499:. This lets the price comparison engine collect data from almost any source without the complexities of building a crawler or the logistics of setting up data feeds at the expense of lower coverage comprehensiveness. Sites that use this method rely on visitors contributing pricing data. Unlike discussion forums, which also collect visitor input, price comparison sites that use this method combine data with related inputs and add it to the main database though collaborative filtering, artificial intelligence, or human labor. Data contributors may be rewarded for the effort through prizes, cash, or other social incentives.
472:
from many different merchants. Affiliate networks aggregate data feeds from many merchants and provide them to the price comparison sites. Many of the popular shopping websites provide direct affiliation to the customer who wants to become affiliate partner. They provide their own API to the affiliate partner to show their products with specifications to the affiliate partner's website. This enables price comparison sites to monetize the products contained in the feeds by earning commissions on click through traffic. Other price comparison sites have deals with merchants and aggregate feeds using their own technology.
714:
641:
Commission
Junction. There are also companies that specialize in data feed consolidation for the purpose of price comparison and that charge users for accessing this data. When products from these feeds are displayed on their sites they earn money each time a visitor clicks through to the merchant's site and buys something. Search results may be sorted by the amount of payment received from the merchants listed on the website. large price comparison sites.
42:
328:, these services made between ÂŁ780m and ÂŁ950m in revenue in 2005. Hence, E-commerce accounted for an 18.2 percent share of total business turnover in the United Kingdom in 2012. Online sales already account for 13% of the total UK economy, and its expected to increase to 15% by 2017. There is a huge contribution of comparison shopping websites in the expansion of the current E-commerce industry.
696:
about such a website and consumer protection organization sending out warning letters, observers started to note a sense of panic in the industry, with site owners changing or deleting the content in question. Amazon, being the biggest player in the affiliate market, declined to comment on the matter.
446:
Through 1998 and 1999, various firms developed technology that searched retailers websites for prices and stored them in a central database. Users could then search for a product, and see a list of retailers and prices for that product. Advertisers did not pay to be listed but paid for every click on
660:
focused price comparison websites is that, since their content is provided by retail stores, content on price comparison websites is unlikely to be absolutely unique. The table style layout of a comparison website could be considered by Google as "Autogenerated
Content and Roundup/Comparison Type of
491:
the web for prices. This means the comparison service scans retail web pages to retrieve the prices, instead of relying on the retailers to supply them. This method is also sometimes called 'scraping' information. Some, mostly smaller, independent sites solely use this method, to get prices directly
471:
Comparison sites can also collect data through a data feed file. Merchants provide information electronically in a set format. This data is then imported by the comparison website. Some third party businesses are providing consolidation of data feeds so that comparison sites do not have to import
695:
Until recently the phenomenon of fake test or comparison websites had escaped public attention. An analysis by testbericht.de discovered that 34,6% of German search traffic related to product tests on the first page of google leads to fake test sites. When a big German newspaper published a report
635:
Price comparison sites typically do not charge users anything to use the site. Instead, they are monetized through payments from retailers who are listed on the site. Depending on the particular business model of the comparison shopping site, retailers either pay a flat fee to be included on the
479:
software solutions have been developed that allow website owners to take price comparison websites' inventory data to place retailer prices (context adverts) on their blog or content the only website. In return, the content website owners receive a small share of the revenue earned by the price
699:
Deceptive comparison sites give the impression of testing a product thoroughly. In reality, the tests are just an aggregation of freely available information, often leading to the most expensive products being recommended. This in turn increases the commission rate the site owners earn for the
640:
to the retailer web site, or pay every time a user completes a specified action—for example, when they buy something or register with their e-mail address. Comparison shopping sites obtain large product data feeds covering many different retailers from affiliate networks such as LinkShare and
434:
In the early development stage from 1995 to 2000, comparison shopping agents included not only price comparison but also rating and review services for online vendors and products. Altogether, there were three broad categories of comparison shopping services.
459:
Price comparison sites can collect data directly from merchants. Retailers who want to list their products on the website then supply their own lists of products and prices, and these are matched against the original database. This is done by a mixture of
680:
This technology includes software and plugins aimed to standardize the typical processes involving price and product comparison. Without much resources it became possible for amateurs to build seemingly professional websites, mostly using the popular
344:). The team, led by researcher Bruce Krulwich, created BargainFinder in 1995 as an experiment and published it on-line without advance warning to the e-commerce sites being compared. The first commercial shopping agent, called Jango, was produced by
509:
Empirical projects that assessed the functionality and performance of page-wise SSC engines (AKA bots) exist. These studies demonstrate that no best or parsimonious shopping bot exists with respect to price advantage.
