Price Scraping 101: How to Collect Competitor Prices Without Getting Caught

Did you know that 80% of online shoppers are more likely to buy from a site offering the best price? Or that e-commerce sales are expected to hit $6.3 trillion by 2024? 

Now, what if you could have access to real-time competitor pricing to ensure you’re always on top of the game? That’s where price scraping comes in! 

But here’s the thing—scraping competitor prices from websites sounds easy, but doing it without getting caught? That’s the trick.

In this guide, we’ll walk you through price scraping, reveal how to gather competitor price data without triggering alarms, and explain how tools like Multilogin can help you scrape efficiently and stay undetected. Ready to dig into the digital treasure chest of competitor prices? Let’s go!

What is Price Scraping and Why Should You Care?

Price scraping is exactly what it sounds like: extracting price information from your competitors’ websites using automated tools. But why does this matter? Well, having access to real-time competitor pricing can help you:

• Stay Competitive: Adjust your prices based on what your competitors are charging. A small shift in price could make all the difference in winning that sale.
• Track Market Trends: Monitor how product prices fluctuate over time. This can give you insight into consumer demand and seasonal pricing patterns.
• Boost Profits: If you can adjust prices efficiently in response to market changes, you’ll likely see an increase in profit margins.

The trick is scraping the right way—without getting blocked or banned from your target websites. Let’s look at how to make that happen.

How to Collect Competitor Prices Without Getting Caught

Here’s the thing: websites are no longer playing fair when it comes to price scraping. They use all kinds of measures to protect themselves from bots, like CAPTCHAs, IP blocking, and fingerprinting. But don’t worry—scraping prices from websites isn’t impossible. There are ways to fly under the radar, and we’re about to spill the beans on how to do it.

1. Rotate Your IPs (Proxy Rotation)

Ever had a website reject your request just because you made too many too quickly? If you’re scraping from a single IP address, it’s easy for the site to spot you. Proxy rotation is a game-changer here. You can rotate IPs so it looks like a bunch of different users are accessing the site rather than a single bot. With tools like Multilogin, you can manage multiple IPs and browser profiles to scrape more data without getting flagged.

2. Mimic Human Behavior (Don’t Look Like a Robot!)

You know that moment when you hit a CAPTCHA? That’s your clue to act like a human. Websites detect scraping bots by their rapid, predictable behavior—like making requests every few seconds. To avoid being caught, slow it down! Mimic human behavior, like:

• Clicking through pages.
• Randomizing the time between requests.
• Moving the mouse in a natural way (this can be automated too!).

Multilogin helps here too—by simulating different browser profiles with unique fingerprints, it makes your browsing look real and not bot-like. Trick the system into thinking you’re just another human shopper.

3. Use CAPTCHA Solvers

Sometimes, even the best tactics can’t avoid CAPTCHA. But don’t panic—captcha solvers are here to save the day! These tools solve CAPTCHAs for you, allowing your scraper to keep going while you sit back and relax. With Multilogin, you can integrate CAPTCHA solving features so that your scraping doesn’t hit a dead end.

4. Limit Scraping Frequency (Don’t Go Too Fast)

Scraping too quickly is like slamming the door in a website’s face. If you make requests too rapidly, your IP will get blocked faster than you can say “price scrape.” Spread out your requests, scrape only the necessary data, and ensure you’re not overwhelming the server. Use Multilogin to switch between profiles, and it will help you distribute requests more naturally across different accounts.

5. Respect Robots.txt (It’s Not Just a Suggestion)

Okay, we know it’s tempting to go rogue and scrape anything that isn’t nailed down. But robots.txt exists for a reason. It’s a file that tells scrapers which pages they are allowed to access. If a website clearly says, “Do not scrape this page,” respecting that is just good practice. Plus, avoiding certain areas can save you a whole lot of trouble down the road. Just play nice, and scrape what’s permissible.

Best Tools for Price Scraping

So you’re ready to start scraping—awesome! But which tools should you use to scrape prices from websites efficiently? Here are the top ones to consider:

1. Scrapy

Scrapy is like the Swiss Army knife of web scraping. It’s an open-source framework that’s perfect for extracting data, but it can take a bit of learning. If you’re ready to dive into coding and need customizability, Scrapy is a solid choice for competitor price scraping.

2. Octoparse

Don’t want to code? No problem. Octoparse is a no-code scraper that allows you to scrape e-commerce data quickly. Its user-friendly interface makes it perfect for beginners and experts alike, and it offers cloud-based scraping so you don’t have to worry about running it on your computer.

3. ParseHub

For scraping dynamic websites (those using JavaScript and AJAX), ParseHub is the tool to use. It’s a little more complex than some of the others but works great for scraping prices on sites that require more than just a simple HTML scraper.

4. DataMiner

DataMiner is a super convenient Chrome extension that lets you scrape prices from websites directly from your browser. It’s ideal for smaller scraping projects or when you need data quickly. Plus, it integrates with cloud services for easy data export.

5. Multilogin

While not a traditional scraper, Multilogin is essential for enhancing your price scraping efforts. Why? Because it helps you manage multiple browser profiles with unique fingerprints. This way, you can:

• Avoid getting blocked by rotating IPs and browser profiles.
• Simulate real users and mimic human-like behavior.
• Collect competitor price data from multiple accounts without raising any red flags.

If you’re serious about scraping prices from websites without being detected, Multilogin is your secret weapon. It keeps your scraping safe, efficient, and, most importantly, undetected.