of product prices both from his chain and from competitors relative to the market for a selected period of time. There are three indicators:

• Above the market - percentage of SKUs, which price is above average of market;

• Within the market - percentage of SKUs, which price is average;

• Below the market - percentage of SKUs, which price is below average of market;

The chart shows the overall distribution of prices in your chain and competitors' prices.

The table shows the number of SKUs expressed in units and percentages relative to market average values. The user has possibility to see a detailed breakdown by SKU relative to market shares. To open the breakdown window, you need to click on the percentage in the interested share by the interested date in the table:

After clicking, a window opens with detailed information about SKU:

The following information is presented in the window:

• Share,% - percentage of prices that fall into the selected market share;

• SKU count - number of selected SKUs;

• A table with detailed information about each SKU:

  • SKU - selected SKU identifier;

  • Name - selected SKU name;

  • Priceline ID - selected SKU priceline;

  • Competitor's price - price for SKU from the selected competitor;

  • Your price - price for SKU in your chain;

  • Price index - price index value (the ratio of the price in your network to the competitor's price);

  • Avg sales - average sales for the selected SKU.

• Excel - button for downloading data from a table to a excel file.

Downloading report

To download the generated report, click the "Download Report" button.

The report is downloaded in excel format with all the data from the table that was displayed on the page.

Use cases

Section is under development.

Policy

Overview & Use

Module "Policy" is designed to create and automatically maintain your pricing policies every time competitors' prices change.

Using the "Policy" module allows you to:

• Create pricing policies for products;

• Automatically maintain product prices in relation to policies;

• Automatically update competitors' prices to always maintain actual price of your products in relation to the policy;

• Upload competitor prices from physical monitoring;

• Get information about the price index, which displays the ratio of your prices to the prices of competitors and allows you to check the maintenance of prices relative to policies;

• Find out forecasted changes in sales in pieces, money and margin when applying prices from policies;

• Calculate the forecast for the selected position, taking into account the new price;

• View price elasticity chart;

• View price changes history.

The pricing policy module is used to automatically maintain prices, for selected product lists in your chain, at the same level relative to prices in selected competitors. The system automatically updates the prices of competitors using the Monitoring module and allows you to constantly maintain actual prices for your products due to policy.

Indices and Reliability Rate

To understand the level of prices relative to competitors' prices, the system automatically calculates for each policy 4 indices:

• Approved stores index - indicates how many times the prices for all SKUs in stores differ from the competitors prices, taking into account the approved prices;

• Current stores index -indicates how many times the current prices for all SKUs in stores differ from the competitors prices;

• Approved Skus index - indicates how many times the prices for Skus in policy differ from the competitors prices, taking into account the approved prices;

• Current Skus index - indicates how many times current prices for Skus in policy differ from the competitors prices.

The price index is calculated as the ratio of the price of a product in your store to the price of a product in a competitor's store. For regular and promotional prices price indices will differ for the same product.

Also to understand the completeness of monitoring data, a "Data Reliability Rate" is present. It indicates for what percentage of the positions from the policy there is a competitor's price from monitoring.

Operating manual

The page is represented by two blocks:

• Policy running area. Designed to set additional parameters and start calculation of the selected policy template. Described in detail in the section "Running Policy calculation"

• Results displaying area. Designed for displaying the results of the policy calculation and is described in detail in the section "Results area"

Running Policy calculation

To start policy calculation, you have to select the following details of the price policy:

• Policy selection. The user has to select a previously created policy or create a new one (creation of a new policy is described in detail in the "Adding new Policy" section). To select a policy, click on the label "New policy". A list of the created policies opens, in which user have to select the necessary one.

• Choosing monitoring dates. The user has to choose the dates between which one or few monitorings took place. Both physical and online. If between the selected dates were no monitorings, the policy will be calculated but without competitors prices. To select dates, you must first select the start date - the top field, and then the end date - lower field.

• When you click on the date field, a calendar opens, in which user can select date.

After the policy and monitoring dates are selected, click the "Run" button to begin calculating the policy. Policy calculating time depends on the amount of data.

After the calculation is finished, the data will be displayed in the "Results area".

Results area

The results pane is used to display the results of a policy calculation. Data in this area appears after the calculation of the policy ends.

The result display area consists of the following blocks:

• Table with results - displays policy information for each SKU. The table is described in detail in the section "Table with results";

• Control elements - allow user to display additional data for SKU. Controls are described in detail in the section "Control elements";

• Monitoring report - allows user to download the monitoring report in Excel format;

• To select the report title, click on the  button. To download the monitoring report, click on the  button.

• Margin and sales (in volume and value) delta - indicate how price changes (new price) will affect margin and turnover. Change shows the difference between sales (in volume and value) and margin at the old and new price. If values are negative, then at a new price, margin or sales forecast is worse than the old one; Displayed only for the approved price;

• Search string - search by SKU id or name.

Table with results

The table with results consists of the following fields:

• # SKU - SKU identifier;

• Name - name of SKU;

• Store - store id and name;

• Current price - current price for SKU in the store;

• Comp. price - competitor price for SKU from monitoring;

• New price - SKU price calculated by the system taking into account index that was specified when creating the policy (new policy creating process is described in "Adding a new policy"). The user can change the price value in the field with the new price;

• Margin % - the percentage that the margin is from the purchase price;

• Approve - buttons to approve a new price for SKU. The price approval process is described in detail in the section "Price approving";

• Diff % - the difference between the new price and the price of the competitor in percent;

• Quantity - sales forecast at a new price;

• Δ Margin - the difference in sales margin at the new price and current;

• Δ Volume - the difference in sales volume at the new price and current;

• Δ Value - the difference in sales value at the new price and current.

