Study on Platform Service Pricing in B 2C Drug Trading Market / 中国药房

ABSTRACT

ABSTRACT OBJECTIVE：To provide reference for the efficient operation of online drug retailing by studying the service pricing and influencing factors of different B2C drug trading platforms. METHODS：Based on the theory of two-sided markets and combined with the characteristics of internet transaction service，the pricing models of B2C drug trading platform from the perspective of joint mode and joint & self mode were built. The influence of allocation proportion，search matching degree and the proportion of consumers who buy drugs from the platform of self mode were discussed. Finally，AHP method was adopted for empirical verification. RESULTS：The service pricing models of two B2C drug trading platforms，i.e. joint model and joint & self model，had been successfully constructed. It had been determined that the proportion of sharing and the degree of search matching had adverse and positive effects on the platform service pricing（suppliers），respectively. In the joint & self mode drug trading platform，when the proportion of consumers who chose self mode platform was too high，the platform would reduce the supplier’s registration fee；when the proportion of consumers who chose the self mode platform was too low，the platform would increase the registration fee of suppliers. In the empirical verification，AHP method was used to determine the proportion of self-employed consumers as 0.648. Under this condition，the pricing models of the two operation modes were compared，which was consistent with the above results. At the same time，the service pricing of joint & self model is always lower than that of joint mode. CONCLUSIONS：No matter the platform of joint mode or joint & self mode，different proportion of registration fee and advertising revenue can be set to implement differential pricing. The platforms also can degenerate from homogeneity competition， increase user viscosity and improve platform search matching by providing more professional services. For the platform of joint & self mode，it is necessary to control the ratio of self and joint part，and realize the healthy and effective operation of the platform.