1301:"European Commission - PRESS RELEASES - Press release - Antitrust: Commission fines Google €2.42 billion for abusing dominance as search engine by giving illegal advantage to own comparison shopping service"
752:
released a statement that the
European Commission's assessment will be appealed. Google will review the formal decision, but expects that it will accrue the fine in the second quarter of 2017.
502:
However, some combination of these two approaches is most frequently used. Some search engines are starting to blend information from standard feeds with information from sites where product
426:
began an investigation in 2010, which concluded in July 2017 with a €2.42 billion fine against the parent company
Alphabet, and an order to change its practices within 90 days.
825:
1093:
Investigating the functionality and performance of online shopping bots for electronic commerce: A follow-up study. International
Journal of Electronic Business 8(1): 1-15.
1246:
692:
and the quality of search engines. By playing the algorithm of search engine giant Google, it is possible to place low quality sites prominently in the search results.
1105:
Online shopping bots for electronic commerce: The comparison of functionality and performance. International
Journal of Electronic Business 5(6): 576-589.
1067:
677:, in recent years small price comparison sites have been able to use technology that was previously only available to large price comparison sites.
1050:
1379:
1170:
899:
263:
943:
372:
another entry into comparison shopping was named Times magazine world top 50 website in 2008, only to eventually close in 2018. In 2005,
1222:
1275:
673:
Due to large affiliate network providers providing easily accessible information on large amounts of similar products from multiple
1131:
1254:
957:
879:
688:
The low content quality of typical niche sites, often bordering on spam and fraud, is a growing problem from the perspective of
846:
685:
CMS. These small sites often rely on Google for their visitors, which are monetized using affiliate networks like Amazon.
364:
portal in late 1997. Junglee, a Bay-area startup, also pioneered comparison shopping technology and was soon acquired by
418:
Meanwhile, in developed markets, Google was accused of promoting
Froogle and its replacement, the paid-placement-only
1079:
422:, over competitors in its search results, driving down traffic to other sites and driving some out of business. The
1350:
451:, founded in 1997, has been a very early company in this space; it invented price graphs and email alerts in 1998.
656:
Like most websites, price comparison websites partly rely on search engines for visitors. The general nature of
349:
256:
160:
920:
799:, AGENTS '97 Proceedings of the first international conference on Autonomous agents CM New York, NY, US 1997
1009:
795:
766:
619:
461:
305:
1054:
1023:
1008:
Wan, Y.; Menon, S.; Ramaprasad, A. (2003). "A Classification of
Product Comparison Agents": 498–504.
107:
102:
1116:
1014:
896:
745:
689:
423:
361:
337:
321:
249:
127:
316:
and other criteria. Most comparison shopping sites aggregate product listings from many different
771:
761:
637:
503:
381:
309:
117:
82:
854:
748:
fined Google €2.42BN for allegedly monopolising the comparison shopping engine (CSE) market.
395:
has been a place for many new comparison websites. It started in 2010 with
CompareXpress in
388:
197:
188:
1104:
1092:
1036:
903:
549:
481:
419:
392:
232:
174:
155:
141:
122:
66:
1300:
727:
Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.
665:, Google seems to have started considering these comparison sites to be of low quality.
644:
In addition to comparing tangible goods, some sites compare prices of services, such as
17:
357:
325:
183:
132:
92:
87:
1149:
336:
The first widely recognized comparison-shopping agent was
BargainFinder, developed by
1373:
569:
496:
225:
165:
112:
1194:
915:
368:. Other early comparison shopping agents included pricewatch.com and killerapp.com.
776:
662:
589:
448:
373:
353:
826:"Shopping Comparison Engines market worth ÂŁ120m-ÂŁ140m in 2005, says E-consultancy"
41:
1150:"Get Rid of Autogenerated Content and Roundup/Comparison Type of Pages (Point 4)"
1126:
1124:
983:
1325:
488:
465:
216:
206:
97:
804:
781:
559:
529:
365:
33:
858:
682:
645:
609:
396:
341:
239:
211:
1223:"Verbraucherschutz: HĂĽten Sie sich vor diesen Warentest-Fake-Seiten - WELT"
438:
Later, through mergers and acquisitions, many services were consolidated.
