Price monitoring is an automated process that tracks competitor prices in real time. The system collects price data, matches it to your products and notifies you when something changes.
Put simply: instead of opening competitor pages yourself and writing down prices, software does it automatically. Several times a day, across all your products at once.
The difference between price monitoring and price comparison
These two terms are often confused, but they are completely different things.
Price comparison (e.g. Google Shopping or a consumer comparison site) answers the buyer’s question: “where is it most sensible to buy this product?” It is a consumer tool.
Price monitoring answers the seller’s question: “what price should I sell at to stay competitive?” It is an online shop’s tool. It tracks the whole catalogue automatically and offers history, alerts and analytics.
Read more: B2B price monitoring vs consumer price comparison.
Why an online shop needs price monitoring
Three main reasons:
1. Price changes happen fast
A competitor can change a price at any time: at night, over the weekend, in the middle of a campaign. Without automated price monitoring you find out only when a customer leaves or you check by hand.
2. Manual tracking does not work at scale
10 products are manageable. 200 products from 10 competitors is 2,000 price points, all changing constantly. Manual tracking becomes a full-time job and gaps still remain.
3. Your market position changes constantly
Today you are in position 2. Tomorrow someone is cheaper than you. The day after, a competitor’s product goes out of stock and you are back in first place. Position history shows what is happening. Without it you are dealing with guesswork.
How price monitoring works
Modern price monitoring software uses AI to match your products to competitors’ catalogues. That means:
- The same product is found even when a competitor uses a different name
- EAN codes speed up matching but are not required
- Image recognition and text analysis help with atypical products
After matching, the system tracks prices automatically and sends alerts about changes.
Who price monitoring is for
Price monitoring suits anyone who has competitors in e-commerce:
- Online shops: track your market position and competitors’ price changes
- Manufacturers: MAP/MSRP monitoring, control over resellers’ pricing policy
- Marketers: a product availability matrix and a multi-channel overview
How to get started
To start you need a product feed: CSV, Excel or JSON. Setup takes under an hour, and the first price data appears within 24 hours.
If you want to see how it works for your shop, try it free.