Dynamic Geographical Pricing Zones | Optimize Service Pricing Based on Location

In an increasingly global marketplace, adopting sophisticated pricing strategies to adapt to geographic differences can powerfully drive both profitability and customer satisfaction. Recognizing the need for this granularity in pricing, especially in the field service industry, OctopusPro introduces the Dynamic Geo-Pricing Zones feature.

Harnessing the capabilities of Map Drawing Tools, OctopusPro allows you to design and validate specific Geo-Pricing Zones. This enables you to align your prices with the particularities of localized market conditions, striking a balance between competitiveness and profitability. Moreover, our dynamic pricing feature immediately updates the service cost when customers input their location, promoting transparency and customer confidence in your pricing mechanism.

By leveraging the Dynamic Geo-Pricing Zones feature, you can:

1. Deliver location-tailored services with accurate pricing.
2. Adjust prices based on demand, cost of living, or competition in different regions.
3. Enhance customer satisfaction by offering competitive pricing based on their location.
4. Increase profitability by aligning your prices with local market conditions.

This guide will provide a detailed walkthrough on how to apply price zones to your services, set price zones to custom fields, and manage the appearance of these price zones across various interfaces within OctopusPro.

Table of Contents

• How to Set a Geographical Pricing Zone for a Specific Service
• Assigning Geo-Pricing Zones to a New Service
• Implementing Geo-Pricing Zones for Custom Field Values
• Setting Geo-Pricing Zones for Custom Fields
• Visibility of Geo-Pricing Zones: Admins, Fieldworkers, and Customers
  • Admin Perspective: During Booking Creation
  • On the Fieldworkers’ App While Creating a Booking
  • Customer Perspective: Booking via Customer Portal

To highlight the potential of this feature, let’s explore its benefits and use cases in various field service sectors:

Healthcare Services: Costs in healthcare services can drastically vary based on location due to diverse living costs, operational expenses, or local regulations. For example, an in-home care provider in an urban area might need to charge more than a provider in a rural area due to higher living costs and operational expenses. The Geo-Pricing Zones feature allows you to adjust your prices to reflect these differences, maintaining a balance between service affordability and business profitability.

Legal Consultation Services: Legal consultants often have to consider factors like travel expenses, local competition, and the economic condition of a region when pricing their services. By implementing Geo-Pricing Zones, they can adjust their consultation fees based on these parameters. A lawyer, for example, could charge higher fees for a consultation in a metropolitan area compared to a suburban or rural area.

Specialized Technical Support: Companies offering specialized technical support such as IT or machinery repairs can benefit significantly from geographical pricing. These services often involve substantial travel or logistics costs. Adjusting prices based on the customer’s location can help maintain profitability even when operational costs are higher in certain regions.

Home Improvement and Renovation Services: Companies offering home improvement or renovation services may have to deal with differing labor and material costs based on location. Geo-pricing allows such businesses to adjust their prices according to regional cost variations, ensuring fair prices for customers and a reasonable profit margin for the business.

Getting Started

Implementing the Geo-Pricing Zones feature involves setting up geometrically defined zones for dynamic service pricing. Here’s the general process:

1. Use Google Maps Drawing Tools: Administrators can draw shapes representing service areas or zones on Google Maps using the Drawing Tools from Google Maps API.
2. Store the Drawn Shape: Once the shape is drawn, the coordinates defining the polygon are captured using Google’s Geometry Library. These points are stored in your database linked to the service pricing for the corresponding area.
3. Identify User Location: Google Maps’ Geolocation API identifies the location of a customer when they select a service.
4. Check if the Location is within a Specific Zone: The Google Maps Geometry Library’s ‘containsLocation()’ method verifies if the customer’s location lies within the polygon you have drawn.
5. Apply Zone-Specific Pricing: If the user’s location is within a specific zone, the pricing associated with that zone is applied.
6. Update Price Dynamically: The service price is dynamically updated on the user interface based on the zone pricing you have applied.

By implementing this feature, you can tailor your pricing strategy to regional differences, cost of living, competitive landscape, and other factors, optimizing your profitability while enhancing your service quality.