Price approving

If the user wants a new price to be set in the system, he has to approve it. To approve the price, click on the checkmark in the "Approve" column in the row with the required SKU.

After aprroving, the check mark turns blue.

After approval, the current price in the system will be equal to the new price. The system takes a new price from the "New price" field in the table. The user can approve the price for one SKU or all. To confirm the price for all SKUs, click on the "Approve" in the header of the table. The title turns blue.

Also, the user can withdraw the price approval by clicking on the checkmark again. After removing the approval, the check mark will turn white again.

To unapprove all SKUs, click on the "Approve" in the header of the table again. After removing the approval, the title will turn black again.

In the system, the approved price will become active only after it is saved. To apply approved prices in the system, you press  button.

Control elements

Control elements include the following elements:

• - button that opens price elasticity. On the chart, you can display sales as follows:Volume - display sales volume;Value - display sales value;Margin - display sales margin.

The blue dot on the chart - displays the forecasted sales value for the current price, red - for the new price;

• - a button for building the SKU forecast (opens the "Analysis" page in a new tab);

• - button that opens the history of price changes.

• It is displayed as a table with the following fields:

  • Status - price change status (accepted/declined);

  • Manager - user, who accepted or declined changes;

  • Date - status change date;

  • Prices - SKU prices, consists of:

    • Accepted - accepted price;

    • Recomended - recommended optimal price;

    • Actual - current price;

    • Purchase - purchase price;

    • Competitor's - competitors price;

  • Fcst. Volume - forecast in volume, consists of:

    • Accepted - sales volume with accepted price;

    • Recomended - sales volume with recommended price

    • Actual - sales volume with current price;

  • Fcst. Value - forecast in value, consists of:

    • Accepted - sales value with accepted price;

    • Recomended - sales value with recommended price

    • Actual - sales value with current price;

  • Fcst. Margin - forecast in margin, consists of:

    • Accepted - margin with accepted price;

    • Recomended - margin with recommended price

    • Actual - margin with current price;

Detailed study of SKU

To select a specific SKU for a detailed study, click on the row with its name.

After clicking, item opens on the right side of the screen, that displays a detailed report on the selected SKU.

It includes the following elements:

• Price variation, % - trade points price variation;

• Valuation error, % - optimal price estimating percentage error;

• Prices - data about prices:

  • Old price - old SKU price;

  • New price - new SKU price;

  • Change abs - absolute price change in money;

  • Change % - price change in percent;

• Competitors prices - displays the prices of each competitor. To view the actual price date, click on .

• Sales volume - sales volume depending on the price:

  • Old price - sales volume with the old price;

  • New price - sales volume with the new price;

  • Change abs - absolute change in sales volume;

  • Change % - percentage change in sales volume;

• Sales value - sales value depending on the price:

  • Old price - sales value with the old price;

  • New price - sales value with the new price;

  • Change abs - absolute change in sales value;

  • Change % - percentage change in sales value;

• Sales margin - sales margin depending on the price:

  • Old price - sales margin with the old price;

  • New price - sales margin with the new price;

  • Change abs - absolute change in sales margin;

  • Change % - percentage change in sales margin.

Adding new policy

To add a new policy, select the "New policy" in the drop-down list with policies and then click on the button. After clicking, window for adding a new policy opens, which consists of the following fields:

• Policy Name - the name for the new policy;

• Level - choice at what level policy will be used (all stores, regions, stores);

• Sku template - field for selecting a template with a set of SKUs for which the policy will be created. You can select a previously created template from the drop-down list, or create a new template. For details on creating a template, see "Adding new SKU template";

• Users - selecting users in the system that can edit the policy and approve prices (in addition to administrators);

• Max % reduce - the maximum possible percentage reduction in the price for SKU (from the current);

• Competitors - The list of competitors with which the policy will operate. The competitor is selected from the drop-down list, for each competitor, the change index is set (the system will offer a new price, which is equal to the price of the competitor multiplied by the index) and priority (if a competitor with priority 1 does not have a price for a particular SKU, the system will look for a competitor's price with priority 2 and so on). To add the selected competitor to the policy, click on the sign . To remove a competitor from a policy, click on the sign .

To complete the process of creating a policy, click "Create".

Adding new SKU template

To create a new template, select the "New template" from drop-down list and click the  button. After clicking the button, the window for creating a new template opens, which has the following fields:

• Template name - name of new template;

• Group - name of the group. If a user wants to skip the selection of the group and be able to choose from all SKUs in the system, not limited by the group, check the box next to "Not limited by group" (in this case the SKU list will be loaded longer than usual);

• Sku - list of SKUs, which will be used in the policy. If the user has ticked "Not limited by group", then the process of selecting SKU will change:

• The user will be able to select all SKUs in the system by clicking on "All" or go to the selection of specific SKU by clicking on ;

• Filter by name - It is used if the user wants to output all SKUs, in which name is present a phrase or word entered in the "Filter by name" field. In this case, the user does not need to select SKU in the Sku field.

To complete the process of creating a new SKU template, click "Create".

Editing SKU template

The user canedit previously created SKU templates. To do this, when creating a new policy, select the template and click on the button  near to it. Pressing the button will open the window for editing the SKU template:

You can change the same fields as when creating a template. To save changes, click "Save". To delete a template from the system, click "Delete".

Editing and deleting

The user can edit and delete previously created policies.

To edit or delete, you must select the desired policy from the drop-down list of the "Select Policy" field and click the  button near selected policy. After clicking, the window for editing the policy opens:

The user can change all fields, just like when creating a policy. To save changes, click "Save". To delete a policy, click "Delete".

Use cases

Section is under development.