1171:"Shopping Search Engines Have Lost in the UK Google Panda/Quality Update"
657:
539:
412:
408:
377:
320:
but do not directly sell products themselves, instead earning money from
317:
61:
579:
404:
380:
for $ 485 million, negotiated by then-CEO and founder of the company,
749:
674:
599:
369:
345:
313:
400:
56:
1326:"Google's response to the European Commission fine - Hacker News"
661:
Pages". As of the 2011 updates to its search algorithm, known as
707:
387:
Around 2010, the price comparison websites found their way to
1276:"VerbraucherschĂĽtzer warnen vor Fake-Testseiten im Internet"
796:
A scalable comparison-shopping agent for the World-Wide Web
944:"The rise of price comparison sites in South East Asia"
492:
from the websites that it is using for the comparison.
1051:"Price graph of EPSON A883181 FOR PC ONLY 640X480DPI"
880:"What Happened to Comparison Shopping Engine NexTag?"
480:
comparison website. This is often referred to as the
399:, and in the following years companies like Baoxian (
916:"Experian Buys PriceGrabber.com For $ 485 Million"
648:, credit cards, phone bills, and money transfer.
1132:"Online Shoppers Are Rooting for the Little Guy"
495:Yet another approach to collect data is through
1103:Sadeddin K., Serenko, A. and Hayes, J. (2007).
257:
8:
1247:"Abmahnungen gegen Fake-Test-Nischenseiten"
958:"Episode 787: Google Is Big. Is That Bad?"
805:Shopbots become agents for business change
517:
264:
250:
29:
1013:
544:Germany, Austria, United Kingdom, Poland
984:"Google hit with record $ 2.7bn EU fine"
669:Niche players, fake test sites and fraud
308:that shoppers use to filter and compare
1253:(in German). 2017-01-11. Archived from
817:
808:, IEEE Computer, Vol. 33, Issue 2, 2000
348:, a Seattle startup company founded by
238:
231:
224:
196:
173:
140:
74:
48:
32:
1032:
1021:
1217:
1215:
1189:
1187:
7:
384:, along with Tamim Mourad, in 1999.
1091:Serenko, A., and Hayes, J. (2009).
793:Doorenbos, B; Etzioni, O; Weld, D.
25:
1068:Shopping Price Comparison Scripts
652:Google Panda and price comparison
636:site, pay a fee each time a user
1082:. Retrieved September 3rd, 2010.
712:
40:
878:Steiner, Ina (7 January 2019).
847:"50 Best Websites 2008 - TIME"
1:
1117:How shopping bots really work
360:; Netbot was acquired by the
1380:Comparison shopping websites
1053:. 8 May 1999. Archived from
982:Kelion, Leo (27 June 2017).
278:comparison shopping website
1396:
1070:. Retrieved May 7th, 2010.
902:December 16, 2005, at the
828:. Ukprwire.com. 2006-04-12
504:stock-keeping units (SKUs)
312:based on price, features,
302:comparison shopping engine
721:This section needs to be
430:Comparison shopping agent
290:comparison shopping agent
75:Retail goods and services
350:University of Washington
282:price comparison website
18:Price comparison website
1282:(in German). 2017-01-11
1173:. White.net. 2011-04-28
921:The Wall Street Journal
487:Another approach is to
1031:Cite journal requires
767:Gasoline price website
700:recommended products.
475:In recent years, many
462:information extraction
306:vertical search engine
27:Vertical search engine
280:, sometimes called a
217:Live support software
1330:news.ycombinator.com
704:Google EU Court Case
540:Geizhals (Skinflint)
1115:Mulrean, Jennifer.
1080:50/50 Revenue Share
946:. 18 December 2013.
746:European Commission
690:consumer protection
424:European Commission
411:), and AskHanuman (
338:Andersen Consulting
324:agreements. In the
322:affiliate marketing
286:price analysis tool
161:Trading communities
151:Comparison shopping
1199:www.testbericht.de
1138:. 16 January 2012.
1136:The New York Times
924:. 14 December 2005
772:Customer switching
762:Discovery shopping
468:and human labour.
382:Kamran Pourzanjani
1195:"Fake-Testseiten"
742:
741:
628:
627:
506:are unavailable.