Including Multiple Areas within a Price Zone

One of the enhancements provided by our engineers is the ability to select multiple areas on a map within one pricing zone. There is no restriction based on states or cities, giving you the freedom to create a pricing strategy that fits your business model. For example, a business operating in multiple locations within a city can define these separate locations as one zone and apply the same pricing strategy.

Use Cases

Here are some examples of how businesses can leverage the Geo-Pricing Zones feature:

• Hyperlocal Marketing: Businesses can use geo-pricing to attract customers in specific neighborhoods or regions. For example, a local coffee shop might offer special discounts to customers in its immediate vicinity to drive foot traffic.
• Peak Hour Pricing: Businesses like ride-hailing services or restaurants can use geo-pricing to adjust prices during peak hours in busy locations. For example, prices could be raised during rush hour in business districts.
• Competition-Based Pricing: Retailers can adjust prices based on their competition in different regions. For instance, a fashion retailer can set lower prices in zones where there’s fierce competition from other fashion brands and higher prices in zones where they have a unique offering.
• Economic Variations: Businesses can adjust prices in zones based on the economic conditions of that area. Luxury retailers can set higher pricing zones in affluent neighborhoods, while discount retailers can set lower pricing zones in less affluent neighborhoods.
• Event-Based Pricing: Event-driven businesses like food trucks or pop-up shops can increase prices in zones where large events or festivals are happening. For instance, a food truck may increase prices at a popular music festival due to high demand.
• Environmental Impact Pricing: Companies wishing to encourage environmentally friendly behaviors, such as using public transportation, could set lower prices in zones that are closer to public transit stops. For example, a bicycle rental service could offer lower prices for customers located near bike-friendly paths or public transit hubs.

Conclusion

Our Geo-Pricing Zones feature provides businesses with an innovative tool for dynamic service pricing based on real-time geographic locations. By offering the flexibility to set pricing in alignment with a multitude of factors, from local market conditions to special events, it equips businesses to optimize profitability while enhancing customer satisfaction.

Whether you operate a local restaurant aiming to attract customers in your immediate vicinity, a ride-hailing service adjusting prices during peak hours, or a retailer tailoring prices to match competition and economic conditions, Geo-Pricing Zones presents an efficient and intelligent pricing solution.

If you have any questions or require further assistance, please feel free to contact our support team. We are here to assist you. Enjoy the freedom and precision that Geo-Pricing Zones offers to your pricing strategy!

How to Set a Geographical Pricing Zone for a Specific Service

Want to offer differential pricing for your services based on geographic location? Here’s how you can implement Geo-Pricing Zones for a particular service with OctopusPro:

Steps:

1. From the main dashboard, click on “Settings.”
2. Choose “Service Settings.”
3. Select “Services.”
4. Identify the service you want to assign a price zone to and click on “Price Zones.”
5. Provide a name for the zone and select the geographic locations that belong to this zone. Then, enter the service’s unit price for this specific zone.
6. Repeat these steps for each zone where your service has a different price.
7. Click on “Save.”

After these steps, the adjusted price for the service will automatically apply when a customer selects their location during the booking process.

Example: Let’s say you’re offering legal consultation services at a standard rate of $150 per hour. However, in bustling metropolitan areas, where your operational costs are higher, you wish to charge $175 per hour. To implement this, create a new zone including these areas, like Manhattan or Downtown Los Angeles, and set the new unit price of $175. Consequently, when a client books a consultation and chooses a location within these zones, the unit price will reflect the adjusted rate of $175, maintaining your profitability despite the higher operating costs.

Assigning Geo-Pricing Zones to a New Service

OctopusPro allows you to designate a Geo-Pricing Zone during the creation of a new service or while editing an existing one, helping you to account for geographic cost differences from the outset. Here’s how you can do this:

Steps:

1. Access “Settings” from your dashboard.
2. Navigate to “Service Settings.”
3. Click on “Services.”
4. Either choose to “Create New” service or “Edit” an existing service.
5. While detailing your service under the “Cost & Payrate” tab, find the “Set service cost zone” section and click “Manage zones.”

