In this article:
Market Intelligence is the tool with which you can observe the trends of potential competitors identified by Smartpricing's AI, as well as those you can add manually to build the market that influences your strategy.
The feature is available in the navigation menu under the Market Intelligence item and has two main views, accessible at the top:
- The Market Overview, with which you can track and compare your property with a broad available market.
- The Strategic Market, through which you can make the same comparison, but with your direct competitors, who will also influence your strategy.
Market Overview
The Market Overview page is composed of 3 main areas:
1. Competitor List
During Onboarding, Smartpricing automatically calculates the list of your potential competitors by analyzing various factors, including geographic location, property type, online reviews, offered services, and seasonality. The software constantly monitors market fluctuations and renews the competitor list daily to ensure the information is always up-to-date. The list ranks potential competitors from most to least significant and also indicates the average of reviews collected on OTA platforms. Here you can view the details of each competitor by clicking on their name to see all this additional information.
How do I add more competitors I want to track?
You can expand the list at any time by adding new competitors with a simple click on the Add competitor button, in the top right of the page. The search panel will allow you to add properties through their Booking.com listings. However, it is important to remember that only properties within a 10km radius can be added to the competitor list through this feature.
Once the listing is added to the list, it will take an average of 24 hours for the competitor's data to appear in the charts on the right.
Remember: The changes you make here have no impact on your strategy; that happens through the Strategic Market view further down.
How do I remove competitors from the list?
You can remove competitors from this list by clicking on the 3 dots to the right of each row (...) and selecting Remove from overview.
Competitors generated by Smartpricing, in purple on the list, will remain in the list to be reactivated at a later time, but they will be deactivated in the calculations of the various charts. The menu icons are removed and the background will have a gray color. Below you can see the difference between a deactivated competitor, the first one, and one that is still active, the second one.
Competitors deactivated with this action can be restored by clicking on the arrow to the right of the same row. Competitors added manually, normally highlighted with gray text, will be immediately removed from the list and will no longer be visible.
Always remember to click on Save in the top right of the page to confirm the changes.
2. Competitor Map
The interactive map shows the location of the competitors selected in the previous list and allows direct access to their OTA (Online Travel Agency) page. The map can be expanded to full screen using the arrows in the top right corner.
3. Market Trend
The chart shows the market trend, for both price and occupancy, for the next 12 months, for all properties present in your list.
Prices
The Prices chart shows the price trend of the reference market selected in the Overview, sourced from Booking.com, creating a price band (in pink), with which your price, also from Booking.com, is compared in blue.
Remember: The search compares the cheapest prices that appear on Booking.com from a search for 2 people; it is not a direct comparison between room types.
By placing the cursor on the chart, you can observe the comparison for each day.
Furthermore, it is possible to make a direct comparison, again for a search for 2 people, with a specific competitor. By selecting them in the list on the left, by clicking the checkbox next to their name, you can add their line to the chart and proceed with a price comparison directly on the platform.
Remember: The prices in the chart are updated every 24 hours; they are not live.
Further information on competitor price trends
Competitor prices may appear as a broken line, i.e., with gaps; this means that the room types are not for sale on Booking.com for those dates. They can also appear as dotted lines; this means that the prices have not been updated by the competitor for at least 3 days. The update date is visible by placing the cursor on the page again.
Occupancy Trend
The Occupancy chart, on the other hand, shows the occupancy trend of the reference market selected in the Overview, sourced from Booking.com, creating an occupancy band (in pink), with which your Smartpricing occupancy is compared, in light blue. Direct comparisons with properties are not possible, only the aggregation of data from the reference market.
Strategic Market
The strategic market page works exactly like that of the Market Overview; the most important difference is that the occupancy of the competitors in this list will influence the Market Trend justification in the strategy, which will be positive or negative based on the occupancy trend of your property compared to that of the competitors on the list.
To learn more about how it works, we recommend reading the following article on Strategies: Advanced Settings.
Why is the accuracy of my Strategic Market low?
This bar, initially completely green, represents how much the current market, also following potential removals and additions, is similar to the one initially proposed by Smartpricing and its algorithms. It does not mean that the current list is incorrect, but that it deviates from the one initially proposed, so it's something to always keep in mind.
Sales in my area are not going well for my competitors, why is my Market Trend justification positive?
The Market Trend relates your occupancy with that of the reference market in the Strategic Market list. This means that in any case, if your occupancy is higher than that of the market, the algorithm will increase prices due to your favorable situation.
To learn more about how it works, we recommend reading the following article on Strategies: Advanced Settings.
How do I remove a competitor from a single view?
You can remove competitors from a specific list by clicking on the 3 dots to the right of each row (...), then selecting Remove from overview or Remove from strategic market depending on the necessary changes.