I got tired of constantly adjusting business pricing, so I took the leap and changed to automatic business pricing. Is there anything I need to be aware of WRT this tool? I’m normally very wary of letting Amazon control anything, but at least I could set the tier discounts myself.
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Make sure you can set your minimum price when using any automatic pricing tool.
Last thing you want to happen is to sell an item at a loss.
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I don’t use it, but in addition to what @Lost_My_Marbles noted, is there a way to account for any MAP issues if you go that route?
I would not want to lose the brands that I sell that do have MAP in place.
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What is MAP?
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Minimum Advertised Price. Some brand owners and manufacturers require that resellers sell their products for at least a minimum price, for various reasons.
Although in this case it doesn’t really matter. The point is that either you can control Amazon’s repricing program to your satisfaction or you can’t.
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As stated by @HobbesIsMyTiger , it is something that sellers must use when they are pricing their products. They need to meet those pricing rules if they value the relationship with their brands.
Since you have not run into the term I’m guessing you either are not buying brand direct or through authorized wholesale sources.
On the new, improved, ever evolving Amazon be extremely careful if you are selling branded products and are not aware of any MAP programs in place. All it takes these days is ONE complaint from either the brand (or a pissed off competitor that reports you to the brand for a violation) and Amazon can and will suspend you for selling counterfeits.
Their current policy is to NOT allow appeals for authenticity complaints.
I disagree with Hobbes on the point where they say “Although in this case it doesn’t really matter.”
If there is no way to put in a minimum (and again, I don’t use it) it would appear to possibly have deadly consequences for your account in some cases.
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This is my point though. If you can control the repricing logic, you can make sure you don’t lose money, don’t violate MAP agreements, keep your rates for bulk purchases in line with other retail discounts, etc. If you can’t control the repricer sufficiently to handle your needs, then MAP or not, using it is a bad idea.
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We’re on the same page except neither one of us knew when you responded that @Amazon_seller didn’t have a clue about MAP which can cause problems six ways to Sunday.
And Amazon seems to have entered a ‘take no prisoners’ mode of operation.
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You are wrong in your assumptions. We make our own products. We are not worried about reporting ourselves to Amazon.
Now that I know what MAP is, we set our own MAP.
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It is not going to cause us any problems. We are the manufacturer and brand owner.
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As long as you can set a minimum price, you should be okay. The only other thing to take into consideration (that we thought of) would be if you do any promotions. If you are able to run promotions (we say able as Amazon basically shut down some sellers from doing promotions if they - Amazon - couldn’t find a reference price for the item(s) ), you could run into a scenario where the Automatic Pricing had set a price and Amazon would require you to set a lower price just to run the promo. We understand that this is for Automatic Business Pricing and most promos are for regular customer sales, but we also know how Amazon often can’t keep their sh*t straight.
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Yeah. I had something in the outlet that showed unavailable after I turned on automatic business pricing. Turns out I had a set a (automatic) minimum business price that was higher than the outlet price, so I had to go in and set a lower minimum price.
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Well, actually, my comment is spot on since you make your own products. AND, if you do not sell wholesale there is no reason for you to have MAP in place.
In my case I manufacture under one name and sell on Amazon under a different LLC name. Since I don’t wholesale no one can have any legitimate products with my brand on which makes MAP irrelevant. If anyone shows up on my stuff I just let BR know that I am the only authorized seller (under my sales LLC) and anyone else is removed pretty quickly.
You would only need MAP if you sell wholesale. Then you need a really good contract with the buyers that includes where they are allowed to sell and at what price. I would be sure to include a min/max level to avoid anyone gouging buyers.
Good luck. Amazon is an adventure.
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I was only taking offense to your assumption that “@Amazon_seller didn’t have a clue about MAP which can cause problems six ways to Sunday.” You had assumed we were going to have problems, which was only because you assumed we are resellers.
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