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How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

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Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#121

Post by daveFNbuck »

rahimnathwani wrote: post #118

Summary: Except for auto dealerships, retailers don't use personalized prices. What a terrible article: 1) Its first example of "personalized pricing" isn't actually personalised: it was the result of an A/B test. 2) It says 'Outsize profits can be extracted from “top of the demand curve” customers' when, in fact, the top of the demand curve is normally when price is zero. The author seems to acknowledge this as they…

The A/B test only explained the comparison between apps. The spokeswoman said they personalize based on web vs mobile app and logged in vs logged out.

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#122

Post by zeamaize »

rahimnathwani wrote: post #118

Summary: Except for auto dealerships, retailers don't use personalized prices. What a terrible article: 1) Its first example of "personalized pricing" isn't actually personalised: it was the result of an A/B test. 2) It says 'Outsize profits can be extracted from “top of the demand curve” customers' when, in fact, the top of the demand curve is normally when price is zero. The author seems to acknowledge this as they…

You can get personalized cell service prices. I walk into Verizon yearly and threaten to walk if they don’t give me a discount. I pay about 60% normal price.

You don’t cost Verizon anything, you are pure profit (up to a point). They are authorized to give discounts for retention.

Always be sure you walk in with a competitors price to beat too (ask T-Mobile and AT&T what they will give you to switch).

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#123

Post by nopzor »

ubernostrum wrote: post #51
ChuckMcM wrote: post #39

I expect this to have a large downside in that it introduces a negotiable element into the price. And as such you'll see it become mandatory that you negotiate (just as frequent flier miles became mandatory) and as a result margins will decrease.

Also, while people here are thinking mostly about retailers like Amazon, I'd say that even with all the data they have and the processing and engineer power they throw at it, they still haven't caught up to the airlines in terms of efficiency at determining how much people are willing to pay for something. Airline yield management -- which includes both setting the price buckets for different fare classes, and decidi…

Yeah airlines "yield management" and "pricing" departments are indeed a black art.

But, by and large, they're still not "personalizing" pricing. Instead they are basing pricing on factors like demand, destination, whether you're doing a Saturday stay (business travelers wont, so they'll charge more), how close you are to departure, etc etc.

Plus they're now tweaking their frequent flier programs as a way to encourage people not to buy the "absolute cheapest" fare available.

I recently booked a delta flight from sfo to San Juan, connecting in jfk. Got off in jfk and "missed" my flight. Saved over $1000 versus buying a ticket on the same flight from sfo to jjfk.

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#124

Post by alex_young »

rahimnathwani wrote: post #118

Summary: Except for auto dealerships, retailers don't use personalized prices. What a terrible article: 1) Its first example of "personalized pricing" isn't actually personalised: it was the result of an A/B test. 2) It says 'Outsize profits can be extracted from “top of the demand curve” customers' when, in fact, the top of the demand curve is normally when price is zero. The author seems to acknowledge this as they…

Sounds like grocery stores do it: http://abcnews.go.com/Business/supermarkets-introduce-person...

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#125

Post by imron »

akvadrako wrote: post #109
imron wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're using fastmail you don't even have to worry about that limit. If your email is example@fastmail.com and you are registering with http://www.onlinestore.com/ Just use onlinestore@example.fastmail.com and fastmail will make sure it arrives in your example@fastmail.com inbox. It's completely hassle free.

You'll still be uniquely identified. Just using fastmail itself is going to greatly narrow the search for your real identity.

Except with Fastmail you can use your own domain so it's not immediately obvious that you are using Fastmail.

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#126

Post by fjsolwmv »

praulv wrote: post #114
hiram112 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Morally it seems fair. But like most things in our system, I'm sure it will end up being rigged legally in the big guy's favor. Look at our system now. Big capital can move their tax headquarters to Ireland, its service center to India, its manufacturing to China. Hell, they can now even import low wage workers to the EU and US on visas if it will give them an advantage. But good luck to any consumer trying to buy pr…

I've always wondered why it's not possible to get insider info from purchasing depts on factory details so we're not simply paying for over inflated brands to line corporate pockets.

Alibaba.com / AliExpress.com

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#127

Post by fjsolwmv »

alex_young wrote: post #124
rahimnathwani wrote: post #118

Summary: Except for auto dealerships, retailers don't use personalized prices. What a terrible article: 1) Its first example of "personalized pricing" isn't actually personalised: it was the result of an A/B test. 2) It says 'Outsize profits can be extracted from “top of the demand curve” customers' when, in fact, the top of the demand curve is normally when price is zero. The author seems to acknowledge this as they…

Sounds like grocery stores do it: http://abcnews.go.com/Business/supermarkets-introduce-person...

Just For U is a comical disaster if a flop. It's the sort of user friendliness/usability you expect from the marketing team of an old grocery story -- an A/B -test driven development by finite monkeys at keyboard

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#128

Post by fjsolwmv »

jstanley wrote: post #101
Macha wrote: post #94

I wonder how sustainable some of these approaches are and how often people will just stop buying from places that prey on them too much. For example, I'll often end up paying more for e.g. flights if it's not too costly and it removes the hassle of comparing days/large numbers of airlines to save 50 bucks. But if they started charging me double what others were paying, I'd just stop using that airline. Likewise, I've…

I refuse to participate in YouTube's opaque ad selection system. If the video has an ad, even if it's skippable after 5s, I don't watch the video. I very rarely get shown ads.

How about paying for Youtube Red?

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#129

Post by fjsolwmv »

Macha wrote: post #94

I wonder how sustainable some of these approaches are and how often people will just stop buying from places that prey on them too much. For example, I'll often end up paying more for e.g. flights if it's not too costly and it removes the hassle of comparing days/large numbers of airlines to save 50 bucks. But if they started charging me double what others were paying, I'd just stop using that airline. Likewise, I've…

That's not true. Unskippable ads appear on very popular content with wealthy advertisers. It's obvious when you see something like every single SNL video showing the same nonskippable ad for the same new movie release.

Re: How Retailers Use Personalized Prices

#130

Post by fjsolwmv »

averagewall wrote: post #106
Macha wrote: post #94

I wonder how sustainable some of these approaches are and how often people will just stop buying from places that prey on them too much. For example, I'll often end up paying more for e.g. flights if it's not too costly and it removes the hassle of comparing days/large numbers of airlines to save 50 bucks. But if they started charging me double what others were paying, I'd just stop using that airline. Likewise, I've…

I now buy flights direct from airlines because of the dirty tricks of resellers. They've been terrible at sorting out missed connections (please get a paper document in person from the middle-of-nowhere stopover airport to prove it was their fault, and not going to refund legs on a 2nd airline at all) and do dirty tricks like not actually booking your ticket when you pay but waiting till they expect to get it for a l…

It's funny that you think the airlines don't do dirty tricks.

What reseller doesn't buy tickets when you book? They get paid when you buy, why would they refuse to buy?

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