How to diagnose pricing problems in your e-commerce store?

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Find out where you’re losing margin.
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Diagnosis — analysis of your pricing, margin and competitive position

Written prescription — 3–5 concrete recommendations within 24h of the session

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Why margin falls despite growing revenue

Revenue grows. Margin shrinks. The team is working harder than ever and the bottom line is flat or slightly in the red. Sound familiar? For most e-commerce managers this isn’t a hypothetical — it’s a description of the last quarter. The problem rarely sits where people look for it. It isn’t “a tough market” or “expensive marketing”. In 9 out of 10 cases we see in Pricing Doctor sessions, the root cause is somewhere nobody’s watching: in cost assumptions, in the role of a sales channel, in one pricing rule applied across the whole catalogue.
This article walks through 5 patterns we’ve seen repeatedly in practice. If one of them sounds like your store, you already have part of the answer: a name for the problem.

5 most common pricing mistakes in e-commerce

1. You sell on 5 channels but don’t know how much you make on each

The store is scaling across channels: own site, Allegro, Amazon DE, MediaMarkt, ManoMano. Pricing is built on cost of goods, an assumed margin, and a “rough” view of marketplace fees. On paper, margin is positive. In practice, environmental fees, electronics surcharges, fulfilment, and returns on specific markets quietly eat the result.

What it costs you: You scale sales and you scale the loss. Every new channel that “opens up” deepens the problem instead of solving it. You make growth decisions on revenue, not on profit.
How to spot it: Your P&L per channel isn’t calculated monthly. You can’t say whether ManoMano FR is profitable. Your last review of marketplace fees was more than six months ago. A 20% sales increase didn’t translate into a margin increase.

2. Your own store is losing to your own Allegro listing

The company deliberately runs different pricing strategies on different channels. On Allegro — aggressive price competition, minimum prices, high visibility. On the own store — the same minimum prices, but without accounting for the Allegro commission as a real cost. The result: prices on the own store end up higher than on Allegro under the same brand.
What it costs you: Classic channel cannibalisation. A customer who lands on your own store finds the same product cheaper on Allegro — yours. Sales shift to the more expensive channel (commissions, ads), the cheaper own store loses orders, and you still carry the fixed costs. You sell more and earn less.
How to spot it: Own-store sales drop, marketplace sales grow, total margin falls. Customers ask “why is it more expensive on your site than on Allegro?”. You don’t have defined channel roles (acquisition vs monetisation).

3. You have a strategy, but nobody has time to execute it

The e-commerce manager knows everything that matters: which products are traffic builders, where the margin sits, that private label drives higher profitability. The backlog of important-and-urgent items is long. They ask for a headcount, they get a tools budget. The company brags about “great revenue with one person and automations”. That efficiency blocks growth.
What it costs you: The strategy exists in the manager’s head and in a deck — but not in the store. No cross-sell on the product card, no cart pop-ups, no real push behind private label. The customer buys the cheap, low-margin item and leaves.
How to spot it: Your backlog of “important things to ship” is older than six months. You know what would lift margin, and you haven’t shipped it for a quarter. You invest in traffic, not in what happens to that traffic after it lands.

4. You have the data, but no decisions

A technologically mature store — several automation tools, dashboards, reports, alerts. From the outside, “data-driven”. In reality, every system runs in its own silo without a shared logic. Pricing reacts to competitors but ignores product roles, doesn’t see the cross-sell, doesn’t support private label. Prices “win the ranking” and lose the result.
What it costs you: Instead of removing decision load, automation generates chaos. Strong traffic KPIs, weak profitability, constant manual firefighting on exceptions. You
lose trust in your own systems and go back to Excel.
How to spot it: You have several tools for price and margin analysis, but they don’t answer the question “what should we do tomorrow?”. Your people override automatic
decisions more often than they trust them. The algorithm fights on price where it shouldn’t, and doesn’t fight where it should.

5. Imports look great until the real costs land

A customer is planning to import from China. The maths: supplier price + transport full landed cost. Margin on top. Missing: customs duty, import VAT, the relationship between them (customs value = price + transport, duty calculated on customs value, VAT on the base = customs value + duty). The minimum selling price is calculated from an understated landed cost — pricing is wrong from day one.

What it costs you: The loss isn’t visible on a single transaction. It surfaces in the quarterly result, when customs invoices and the import VAT settlement arrive. You scale sales below real cost — and you don’t see it for a quarter.
How to spot it: You import, but your sheet has no separate line for duty and import VAT. Your “cost of goods” in the system is supplier price + transport. The quarterly result is worse than the per-transaction result summed up by hand. If any of these patterns sounds like your store, the next step is to name the problem on real data. Dealavo helps e-commerce managers calculate real margin per SKU per channel — you can see the tool in action on a free demo.

How to recognise that your store has a pricing problem

A short list of 7 warning signs. Three or more ticked — you have a pricing problem, even if your quarterly numbers don’t show it yet.

• Margin falls despite growing revenue. The most common and most misleading signal — because the board looks at revenue.
• You manage prices with one rule across the whole catalogue (e.g. “20% margin”, “MSRP minus 5%”).
• You don’t know which sales channel is profitable after all costs (commissions, ads, returns, environmental fees).
• You have more than 500 SKUs and you set prices manually or semi-manually in a spreadsheet.
• Ad spend is growing faster than sales.
• No cross-sell on the product card and in the cart — even though you know you need one.
• Your top sellers and your top margin items are two different lists — and your attention is on the first one.

