MAP monitoring and MSRP compliance
Find out which reseller advertises below your MAP, since when and by how much. Daily channel monitoring with seller names and price history.
If you're a brand or distributor, the question isn't whether the channel respects your MAP. It's who doesn't, since when and by how much. Turbodato captures the advertised price of your products every day on every channel where they appear, records which seller listed it, and alerts you when someone crosses the threshold you set.
The difference from checking by hand is that a violation doesn't show up in a single snapshot. A reseller 20% below MAP on a Tuesday could be a 24-hour promo or the third month of a sustained position, and those are two different problems with two different responses. You can only tell them apart with history.
What it solves
The seller's name, not just the price. "Someone is listing it cheap" isn't actionable. On Amazon or Walmart Marketplace the same product is offered by dozens of sellers, and what you need to have the conversation is the name, the date and the number.
Compliance rate per reseller. The percentage of days each one advertised at or above MAP. It's the metric that turns "the channel doesn't respect our pricing" into a short list of three names.
Depth and duration of the violation. 3% below isn't the same as 25% below, and one stray day isn't the same as three weeks. The two dimensions are measured separately because they call for different responses.
Who moved first and who followed. The price history shows which seller dropped first and which ones reacted afterwards. That's the difference between the source of the problem and the sellers who got dragged along, and it keeps you from having the wrong conversation with the wrong person.
Exception-based alerts. You write rules in plain language ("tell me if anyone advertises more than 5% below MAP for more than two days in a row") and they arrive by email or webhook. The threshold and the persistence are what filter out the noise of short promos.
Dated evidence. Every violation is documented with the day, the price and the gap against MAP. That's what turns a complaint to the channel into a fact rather than a perception.
MSRP and MAP
They're different things, and it's worth keeping them apart before you write your policy:
- MSRP (manufacturer's suggested retail price) is the price the brand recommends to consumers. It's a recommendation: the reseller sets its own final price.
- MAP (Minimum Advertised Price) is the lowest price at which the brand asks that the product be advertised. It covers advertising, not the sale itself, and in the US it's typically set as a unilateral policy by the brand.
The distinction matters for monitoring because the advertised price is visible to anyone and can be verified objectively from the outside, while the final price of a transaction can't. That's why a policy built on advertised price is the one you can back up with data.
A necessary caveat: dictating the price at which a reseller must sell raises legal questions that depend on jurisdiction and on how the policy is structured, and coordinating prices between competitors is flatly illegal. Turbodato observes and documents advertised prices, which are public information. It isn't legal advice: if you're going to formalize a MAP policy, review it with your counsel.
The full framework (why MAP breaks down, which metrics to track and how to escalate the conversation with the channel) is in the guide on MAP pricing.
How you get started
- Scope. Which SKUs, which channels and which resellers are in. Start with the products where MAP really matters for your channel's margin, not with the whole catalog.
- Matching. We load your catalog and match it to the channel's listings. It's the heavy lifting and only happens once: exceptions get reviewed and stay fixed.
- Thresholds. We define what counts as a violation in your case (how far below and for how many days) and load your MAP price list.
- Routine. Who looks at the board, how often, and what happens when an alert fires. Without this, the system becomes a board nobody opens.
Who it's for
- Brands distributing through marketplaces and retailers, where the advertised price erodes without anyone watching it systematically.
- Distributors that maintain a price list across their own network of resellers.
- Sales teams that already know there's a channel problem but have nothing to document it with when it's time for the conversation.
If besides enforcing MAP you need to compare your own price against your competitors', that's covered in competitor price monitoring.
Is a competitor beating you on price right now?
Leave your email and a link to your store or your Amazon listings. Within 48 hours we'll send you a report with how many sellers compete for your products, who's cheaper and which listings are losing you the Buy Box.
Got it
We'll send your report within 48 to 72 business hours. If you want to tell us what to look at first, write to santiago@turbodato.com.
Frequently asked questions
How do I find out who is violating my MAP policy?
You need four things together: coverage of every channel where your product appears (not just authorized ones, because violations usually start on marketplaces), seller identification in addition to price, daily capture so short price drops don't slip past you, and history to tell a one-off deviation from a sustained position. With all four, detection no longer depends on someone checking by hand.
Can you monitor MAP compliance?
Yes, and it's the cleanest case to measure, because MAP covers the advertised price and the advertised price is visible to anyone. Monitoring records the price each seller advertises every day and compares it against the MAP you loaded.
How often is data captured?
Daily. That's the minimum frequency that works for this use case: price drops on marketplaces tend to be short-lived, and those are exactly the ones you want to catch. During events like Black Friday, Cyber Monday or Prime Day, frequency can be increased for those days.
Does it work on Amazon?
Yes, and it's the channel where it's used most. The same product shows up as several listings, in packs of different sizes, offered by dozens of sellers, so recording the seller is essential. The details are in how to monitor prices on Amazon.
Is it legal to monitor the prices my resellers advertise?
Prices published on an online store are public information, and recording them is standard business practice. What has legal limits is dictating resale prices, and what's flatly illegal is coordinating prices between competitors. Watching the advertised price in your own channel and managing the business relationship with that information is a different thing. For anything about how to structure or enforce your policy, talk to counsel.
What do I do when I find a violation?
First, understand the cause: often it's a misconfigured automated repricer and the reseller doesn't know they're breaking your MAP. Then reach out with concrete data (date, price and gap), which is usually enough. If it persists, you have the usual commercial levers your policy spells out. And if half a dozen resellers are consistently below MAP, it's worth asking whether the problem is the channel or a MAP that's out of line with the market.
How much does it cost?
It depends on how many products, channels and resellers are in scope, so it's quoted for your case. A thirty-minute call with your catalog and your list of channels on the table is enough to get a number.