Here's a free idea, and a bit of public prior art to ruin someone else's future patent application.
Some e-commerce these days is based on opaque purchases. This is where you know what you're buying, and the price, but you don't know who from. Examples tend to come from the travel industry, and sites like Priceline, Hotwire and Autoeurope. You know you're flying from Boston to London, and what days, but you don't know the airline or times before you commit yourself. It's very useful for sellers, because they can offload inventory, and the opacity prevents people by-passing the premium that would normally be charged for differentiating features like extra legroom or frequent flyer points.
Here's an alternative version. Say you're looking for a rental car on the Orbitz travel site. Their summary matrix shows the car companies, the cars and prices. You choose the cheapest company at the car size you want, say Hertz. Enter your payment details. And click "buy".
Now here's where things get interesting. Instead of confirming your purchase, you may get a counter-offer from a named competitor, such as Avis. You can't rely on getting such an offer, so you have to be ready to accept the first offer. Avis can keep their advertised prices high, and selectively pick off the customers whom they believe to be price-sensitive. The travel site takes a payment for presenting the counter-offer. Everyone, apart from Hertz, wins.
After all, if markets are conversations, why shouldn't the process of purchasing involve a bit more two-way haggling?
Posted by Martin Geddes at 1:30 PMTrackBack URL for this entry:
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