A repricing strategy should match the job a SKU has this month. If the job is to earn as much as possible per unit on a healthy, well-stocked listing, use a profit-focused strategy. If the job is to hold sales velocity, rank or a reorder rhythm, use a sales-focused strategy. If the job is to turn stock into cash before a deadline, use a liquidation strategy. The same account usually needs all three at once, on different SKUs.
Choosing one strategy for the whole catalog is a costly setup decision, because it applies the right logic to some SKUs and the wrong logic to the rest. This article explains what each strategy optimizes, works through the profit math for each situation, and lists the settings that decide whether any strategy protects your margin.
What is a repricing strategy?
A repricing strategy is the rule that decides which way your price moves, and how far, when conditions on your listing change: a competitor changes price, the Buy Box (the offer Amazon features with the Add to Cart button) moves to another seller, or stock needs to sell by a certain date. Every strategy works inside two limits you set: a minimum price the repricer will never go below, and a maximum price it will never go above.
The strategy decides behavior between those limits. The limits decide the worst and best outcomes the strategy is allowed to produce. Both matter, and they are covered separately below.
Which strategy fits which situation?
| SKU situation | Strategy | What it optimizes | What to watch |
|---|---|---|---|
| Healthy stock, several sellers on the listing, no deadline | Maximize profit | Profit per unit while keeping the Buy Box | Average selling price vs. Buy Box share |
| Sales velocity matters: rank, supplier minimums, steady reorders | Maximize sales | Units sold at a price near the nearest competitor | Net profit per unit at the lower price |
| Aged or excess stock that must sell by a date | Liquidate stock | Selling through remaining units before the target date | Recovery per unit vs. the cost of keeping the stock |
When should you use a profit-focused strategy?
Use it on SKUs where stock is healthy and there is no pressure to move units quickly. The goal is to win the Buy Box at the highest price the listing will bear, rather than the lowest price that still wins.
In sellerboard’s Maximize profit strategy, the price drops when you lose the Buy Box, then steps back up in shrinking increments once you win it, testing how high the price can go before the Buy Box moves away again. Price decreases happen in reaction to changes on the listing: Amazon notifies sellerboard when a competitor moves or the Buy Box changes hands, and the Repricer responds. Price increases run on a schedule, and the time between steps grows as the price climbs.
That timing has a practical consequence: the gain from a profit-focused strategy shows up over days, not hours. Judging it after the first afternoon usually shows only the price drops.
What the recovered cents are worth. Take a SKU selling 400 units a month. If a profit-focused strategy holds an average selling price $0.60 higher than a strategy that stays pinned to the lowest competitor, and the Buy Box share stays roughly the same:
Extra profit per month = 400 units × $0.60 = $240
Extra profit per year = $240 × 12 = $2,880
The per-unit difference looks small on the listing. Across a year and several SKUs, it becomes a significant share of net profit.
When should you use a sales-focused strategy?
Use it when units sold matter more than profit per unit for a period: a product that needs to hold its sales rank, a SKU with a supplier minimum order you need to clear every month, or a launch phase where you have already decided to trade margin for volume.
In sellerboard, Maximize sales tracks the nearest competitor’s price instead of testing higher prices. It still moves the price up when the market allows, but it stays close to the competition rather than probing for the ceiling.
The math to check before choosing it. A sales-focused strategy earns more only if the extra units outweigh the lower profit on every unit. Example: a $24.99 SKU with $5.20 net profit per unit, selling 300 units a month.
| Profit-focused | Sales-focused | |
|---|---|---|
| Average price | $24.99 | $23.99 |
| Net profit per unit | $5.20 | $4.35 (the $1.00 cut, less $0.15 lower referral fee) |
| Units per month | 300 | 360 |
| Net profit per month | $1,560 | $1,566 |
A 20% increase in units only just matches the profit-focused result. The break-even volume is:
Units needed = Current units × Current profit per unit ÷ New profit per unit
300 × $5.20 ÷ $4.35 = 359 units
If you choose a sales-focused strategy, do it because the volume serves a separate goal (rank, supplier terms, a planned reorder), and track net profit per unit so you know what that goal costs each month.
When should you use a liquidation strategy?
Use it when keeping the stock costs more than selling it at a lower price. This is typical for aged inventory approaching Amazon’s aged inventory surcharge thresholds, seasonal stock after its season, and discontinued SKUs taking up capacity you need for better products.
In sellerboard, Liquidate stock works back from a target date you set: the Repricer adjusts the price so the remaining units sell by that date, rather than reacting only to competitors.
Comparing a lower price with the cost of waiting. Example: 250 units of a SKU that normally sells at $18.99 with $3.10 net profit per unit. At the current pace, the stock will take five more months to sell, and each unit costs an estimated $0.55 per month in storage and aged inventory charges (illustrative figure; check your own rates in Seller Central).
