# Which pricing goal should I pick?

> The five goals on the Strategy page, how each one works out a price, and which rule wins when several apply to one product.
>
> en | updated 2026-09-28 | https://priceq.io/help/en/rules-and-proposals/which-pricing-goal-to-pick

Start with **Protect my margin** for your whole shop. It follows the market but never goes below your minimum price, and it is the goal a new rule starts on. Give a category or a single product its own goal only where it needs to behave differently.

Strategy and price proposals come with the Business plan and up. Changing a rule needs the Supervisor or Admin role.

## The five goals

On **Strategy**, open a row and pick a goal under "which price we aim for":

- **Be the cheapest**: just below the lowest competitor. You set the **Percent under lowest**.
- **Protect my margin**: the average competitor price, or the lowest when there is no average. Without any competitor price it uses your cost price plus your margin.
- **Follow the market**: the average competitor price.
- **Clear this stock**: the lowest competitor price minus the percentage you set. Use it to move stock.
- **Manual**: priceq leaves the price alone and makes no proposal for these products.

Older rules can still show **Match the lowest** or **Follow MSRP**. They keep working, but you cannot pick them for a new rule.

Whatever the goal works out, the result then passes your minimum price and ceiling. See [What's the difference between a floor and a ceiling?](/help/en/rules-and-proposals/floor-and-ceiling-explained)

## Where a rule applies

The top row, **Whole shop**, is the default for everything. Click **Add a rule** to set a goal for:

- **A whole category**, for example all GPUs.
- **A group inside a category**, filtered on properties.
- **One product**.

A more specific rule wins over a broader one: one product, then group, then category, then whole shop. Rows without their own rule show "follows the whole shop". **Back to shop default** removes a row's own rule.

## Check before you save

Under "what this will do", priceq works out what the rule would change right now, for example "This changes 12 prices", with the total amount lower or higher. It also counts products it would refuse and products without a recent competitor price. Press **Save** to apply. The minimum price is saved with the rule in the same step.

## Marketplaces

For goals that read a competitor price, **On marketplaces, follow** offers **the buy box** or **the lowest price in stock**. Following the lowest price needs the Marketplace insight add-on. If you want it, ask us to switch it on. Without it, the rule follows the buy box. See [Following Amazon and bol.com](/help/en/products-and-sources/following-amazon-and-bol).