Walmart wants to entice more people to visit its stores while at the same time increasing online profit margins.

Ever since online shopping became a thing we as consumer expect prices to be lower online than they are in physical stores. But Walmart is this week attempting to reverse that trend just before consumers start eyeing the bargains next week on Black Friday.

As The Wall Street Journal and The Verge reports, Walmart decided it was time to increase the price of products sold through its online store. However, those same products did not increase in price in-store. Depending on what you want to buy, it may now actually be cheaper to visit a Walmart store than it is to visit the retailer's website.

There are two main reasons pointed to for this decision to increase prices online. The first is Walmart's desire to get more people visiting its stores again. Not only does that present more potential to sell you things, it's actually cheaper for Walmart than shipping goods out to you. Secondly, Walmart wants to improve the profit margins for online sales, which are sure to continue growing. Shipping isn't free, after all.

Retail stores also remain a big differentiator to Walmart's biggest rival: Amazon. Amazon is slowly moving towards having a physical presence, but it's being done at a snail's pace. Walmart really needs to push the retail experience while it can, but at the same time continue to compete with Amazon online. Increasing online pricing certainly won't help in that regard.