Holding cost if you wait = 250 units × $0.55 × 5 months ÷ 2 = $344
(divided by 2 because stock sells down gradually, so on average half the units are still in storage)
Selling everything within six weeks at $16.99 lowers profit per unit to about $1.40 (the $2.00 cut, less $0.30 lower referral fee). Total profit on the batch:
Wait: 250 × $3.10 − $344 = $431
Liquidate: 250 × $1.40 − $103 holding cost over six weeks = $247
In this example waiting still earns more, so liquidation is the wrong call unless the capital or storage space is needed for something that earns more than the $184 difference. Change one input, such as a surcharge tier the stock is about to cross, and the answer flips. Run the numbers before switching a SKU to liquidation, not after.
What decides whether any strategy protects your margin?
The minimum price. Every strategy will reach its floor on some days. In sellerboard, the calculated minimum price can be based on COGS (cost of goods sold, what you paid per unit) plus a markup, on ROI or on margin, and a minimum price you enter manually for a single product always overrides the formula in the repricing profile. The floor needs to cover every cost a sale carries, not only the purchase price. How to build that floor per SKU is covered in our article on the repricer minimum price.
The maximum price. A ceiling stops the price from climbing to a level that damages conversion or looks wrong to shoppers. As an additional safeguard, the sellerboard Repricer never raises a price more than 50% above the Was Price, which is the median price of the product over the last 90 days.
Who you compete with. The Repricer can compete with all offers on the listing or only with offers that use the same fulfillment method as yours. The second option is typically used for FBM (merchant-fulfilled) offers that should not chase FBA prices. Sellers whose rating is much worse than yours are left out of the competitor set, because Amazon rarely features them anyway.
Does repricing work for private label products?
Partly. A repricer compares your offer with other offers on the same listing. Private label products usually compete with other products, not with other offers on their own listing, and that kind of competition is outside what the sellerboard Repricer does.
When you are the only seller on a listing, the Repricer adjusts the price based on sales velocity instead: it takes the velocity at the moment repricing starts as the baseline, lowers the price slightly if velocity drops and raises it if sales are very strong. That can help a private label seller test price sensitivity, but it is a different job from winning the Buy Box on a shared listing.
Best practices
- Assign strategies per SKU, based on the job the SKU has this month. Revisit the assignment when stock level, season or competition changes.
- Set the minimum price before choosing a strategy. The strategy only works inside the floor, and a floor below break-even turns any strategy into a loss on bad days.
- Give a profit-focused strategy several days before judging it. Increases run on a schedule, decreases react immediately.
- Write down why a SKU is on a sales-focused strategy. Rank, supplier terms or a launch. When that reason no longer applies, move it back.
- Calculate the holding cost before liquidating. Liquidation is right when waiting costs more than the discount, not whenever stock feels slow.
- Check net profit per unit monthly, per SKU. Buy Box share and units sold can both improve while profit falls.
Common mistakes
- One strategy for the whole catalog. Fits some SKUs and costs money on the rest.
- Leaving a SKU on liquidation after the stock problem is solved. The strategy keeps pushing the price down with no reason to.
- Using a sales-focused strategy by default. Volume looks healthy on a dashboard while profit per unit shrinks.
- Judging a strategy on revenue. Revenue can rise while net profit falls, especially after a price cut.
- Competing on all channels with an FBM offer that cannot match FBA delivery. The price follows offers that the customer and Amazon value differently.
FAQ
What is the best Amazon repricing strategy? There isn’t one for every SKU. A profit-focused strategy suits well-stocked competitive listings, a sales-focused strategy suits SKUs where volume serves a specific goal, and a liquidation strategy suits stock that is cheaper to sell at a discount than to keep.
Can I use different strategies for different products? Yes, and you should. Assign the strategy per SKU based on stock level, season and what you need the product to do.
How fast does a repricer react to competitors? In sellerboard, price decreases react to change notifications from Amazon, so they follow competitor moves closely. Price increases run on a schedule, with longer intervals as the price climbs.
Will the Repricer ever go below my minimum price? In sellerboard, no. The minimum price is a hard limit. What it protects depends on whether the floor itself covers your full cost per unit.
Should I switch aged stock to a liquidation strategy? Only if the cost of keeping the stock (storage, aged inventory charges, tied-up capital) is higher than the profit you give up with the lower price. Calculate both before switching.
Conclusion
A repricing strategy is a decision about what a SKU should achieve, made in advance and applied automatically. Assign it per product, set the floor and ceiling first, give each strategy enough time to show its effect, and measure the result in net profit per unit rather than Buy Box share or revenue.
sellerboard’s Repricer is available on all marketplaces and included in all plans, with the three strategies described above. Because it runs on the same product costs sellerboard already uses for your profit dashboard, the minimum price reflects the COGS and fees you have already set up, and the dashboard shows whether each strategy is earning what you expected.
Fee and charge figures in the examples are illustrative. Last verified September 2026; confirm current rates in Seller Central.