274:
273:
16:(Redirected from
1387:
1365:
1364:
1362:
1361:
1347:
1341:
1340:
1338:
1336:
1322:
1316:
1315:
1313:
1311:
1297:
1291:
1290:
1288:
1287:
1272:
1266:
1265:
1263:
1262:
1243:
1237:
1236:
1234:
1233:
1219:
1210:
1209:
1207:
1206:
1191:
1182:
1181:
1179:
1178:
1167:
1161:
1160:
1158:
1157:
1146:
1140:
1139:
1128:
1119:
1113:
1107:
1101:
1095:
1089:
1083:
1077:
1071:
1065:
1059:
1058:
1047:
1041:
1040:
1034:
1029:
1027:
1019:
1017:
1005:
999:
998:
996:
994:
979:
973:
972:
970:
968:
954:
948:
947:
940:
934:
933:
931:
929:
912:
906:
894:
888:
887:
875:
869:
868:
866:
865:
843:
837:
836:
834:
833:
822:
737:
734:
728:
716:
715:
708:
518:
484:business model.
389:emerging markets
376:was acquired by
266:
259:
252:
198:Customer service
44:
30:
21:
1395:
1394:
1390:
1389:
1388:
1386:
1385:
1384:
1370:
1369:
1368:
1359:
1357:
1349:
1348:
1344:
1334:
1332:
1324:
1323:
1319:
1309:
1307:
1299:
1298:
1294:
1285:
1283:
1274:
1273:
1269:
1260:
1258:
1245:
1244:
1240:
1231:
1229:
1221:
1220:
1213:
1204:
1202:
1193:
1192:
1185:
1176:
1174:
1169:
1168:
1164:
1155:
1153:
1148:
1147:
1143:
1130:
1129:
1122:
1114:
1110:
1102:
1098:
1090:
1086:
1078:
1074:
1066:
1062:
1049:
1048:
1044:
1030:
1020:
1007:
1006:
1002:
992:
990:
981:
980:
976:
966:
964:
956:
955:
951:
942:
941:
937:
927:
925:
914:
913:
909:
904:Wayback Machine
895:
891:
877:
876:
872:
863:
861:
845:
844:
840:
831:
829:
824:
823:
819:
815:
790:
758:
738:
732:
729:
726:
717:
713:
706:
671:
654:
633:
631:Business models
584:Southeast Asia
574:United Kingdom
550:Google Shopping
524:Regional focus
516:
457:
444:
432:
420:Google Shopping
393:South-East Asia
334:
270:
233:Purchase-to-pay
175:Mobile commerce
156:Social commerce
142:Online shopping
67:Streaming media
49:Digital content
28:
23:
22:
15:
12:
11:
5:
1393:
1391:
1383:
1382:
1372:
1371:
1367:
1366:
1342:
1317:
1292:
1280:idealo Magazin
1267:
1238:
1211:
1183:
1162:
1152:. Webconfs.com
1141:
1120:
1108:
1096:
1084:
1072:
1060:
1057:on 8 May 1999.
1042:
1033:|journal=
1015:10.1.1.57.9018
1000:
974:
949:
935:
907:
889:
884:EcommerceBytes
870:
853:. 2008-06-17.
838:
816:
814:
811:
810:
809:
800:
789:
786:
785:
784:
779:
774:
769:
764:
757:
754:
740:
739:
720:
718:
711:
705:
702:
670:
667:
653:
650:
638:clicks through
632:
629:
626:
625:
622:
616:
615:
614:United States
612:
606:
605:
602:
596:
595:
594:United States
592:
586:
585:
582:
576:
575:
572:
566:
565:
562:
556:
555:
552:
546:
545:
542:
536:
535:
532:
526:
525:
522:
515:
514:Major websites
512:
456:
453:
443:
440:
431:
428:
358:Daniel S. Weld
333:
330:
326:United Kingdom
272:
271:
269:
268:
261:
254:
246:
243:
242:
236:
235:
229:
228:
222:
221:
220:
219:
214:
209:
201:
200:
194:
193:
192:
191:
186:
178:
177:
171:
170:
169:
168:
163:
158:
153:
145:
144:
138:
137:
136:
135:
130:
125:
120:
115:
110:
105:
100:
95:
90:
85:
77:
76:
72:
71:
70:
69:
64:
59:
51:
50:
46:
45:
37:
36:
26:
24:
14:
13:
10:
9:
6:
4:
3:
2:
1392:
1381:
1378:
1377:
1375:
1356:
1352:
1346:
1343:
1331:
1327:
1321:
1318:
1306:
1302:
1296:
1293:
1281:
1277:
1271:
1268:
1257:on 2017-02-03
1256:
1252:
1248:
1242:
1239:
1228:
1224:
1218:
1216:
