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Wireless
Bandwagon
As a result, comparison sites that once catered only to techies in
search of low prices on gadgets, such as laptop computers and digital
cameras, have gained broader appeal. "Comparison shopping vendors have
been focusing more on marketing their services to women, who tend to
be the primary group making purchases," ComparisonEngines.com's Smith
told the E-Commerce Times. Consequently, the range of products
available has been growing to include items like blenders and baby car
seats as well as traditional electronics products.
Comparison shopping engine vendors have developed new services to
support wireless devices, such as cell phones. Mobile searching also
offers users new functions: they can have their camera phones scan bar
codes with their phones for instant price checks. Scanbuy and NextCode
have developed such features and comparison shopping engineers are
reportedly ready to incorporate them into their services.
The improvements have attracted more customers, which in turn has
lured the industry titans into the market: Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) ,
Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) , and Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) have been trying to
build up businesses in this space. Google's comparison-shopping site,
Froogle, added local search to its offerings. With Froogle's local
service, merchants with brick-and-mortar stores can upload data feeds
of their inventory. Once users enter their zip codes, they can search
for items near their home or office. "Yahoo has been pushing users
from its search services to its comparison shopping engine,"
eMarketer's Grau told the E-Commerce Times.
An Order of Magnitude Improvement
To compete, smaller vendors have been adding more sites to their
searches. "The newer shopping comparison search engines scan hundreds
of thousands of merchant listings compared to the tens of thousands
found with most services," said ComparisonEngines.com's Smith.
While the comparison search engines have many alluring features, they
also have weaknesses, some of which may surprise customers. The most
glaring is the fact that their searches are neither all inclusive nor
unbiased. Most often, comparison shopping engines have arrangements
with various vendors, so their partners' merchandise is displayed
first.
Many of these sites include user reviews as well -- but the value of
these can be questionable. Users should be aware that some vendors may
doctor the reviews, often writing reviews of their own products to
present them in a most favorable light, or skewering the competition
with unfavorable entries about their offerings.
Guarding Against Vendor Fraud
In addition, the sites can be home to disreputable vendors. There have
been cases where suppliers offer low prices for their items but then
force consumers to buy additional add-on materials. Because of the
problems, a few, but not all of the comparison engines, have begun to
offer money back guarantees. Often these are capped, however, at
US$500 to $1,000.
Disreputable vendors have also been known to attempt to drive up
competitors' costs. Many of the sites generate revenue on a
pay-per-click basis where a merchant is charged each time someone
clicks on links to their product. Click fraud is perpetrated by
automated programs that continually click on rivals' advertisements
with the sole purpose of driving up costs. "The comparison shopping
engine vendors say they have 'black boxes' that prevent fraudulent
pay-per-click items, but how they work and how effective they are is
unclear," stated ComparisonEngines.com's Smith.
Even in the face of these potential problems, however, use of these
systems is expected to increase. As such, vendors will continue to
remedy issues like these as they come.
"As users work with the comparison shopping services more extensively,
they will understand their benefits as well as their limitations,"
concluded JupiterResearch's Freeman Evans. "While they have been
making progress, vendors still have to take steps to improve the level
of trust users have in their services."
Source: Business
Wire via Yahoo! Finance
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