Price competitiveness – a quick global summary
Since Price2Spy clients come from virtually all parts of the world, we have gathered some comparative data which can help analyze competitiveness of online stores worldwide.
1) US & Canada – US data can be somewhat misleading since big US stores are actually big global names, so their pricing applies not only to the US, but to the rest of the world as well. Anyway, this is the region with the highest price awareness rate, with many retailers operating under the ‘Best price guarantee’ policy. Whole clusters of competitors are closely monitoring each other – with the end buyer making the most of this price race. The fact that Google Shopping comparison works very well with most such websites makes the competitive edge even more sharp for the retailers.
2) Western Europe + Australia – it’s pretty similar in Australia, UK, France, Germany and Benelux, apart from the fact that those markets are in most cases oriented to their local customers (or at least customers speaking the same language). One should also take into account that big marketplaces like Amazon, Ebay etc. have their local websites in most of these countries, making the race extremely competitive. However, we have noticed that retailers from non-English speaking countries are much more reluctant to make use of automated tools for tracking their competitors.
3) Southern Europe – it’s a bit more relaxed there (does it have something to do with the lifestyle? 🙂 ) Anyway, it’s a known fact that customers in Mediterranean countries like to speak to a sales representative (human being) before making the purchase. This makes the price race a bit less tight, with more emphasis on other sales skills (talk talk talk, web design, etc.).
4) Far East – English speaking regions of the Far East (Hong Kong, Singapore) are highly technologically developed and thus very price-savvy. With very very tight pricing race there, every single cent matters.
5) China, Korea, Japan – to be honest, the language barrier is too big for me there, so I don’t really have that many details. Anyone who could help?
6) Brazil and Latin America – Brazil is by all means the technological leader of this part of the world, in all aspects, and we are encountering a high increase in the number of Brazilian stores competing with each other / monitoring each others’ prices. However, the price race is not that intense as in the US / Western Europe yet. On the other hand, Latin America is lagging behind, not that competitive at all (except for Mexico).
7) India – huge market, with some of the world’s biggest IT stores, still discovering online competitiveness. Lots of evangelical work to be done there yet.
8) Africa and Arab world – with the exception of South Africa and somewhat Egypt, there is not that much competition after all – and the ones who do compete, do it the old-fashioned, manual way.
9) Eastern Europe and Russia – the bigger the market (Russia, Poland, Turkey), the tighter the competitive edge. Particularly in Russia, whose population is getting more and more aware of price comparison sites. In smaller countries, traditional ways of following competitors are more popular, especially for the fact that online retailers in Eastern Europe usually find prices of automated price monitoring tools too expensive.
So the general conclusion is – the more technologically advanced the population is – the more competitive retailers have to get. The bigger the market, the bigger the business for online comparison sites is, making it easier for the end consumer to find a better deal. It’s very interesting to see how this situation will evolve over time.
Please let us know if this summary was of any help to your online business.
Of course, we would like to encourage eCommerce professionals from different parts of the world to have their say on their local markets – it would be much appreciated.