If you tick five or more, this isn’t a single problem. It’s a system that needs a review — a proper pricing health check.

What to do once you’ve recognised the problem? Three paths

The choice depends on the size of the store, the time available, and how much of the diagnosis you want to do yourself.

Path 1 — On your own: internal audit

Cheapest option, most time-consuming. Works if someone on your team can step out of day-to-day work for a week. What to check:

1. Calculate real margin per SKU per channel after all costs (commissions, fulfilment, ads, returns, extra fees). Not price minus cost of goods — the full calculation.
2. Split the catalogue into product roles: traffic builders (KVIs), margin drivers, long tail, dead stock. Each group needs different pricing logic.
3. Do a competitive price review on the top 100 SKUs (they usually drive 70% of revenue). Even manually, even once.
4. Verify your cost assumptions — especially if you import or have new markets in play.

That gives you the diagnosis. Execution is a separate conversation.

Path 2 — With a tool: automated analysis

The next step up. A tool for automated price analysis and margin tracking takes repetitive work off the team — daily checks on competitors, margin after costs, signalling deviations. The human decides, the system collects and presents the data.

Good path if you know what you’re looking for and just need scale. Worse if the problem itself hasn’t been named yet — a tool without a strategy (see pattern 4) generates chaos, not a solution.

Path 3 — With an expert: external diagnosis

The fastest route to naming the problem. Someone from outside looks with fresh eyes, knows 50 similar cases, and in 30 minutes can say: “this isn’t a price problem, it’s a channel-role problem.” This path makes sense when you don’t know where to start — or when you do, but you want validation before you invest in a tool or a hire.

This is where Pricing Doctor comes in.

Book a Pricing Doctor session

A free 30-minute diagnosis of your pricing problem. Fill in the form — a Dealavo consultant will reach out within 30 minutes to confirm fit and set the session date with the expert.

Pricing Doctor — free diagnosis in 30 minutes

Pricing Doctor is a format of 30-minute 1-on-1 sessions with a Dealavo pricing expert. The session is entirely about your store and your specific problem. Not a demo. Not a generic pricing training. A diagnosis.

How it works — 3 steps

1. Sign-up. You fill in a short form with details of your store and a description of the problem. Within 30 minutes a Dealavo consultant calls to confirm fit and set the session date.
2. Online session — 30 minutes. The expert prepares for your case individually, based on the form and the consultant’s notes. No slides. Asks, listens, diagnoses.
3. After the session. You receive a written summary by email with the expert’s recommendations — what to change, where to start, what to watch out for. It’s a diagnosis summary, not a full report or implementation plan.

What you get after the session

A written summary with the expert’s recommendations. The document: 3–5 steps to implement in your store, tailored to what the expert heard.

Pricing Doctor vs webinar vs demo — comparison

Who Pricing Doctor is for

Yes if:

• You run an e-commerce store with 500+ SKUs.
• Margin is falling despite growing revenue and you don’t know why.
• You manage prices manually or with one rule for the whole catalogue.
• You have a specific question about the pricing strategy of your store.

No, if:

• You’re looking for general pricing knowledge (Dealavo webinars cover that).
• You want to see a tool demo (different contact — link at the bottom).
• You expect a full implementation in 30 minutes.
• You don’t have a store or products to analyse yet.

FAQ — frequently asked questions

How do I check whether I have a pricing problem in e-commerce?

Three fastest signals: (1) margin falls despite growing revenue, (2) you don’t know which sales channel is profitable after full costs, (3) you manage prices with one rule across a 500+ SKU catalogue. If you tick two of three — you have a pricing problem. The full list of 7 warning signs is in the section above.

What is a pricing diagnosis?

A pricing diagnosis is a review of the pricing strategy of an online store that answers the question “where is the margin leaking?”. At minimum it covers: real margin per SKU per channel (after all costs), product roles (traffic builders, margin drivers, long tail), channel cannibalisation, and cost assumptions. A diagnosis isn’t an implementation — it’s naming the problem and listing concrete steps. This is what a proper pricing strategy audit does

Is 30 minutes enough to diagnose a pricing problem?

Enough for a diagnosis — not for an implementation. In 30 minutes the expert names the problem (often a different one than you thought), points out 3–5 concrete steps, and tells you what you can do yourself and what needs tools or a team. Implementation is a separate conversation, which you can run with Dealavo, with another supplier, or internally — that’s how to fix ecommerce pricing in practice, step by step.

How is Pricing Doctor different from Dealavo webinars?

Webinars are general education — pricing knowledge for a broad audience. Pricing Doctor is an individual diagnosis — 30 minutes focused entirely on your store. The expert knows your sign-up before the session, asks about specific data, and leaves you with a specific prescription, not a presentation for everyone

Who runs the Pricing Doctor sessions?

Sessions are led by Dealavo pricing experts specialising in different markets and types of e-commerce: Polish market and Allegro, international multichannel (Amazon, eBay, UK marketplaces), DACH market and FMCG. The Dealavo consultant matches the expert to your case after reviewing your sign-up.

Start with a diagnosis — not with another price drop

30 minutes about your store only. A written summary after the session. No sales presentation. If you’d rather see the tool the expert will reference during the session first — order a free Dealavo Smart Prices demo.