When it comes to comparison shopping sites, there is more than one that you should be aware of. There are several actually, and if you’ve been online long then you may be aware of a few of them. Here is a list of comparison shopping sites that you should know about:

• NexTag - Online since 1999, NexTag is great for many industries including travel, real estate, education, automobile, mortgage and financial products, and more.
• BizRate - A leading comparison shopping site for computers and digital hardware products, BizRate also has categories for clothing, home & garden, furniture, shoes, jewelry, and many more categories too.
• CNET Shopper - If you sell electronics then you know about CNET. This is one of the most popular comparison shopping sites online and it has a lot of authority as well.
• PriceGrabber - Very popular site with a ton of categories, to include appliances, auto parts, books, cameras, computers, flowers, health & beauty, magazines, movies, music, toys, and a whole lot more.
• Shopzilla - Shopzilla is owned by Scripps Media Company. Not as extensive as some of the other comparison shopping sites, but it’s well worth knowing.
• ShopLocal - ShopLocal is a comparison shopping site for local businesses. Organized by city and category, this is the way to offer your goods and services for consumers.
• Smarter - Smarter.com not only has the categories but also offer product reviews and product videos. They also have a featured merchants site and offers buying guides and tips, etc.
• Yahoo! Shopping - In spite of the soap opera games its been playing with Microsoft and Google, Yahoo! has some great services to offer and one of those is one of the best and most trafficked comparison shopping sites online. List your products here first.
• DealCatcher - Deal Catcher may look like just another comparison shopping site, but it’s not. They have a category for ecofriendly products, another one for high speed Internet, and in addition to all the usual category listings the site also lists popular stores so that you can find them easily. But, of course, if you’re not one of the popular stores then you’ll be competing, but this is a site worth listing your products in any way.
• Ben’s Bargains - Their tagline is “Where ghetto dogs come for the lowdown on deals.” And that’s pretty much it. Categories include accessories, apparel, bags, Bluetooth, Black Friday, Giveaways, GPS, and a ton, ton, ton more. Coolest of the cool.

Don’t just list your products on one site, list them on several comparison shopping sites, but shop around to find the best ones for your products. They’re not all the same.

Once again, David Rodnitzky gets into a meaty topic when he discusses the future of comparison shopping sites.

I like what he has to say about Google and Microsoft and I think he’s right on. The most interesting insight that he offered was a direct statement about Google’s announcement concerning comparison shopping sites and how they don’t usually have quality landing pages. Rodnitzky claims this could lead to comparison shopping sites being banned from AdWords. That isn’t likely to happen, but it could mean that they’ll have a tougher time getting their AdWords ads to attract clicks.

If the comparison shopping sites don’t improve their landing pages then they’ll be paying higher prices for clicks. Their ads may not even be approved unless they are will to pay enormous prices for their keyword bids. That could effectively send the comparison shopping sites out of the advertising business unless they improve their landing pages, which will be difficult to do since many of them have landing pages that are created by their users.

Still, Google is poised to compete in the comparison shopping arena and it’s possible that they could aggressively pursue that avenue. If so, then it will be good for Google, for shoppers, and for companies that use these sites to promote their products. You can be sure that whatever Google decides to focus on it will do it well.

Rodnitzky also discussed MSN and its new policy to pay consumers to purchase through them. If it works then MSN will be a key player in consumer shopping information, but it remains to be seen that it works. MSN will have to convince consumers to purchase products through their search engine. If they can do that then they may be a major player in this arena and can charge more for advertising. Let’s just wait and see what happens with the comparison shopping landscape. My bet is that Rodnitzky is right about one thing: It will change.

(Source) Shopping sites are largely “generic” and undifferentiated. True e-tailers with a few exceptions are interchanable and thus vulnerable. And “e-commerce” for major retailers is increasingly about “buy (soon to be reserve) online, pick up in store.”

Once again, Greg Sterling hit it on the head. Comparison shopping sites really only do one thing well: Draw traffic from people who plan to make a purchase offline. That’s why major online retailers who want to close the sale will have to come up with creative solutions beyond these comparison shopping sites, which tend to be more and more for offline merchants who expect to drive traffic to their brick and mortar stores. That’s what online shopping is quickly becoming more and more.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it does mean that pay per click is not all about driving traffic to your website to close the sale there. The reason many products are priced lower online than they are offline is precisely to encourage people to make more online purchases. Unfortunately, they aren’t buying it. They’re doing their research online and driving to buy. Even with rising gas prices.