By setting up Geo-Pricing Zones during the service creation phase, you can ensure location-based pricing is factored in from the beginning. This could be particularly useful for services that may incur higher costs in specific areas. For example, high-end real estate inspection services might involve higher travel and personnel expenses in luxury neighborhoods or gated communities. By incorporating these variations upfront, you avoid flat rates that might hamper your profit margins in costlier areas.

Implementing Geo-Pricing Zones for Custom Field Values

Some services may have custom fields that influence the service’s price. OctopusPro allows you to set Geo-Pricing Zones for these specific custom field values, ensuring price accuracy. Here’s how you can do this:

Steps:

1. Go to “Settings.”
2. Choose “Service Settings.”
3. Select “Services.”
4. Click on “Manage Custom Fields.”
5. Under a particular custom field, click on “Value Price Zones.”
6. Select the custom field value, provide a zone name, pick the locations for this zone, and specify the unit price.
7. Repeat these steps for all zones and corresponding attribute values.
8. Click on “Save.”

This granular level of control is a game-changer in industries where additional factors can significantly influence the cost of service. For instance, in IT consulting, an on-site visit’s cost might depend on the specific systems or hardware requiring attention, which could vary greatly depending on the client’s location. Setting Geo-Pricing Zones for these custom field values allows for more nuanced and accurate pricing.

Setting Geo-Pricing Zones for Custom Fields

To further enhance your pricing strategy, OctopusPro enables you to set Geo-Pricing Zones specifically to custom fields. Here’s your step-by-step guide:

Steps:

1. Access “Settings” > “Service Settings” > “Services.”
2. On the services page, click “Manage custom fields” next to the service for which you wish to edit the custom field.
3. You will be redirected to the custom fields page. Click on “Prize zones” to edit the custom field, or click on “Value price zones” to modify each custom field value.
4. On the custom field price zone page, you can:
   1. Select the custom field value from the drop-down menu.
   2. Enter your zone name.
   3. Use the map tool to draw and select the desired areas.
   4. Specify the unit price to be applied when this value is selected.
5. Click “Save” to finalize your changes.

Once saved, the zone will appear below, and you can edit or delete it as needed. This feature can be incredibly beneficial for more complex services. For example, a private medical clinic might offer home visit services involving different kinds of medical procedures, each with distinct equipment, personnel, and associated costs. By applying Geo-Pricing Zones to these custom fields, they can more accurately reflect the various factors impacting their pricing.

Visibility of Geo-Pricing Zones: Admins, Fieldworkers, and Customers

Admin Perspective: During Booking Creation

Once Geo-Pricing Zones are set for a custom field, these zones impact the pricing displayed during the booking process for the associated service. Here’s how it works:

1. Navigate to “Booking” > “Create new” via the sidebar menu on the left. Scroll down and click “Add service,” selecting a service from the pop-up menu.
2. When adding a customer whose location falls within a specific zone, the custom field’s price will adapt accordingly.

For instance, imagine you’re a firm offering legal consultation services. You have different rates for in-person meetings based on the client’s location due to the varying commute times and expenses. As an admin, when you create a booking for a client in a higher-priced zone (say, an area known for heavy traffic), the system would automatically reflect the adjusted cost on the booking form.

Fieldworker Perspective: During Booking Creation

The Geo-Pricing Zone also comes into play when fieldworkers create a booking. If a fieldworker selects a customer whose location is in a designated zone, the booking process would look like this:

1. Navigate to “Bookings” > “Create a new booking.”
2. Proceed through the booking steps until the custom field, then select the appropriate response. The added price, considering the customer’s location within the price zone, will appear.

For example, an engineer working for an industrial equipment maintenance company may be creating a booking for a client whose factory is located in a remote industrial zone. The travel costs and time for servicing such locations would be higher, and this would be automatically factored into the booking price when the fieldworker sets up the appointment.

Customer Perspective: Booking via Customer Portal