How Do I Find Out What My Competitors Charge?

You find out what competitors charge by looking at what they publish (menus, price lists, booking pages, quotes in reviews) and by asking them directly as a customer would; you find out what their customers complain about by reading their Google, Yelp and Facebook reviews and sorting the complaints into repeating themes. Both jobs take a few hours, not a marketing degree — and you can do them with a notebook, a browser and one phone call.

Below is the step-by-step version, with examples from a barbershop, a bakery and a gym, plus an honest look at where this gets hard and what doesn't work.

Where do competitors actually publish their prices?

Most small businesses publish prices somewhere, even if they don't mean to. Start with the places customers already look:

• Their own website — a menu, services page, class schedule or "prices" page. Check the footer and FAQ too; small shops often hide a price list there.
• Google Business Profile — the panel that appears when you search their name. Look at the photos: a barbershop often has a price board on the wall, a bakery has a menu card in the window, a gym posts a membership flyer.
• Booking and ordering pages — online booking tools, delivery apps, and reservation platforms usually show the price before checkout.
• Social media — pinned posts, story highlights, and the "services" tab on Facebook or Instagram.
• Reviews — customers write things like "€18 for a fade, fair" or "membership went up to €45 a month." These are real numbers, dated, and free.

Write down what you find with the date next to it. Prices change, and a price from two years ago is not evidence of anything.

How do I get prices that aren't published anywhere?

Plenty of businesses — a plumber, a personal trainer, a wedding bakery — quote per job and never post a number. The reliable method is to become a customer for ten minutes:

1. Call or message as a normal customer. Ask the exact question a customer would: "What do you charge for a standard men's cut?" or "How much for a birthday cake for 20 people?" Don't pretend to be someone you're not, and don't lie about booking.
2. Ask for the range, not just the number. "What's the usual range?" gets you a low and a high, which is more useful than one quote.
3. Ask what's included. A €30 gym month with a joining fee and a 12-month contract is not the same as a €40 month you can cancel anytime.
4. Note how fast and how well they answered. That's free information about their service, and often a place you can beat them.

Do this for three to five competitors, not fifteen. You're looking for the pattern, not a census.

What should I put in a competitor price tracker?

A single page or spreadsheet beats scattered notes. Keep it small enough that you'll actually update it. Here's a workable shape:

Update it every few months, or whenever a customer mentions a competitor's price.

How do I find what their customers complain about?

Reviews are the honest version of a competitor's business. Read the two- and three-star reviews first — one-star reviews are often about a single bad day, and five-star reviews rarely mention problems. Then sort what you read into themes.

• Where to look: Google reviews, Facebook recommendations, Yelp, Trustpilot, and niche sites (a gym may be reviewed on ClassPass, a bakery on a local food group).
• How many to read: the last 30 to 50 reviews is usually enough to see the pattern.
• How to sort: make four columns — waiting time, price/value, staff and service, quality of the thing itself. Tally mentions. Three people complaining about slow service is a pattern; one is a mood.
• Copy the exact words. "Waited 40 minutes past my appointment" is more useful than "bad service," because it tells you what to fix and what to promise in your own marketing.

Example: a bakery's reviews keep saying the bread is great but the shop closes early on Saturdays. That's not a reason to copy them — it's a reason to put your Saturday hours in large type on your own site.

What do I do with what I found?

Information is only worth the change it causes. Turn your notes into three short lists:

1. Where you're priced wrong. If you're 30% above everyone nearby, either say clearly why (longer appointment, better products) or move. If you're well below, you're probably leaving money on the table.
2. The complaint you can fix cheaply. If competitors are slammed and can't answer the phone, being the one who answers is a real advantage — and it's free.
3. The sentence for your own website. "Same-day appointments, evenings until 8" answers a complaint customers are already writing about your competitors.

Keep it to three changes. A page of findings nobody acts on is just homework.

Can software do this reading for me?

Yes, partly — and it's worth knowing where the line is. Reading a competitor's public pages and reviews is exactly the kind of repetitive reading a tool can speed up. Agentica (ai-biz.dev) has a research agent that reads competitors' prices, hours and Google reviews from the web and cites the URLs it used, so you can check each number yourself. It's built for small businesses that already have a website, and it works from what's publicly stated — it won't call a competitor and pretend to be a customer, and it won't invent a price that isn't written down anywhere.

What it doesn't replace: your judgment about which complaints matter, and the phone call that gets you a real quote. If you'd rather do the whole thing by hand, the steps above work fine without any software.

What doesn't work, and where this gets hard

Be honest with yourself about the limits before you spend a weekend on it:

• Old prices mislead. A price list from three years ago can be 20% off. Always date your findings.
• Reviews are skewed. Angry customers write more than happy ones, and some businesses ask for reviews aggressively. Read the pattern, not the average score.
• One quote is not a price list. A single phone call gets you one person's answer on one day. Ask two or three times, or ask for the range.
• Don't copy a competitor's price. Their costs, rent and staffing aren't yours. Use their number as a reference point, then price from your own numbers.
• Don't fake being a customer to get secrets. Asking a normal question is fine; pretending to book a wedding to see a contract is not, and it's a bad way to start a relationship in a small town.
• This doesn't guarantee you customers. Knowing the market helps you make better decisions; it doesn't make the phone ring by itself.

Frequently asked questions

How long does this take?

For three to five nearby competitors, plan two to three hours: about an hour reading websites and reviews, an hour on calls or messages, and the rest filling in your tracker. You don't need to do it all at once.

Is it legal to check competitors' prices?

Yes. Reading public websites, menus, reviews and booking pages is normal market research. Asking a normal customer question is fine too. What you shouldn't do is lie to get confidential information or misrepresent yourself.

What if a competitor has no website and no reviews?

Then their price is whatever they tell you on the phone, and their reputation is whatever people say in person. Ask a few regular customers what they've heard, and note that a competitor with no online presence is often invisible to new customers — which is an opening for you.

How often should I check again?

Every three to six months, or whenever a customer mentions a competitor's price. Prices move slowly in most local businesses, so constant checking is wasted effort.

Can I just use an AI tool and skip the reading?

You can let a tool gather the public pages and reviews, but check the sources it cites and make the pricing decision yourself. Tools speed up the reading; they don't know your rent, your staff or your customers.