So what does that mean for online merchants and pay per click advertisers? It means you don’t necessarily have to pay for clicks and expect people to buy. You can pay for clicks and drive traffic to your brick and mortar store. If you don’t have a brick and mortar store then you’ll need to watch your pay per click bottom line a little more closely and keep an eye on your ROI. You can still turn a profit. It just means that may have to lower your click bids.

In early March I introduced to my readers a new SEM comparison review site sponsored by Search Marketing Standard magazine. Today, Kalena Jordan offers her impressions of the site and she says it spells nothing but trouble. Is she right?

I’ve got to say, she does bring out some good points:

The problem with the concept of rating SEM firms is that there are no published search industry standards that SEM agencies are required to meet and no formal accreditation body imposing such standards.

and

Giving consumers the power to anonymously rate SEM firms opens up another can of worms: how to keep the system free of corruption by SEM firms and disgruntled consumers alike?

Both of those are good points, but the second one is even better. Regarding consistent standards, I’m not sure I’d want an agency to regulate SEM. Consumers might feel differently, but I think giving any one agency the power to be the regulator over the entire industry would lead to already established companies gaining an unfair advantage over newcomers. That’s way it has worked in the off line world for a long time and it typically leads to higher prices and less freedom to negotiate prices and services between consumers and service providers.

Regarding the anonymous rating system SEMCompare has decided to use, I’d say Kalena makes a good point and I agree with it at heart. The problem with anonymous reviews is you don’t know who the reviewer is. The company has no way of responding to a negative review that is made anonymously, which isn’t really fair. Though most of the reviews I’ve seen so far have been positive and the negative reviews that Kalena provides on her blog are not necessarily problems, either for the companies or for SEMCompare, anonymous reviews could lead to problems. There is the danger of a customer with an axe to grind posting a negative review that could lead to a loss of revenue for a reputable company. So what should be done?

Amazon.com allows users to post reviews. They can be anonymous, but the reviews are rated individually and not by aggregating user reviews into a single rating system. Every review can be taken on its own merit. While this is not always seen favorably by industry insiders, it can be a great help to consumers. I personally like the idea of users having to sign up for an account and posting reviews under their user name. That way, no review is really anonymous, even if a user uses a fictitious name, which would still be possible. Anyone trying to game the system by unfairly reviewing a competitor negatively could be banned.

I don’t fault SEMCompare for attempting the review nature of its site, but it is possible to improve it. What do you think?

A new Krillion survey shows that many consumers still spend a considerable amount of time online researching products before purchasing locally off line. This information could have serious implications for pay per click advertisers.

It’s interesting that many of these consumers will spend 30% of their time researching products before making a buying decision. Then, they’ll either order online and drive to pick up their purchase or drive to make the purchase. But don’t discount the 20+% of consumers who will purchase online. That’s a big number when you consider how many people are online every day researching products.

Greg Sterling at Screenwerk highlights the most important online resources for product research:

1. Manufacturer websites
2. Retailer websites
3. Search engines
4. Shopping comparison sites
5. Consumer magazines online
6. Portals and other directories
7. Blogs

This is very interesting, and very telling. With all the hyper surrounding blogs you’d think they’d be higher up on the list. But look at what is higher on the list:

1. Manufacturer websites
2. Retailer websites
3. Search engines
4. Shopping comparison sites
5. Consumer magazines online
6. Portals and other directories

All of these are resources that can be used in conjunction with pay per click advertising. Manufacturers and retailers can drive consumers to their websites with pay per click ads. Search engines, of course, display pay per click ads in the SERPs when searchers make a query. Shopping comparison sites and consumer magazines can also be used as great resources and both can drive targeted traffic through pay per click ads. Of course, portals and directories, like search engines, will display the ads.

