Is changing compare as price to 20% higher to advertise a 20% discount false advertising?

[MagicalCat]

I was going to advertise that my entire shop is on a 20% discount by changing the compare as price to 20% higher. Is this considered false advertising which is illegal?

[1100904]

Thanks,  i.need help

[the-pricing-guy]

@1100904 , happy to help. You can either start by installing our app: https://apps.shopify.com/dash ($5 for early adopters), or by grabbing time on my calendar.

Tim

[1100904]

Please,  yes, i nerd help

[MagicalCat]

Ok, I just updated my list of shopify scripts to include the raising and resetting prices.

They are available on my github: https://gist.github.com/hendersonyang/ce7bf9ba333bdb6101da9d4a0a6aff68

[the-pricing-guy]

Hey @MagicalCat , thanks for sharing your snippet.

Does this script run in a browser when a page is loaded, or is this script run once, offline, directly against the back end?

Assuming the first, here's what I understand: When a page (showing prices) is loaded in a browser, the "fake discount" function quickly updates each comparison price to 1.2 x the list price, and then it saves it to the back end using .trigger("change"). When you want to revert, the "revert" function then recalculates all the comparison prices to equal the list price. Did I get that right?

Here are few comments:

1. If you're insistent on a 20% discount, you would want to multiply by 1.25 rather than 1.2. For example, if you want an $8 product to look discounted by 20%, you'd say the comparison price is $10, which is $8 x 1.25.
2. Assuming this is run in the browser, when a page is loaded, this process is redundant. Person 1 loads a page of prices, and the comparison price is updated. Then person 2 loads, and the same comparison price is calculated again. I assume there is a way to run this once against the back end.
3. When you revert, you might consider updating the comparison prices to '' (empty string) rather than the list price, so that a visitor does not see "price: $8, comparison price: $8". (Not sure, but maybe the comparison price properly disappears altogether if it's empty.)

Anyway, hit me up if you want to talk about strategy. Ultimately, you'll want to analyze whether the fake discount actually increased sales, or if folks were immune to it. Or maybe a 35% does the trick.... In order to separate out that effect from seasonality, competition, layout, and whatever else is going on, you'd want to control the experiment a little more. Our app (https://apps.shopify.com/dash---in beta) is designed to help you with this.

[MagicalCat]

It does not run when the page is loaded, or run automatically. It's completely manual and you paste it when you are editing products on the bulk product edit page. And yes the compare as price disappears when its equal to or less than the price.

I am interested in the strategy for it, and I just messaged you.

[the-pricing-guy]

Hey @MagicalCat ,

I like your strategy, and evidently it's legit. The next question is: how much should you bump the price/discount?

For example, what if you found that $20 $10 leads to tons more sales than $11 $10? (Of course, if the artificial discount looks too good, folks won't fall for it, like $1,000,000 $10.)

I am working on an app that analyzes your past sales/discounts and then optimizes this for you, and would love to hear if it would be useful to you...

[MagicalCat]

Hello! I am doing it by using a browser script. I’m away rn but I will send
it when I get home