Pricing Capability Matrix and Monitoring for Vivo Online Mall

Background

In the daily operation of the official Vivo online mall, two problems may occur:

1) Misaligned promotional information – With an increasing number of promotion types (flash sale, full reduction, coupons, vouchers, etc.), different promotions may be configured by different operators. If there is no internal alignment, promotions that should not be combined may be stacked, leading to a final price lower than cost.

2) Incorrect promotional pricing – Occasionally, a promotional price is set incorrectly (e.g., a missing zero in a fixed price), which can cause a massive surge of orders and large losses, commonly referred to as “price hunting”.

(Image credit: The Daily Mail, photographer – AIan Price)

To address these issues, we aim to issue early warnings for orders whose final price falls below a predefined “floor price threshold”, and, when necessary, block the order to prevent loss.

Marketing Price Capability Matrix

Understanding the planning and construction of the marketing price capability matrix is the first step. The pricing center of the Vivo mall handles real‑time price calculation for order items. However, some business scenarios (e.g., product list pages) do not require strict real‑time pricing, and operators often cannot foresee the lowest possible price for a SKU after applying multiple promotions.

The pricing center focuses on real‑time price calculation for order items, while some upstream services can tolerate near‑real‑time or historical pricing.

Operators cannot easily see the future promotional price or the minimum possible price for a SKU, leading to overlapping promotions and prices below expectations.

Historical discounted prices are not recorded, limiting post‑analysis.

Future commitments such as “price guarantee for xx days” lack reference data.

We propose to extend the capability matrix to include future discounts , near‑real‑time discounts , and historical discounts , forming a multi‑dimensional SKU price‑discount matrix.

3. Price Monitoring

3.1 Purpose

Improve the accuracy of promotional configuration (pre‑event).

Provide multi‑dimensional strategies for operational decisions (during event).

Supply marketing price data for downstream analysis (post‑event).

3.2 Solution

3.2.1 Pre‑event

a. Preventive measures

Configure promotion exclusivity – decide whether a promotion can be stacked with others.

When a promotion is set as mutually exclusive, the system will prevent it from being combined with other promotions during configuration.

Set SKU floor‑price thresholds – either an absolute price (e.g., ¥750 for a ¥1000 SKU) or a discount rate (e.g., 75% of the original price).

This setting is critical as it underpins many monitoring mechanisms in both pre‑ and during‑event phases.

b. Early reminders

When configuring a promotional price, trigger an alert if the price falls below the floor threshold.

c. Early warnings

Schedule periodic inspections of SKUs to pre‑emptively warn if future promotional prices are expected to drop below the threshold.

Inspection workflow for all SKUs with floor thresholds:

If a violation is detected, an internal communication tool notifies the responsible personnel immediately.

3.2.2 During event

a. Real‑time promotion activation alerts

When a promotion becomes active, the system instantly alerts if the price falls below the floor threshold.

If an alert is generated, a notification is sent to the relevant operators.

b. Real‑time order monitoring

Monitor each SKU’s real‑time order discount price; if it breaches the threshold, the system can issue an alert or block the order.

When the pricing center processes an order and detects a price below the floor, an alert is shown:

Additionally, a global “order‑blocking switch” allows operators to enable or disable automatic order blocking when predefined conditions are met.

3.2.3 Post‑event

a. Historical marketing price analysis

Query historical discount price trends.

Store historical discount data for operational analysis.

b. Price guarantee for xx days

Commit to a low‑price guarantee for a specified period.

c. Minimum price reminders

Show low‑price reminders on product detail pages.

Show low‑price reminders on checkout pages.

Conclusion

By executing the pre‑event and during‑event measures, operators receive timely notifications when issues arise. In extreme cases, the system can block the order to prevent further loss. To avoid “cry‑wolf” fatigue, each alert should be closed‑loop processed, distinguishing between false alarms and genuine promotional configuration problems, ensuring continuous attention and response.