These entities should not miscalculate the value of their ad spend. Just because you spend money on advertising and not close the sale online doesn’t mean that the advertising isn’t paying off. Pay per click advertising should be seen as another way to help consumers conduct research about products and services online. If the sale is closed off line as a result of research conducted online when a consumer clicked a pay per click ad then the advertising has worked. The downside is, that’s not exactly trackable. But then, neither are many methods of traditional advertising: Outdoor advertising, TV, radio, and other top-of-mind awareness product branding. It’s difficult to put a dollar amount on every ad you run, as savvy advertisers well know.

The importance of branding cannot be overstated. Advertisers who are capable of using various advertising media to establish a brand and market presence know that this increased presence can, and will, lead to future sales. Getting there is half the battle. That’s why pay per click advertising is not necessarily about pay for the traffic now and see the conversion five minutes from now. You may pay for the traffic now and see the conversion three or four months from now through a totally different conversion path.

Advertisers cannot be shortsighted about their ad spend. Pay per click advertising should be considered a part of your overall advertising budget with the idea that you are branding your company in the marketplace and not using the medium as an inexpensive sales representative.

When listing your business and its products on comparison shopping sites, your primary focus should be on making yourself stand out. Are you doing what you can to draw attention to yourself?

Comparison shopping sites like BizRate and NexTag are becoming more and more popular. Of course, it’s no secret that most people today shop online, do product research online, look for the product of choice online, then drive to a local merchant to make their purchase. If you are a product manufacturer you can make that work in your favor. The road to salvation is to make your product stand out.

You might think that the way to stand out on such sites is to make your product lower priced than the competition. But that would be wrong. Since most people are driving to make the purchase any way, price is not a consideration. Chance are, they’ll pay more off line at their local shopping center than they will online at your website or your competition’s. What then is a deciding factor?

Your product description.

Yes, your product description is the sole deciding factor in whether a consumer will purchase your product or not. Here are a few tips to help you write the best product description for the shopping comparison sites that you list on:

• Include a photo of the product (from various angles if possible)
• Sell the benefits, not the features
• List only the most sellable features as bullet points
• Make your comparison shopping product description readable by including lots of action verbs
• Describe the product in as much detail as you can with the word count you have

Your product description is the most important aspect of your comparison shopping ad. Make the most of it and you’ll see the results sooner rather than later.

Comparison shopping sites have become very popular online since companies started marketing their products online. These sites can be very good sources of advertising for any company with a product to sell. One popular and very good comparison shopping site is BizRate.

BizRate is owned and operated by Shopzilla, one of the pioneers of online comparison shopping. Companies looking to get the recognition they deserve in the marketplace would do themselves well to pay attention to sites like BizRate and other comparison shopping sites. It’s the perfect way to build credibility for your products.

The first step to taking advantage of the comparison shopping sites is to sign up for a merchant account. Then you can send notices of products and even list the products that you offer through your retail store. The sites offer shoppers a chance to compare name brand items in a nonthreatening atmosphere. Since many consumers shop online for the products they want then drive to purchase them locally, these sites can benefit almost any business online, but particularly local retail stores that carry national name brand items.

BizRate offers ratings of the products in its system, organized by categories or departments. If your retail store is located in a large metro area where a large number of consumers are likely to shop online then purchase locally then you can’t ignore comparison shopping. Most comparison shopping sites even allow merchants to advertise and that’s just one more opportunity for you to reach your target market.

People go online to shop and look for the best deals. Comparison shopping sites make it easy for consumers to do that. But when it comes to finding the right comparison shopping site for your products and services, you can not be too careful. You don’t want to spend the money to be a member of a site that isn’t going to benefit you.

Then, when you do find the right comparison shopping sites, you’ll have to describe your products adequately for maximum effectiveness. You are in essence selling your products and your company. You want your descriptions to do that while you’re not watching.  Brick Marketing makes the process of getting listed on the right comparison shopping sites easily.

Here are a few of the expert services you’ll get when you let Brick Marketing help you with your comparison shopping site listings:

• We’ll examine each product in your inventory to determine the most effective way to present them
• We’ll research the comparison shopping websites and choose the best ones for your products
• We’ll also upload each product description at each website for you
• Then we’ll add the most enhancing graphic for each product description
• We will manage your pay per click budget for you (shopping comparison sites operate on a pay per click basis)
• We’ll also manage your listings so that discontinued products are removed promptly

When it comes to comparison shopping sites, let Brick Marketing be your guide.

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