1212:
1200:
1196:
1190:
1188:
1184:
1172:
1166:
1163:
1151:
1145:
1142:
1137:
1133:
1127:
1125:
1121:
1118:
1112:
1109:
1106:
1100:
1097:
1094:
1088:
1085:
1081:
1076:
1073:
1069:
1064:
1061:
1056:
1052:
1046:
1043:
1038:
1025:
1016:
1011:
1004:
1001:
989:
985:
978:
975:
963:
959:
953:
950:
945:
939:
936:
923:
922:
917:
911:
908:
905:
901:
898:
893:
890:
885:
881:
874:
871:
860:
856:
852:
848:
842:
839:
827:
821:
818:
812:
807:
806:
801:
798:
797:
792:
791:
787:
783:
780:
778:
775:
773:
770:
768:
765:
763:
760:
759:
755:
753:
751:
747:
744:In 2017, the
736:
733:February 2024
724:
719:
710:
709:
703:
701:
697:
693:
691:
686:
684:
678:
676:
668:
666:
664:
659:
651:
649:
647:
642:
639:
630:
623:
621:
618:
617:
613:
611:
608:
607:
603:
601:
598:
597:
593:
591:
588:
587:
583:
581:
578:
577:
573:
571:
570:Pricesearcher
568:
567:
563:
561:
558:
557:
553:
551:
548:
547:
543:
541:
538:
537:
533:
531:
528:
527:
523:
520:
519:
513:
511:
507:
505:
500:
498:
497:crowdsourcing
493:
490:
485:
483:
482:revenue share
478:
477:off the shelf
473:
469:
467:
463:
454:
452:
450:
441:
439:
436:
429:
427:
425:
421:
416:
414:
410:
406:
402:
398:
394:
391:. Especially
390:
385:
383:
379:
375:
371:
367:
363:
359:
355:
351:
347:
343:
339:
331:
329:
327:
323:
319:
315:
311:
307:
303:
299:
295:
291:
287:
283:
279:
267:
262:
260:
255:
253:
248:
247:
245:
244:
241:
237:
234:
230:
227:
226:E-procurement
223:
218:
215:
213:
210:
208:
205:
204:
203:
202:
199:
195:
190:
187:
185:
182:
181:
180:
179:
176:
172:
167:
164:
162:
159:
157:
154:
152:
149:
148:
147:
146:
143:
139:
134:
131:
129:
126:
124:
121:
119:
116:
114:
111:
109:
108:Food ordering
106:
104:
101:
99:
96:
94:
91:
89:
86:
84:
81:
80:
79:
78:
73:
68:
65:
63:
60:
58:
55:
54:
53:
52:
47:
43:
39:
38:
35:
31:
19:
1358:. Retrieved
1354:
1345:
1333:. Retrieved
1329:
1320:
1308:. Retrieved
1304:
1295:
1284:. Retrieved
1279:
1270:
1259:. Retrieved
1255:the original
1250:
1241:
1230:. Retrieved
1226:
1203:. Retrieved
1198:
1175:. Retrieved
1165:
1154:. Retrieved
1144:
1135:
1111:
1099:
1087:
1075:
1063:
1055:the original
1045:
1024:cite journal
1003:
991:. Retrieved
987:
977:
965:. Retrieved
961:
952:
938:
926:. Retrieved
919:
910:
892:
883:
873:
862:. Retrieved
850:
841:
830:. Retrieved
820:
803:
794:
777:Smartfinance
743:
730:
722:
698:
694:
687:
679:
672:
663:Google Panda
655:
643:
634:
590:Shopping.com
508:
501:
494:
486:
476:
474:
470:
458:
449:Streetprices
445:
437:
433:
417:
415:) followed.
386:
374:PriceGrabber
354:Oren Etzioni
335:
301:
297:
293:
289:
285:
281:
277:
275:
150:
128:Ride-hailing
103:Distribution
1355:www.sec.gov
1251:Kritzelblog
1201:(in German)
928:20 December
466:fuzzy logic
352:professors
207:Call centre
118:Marketplace
98:DVD-by-mail
83:Advertising
1360:2017-06-29
1286:2017-02-03
1261:2017-02-03
1232:2017-02-03
1205:2017-02-03
1177:2013-10-17
1156:2013-10-17
864:2017-03-22
832:2013-10-17
813:References
802:Clark, D.
788:Literature
782:Switchwise
560:Kakaku.com
554:Worldwide
455:Technology
366:Amazon.com
298:aggregator
240:Super-apps
34:E-commerce
1305:europa.eu
1010:CiteSeerX
859:0040-781X
683:Wordpress
646:insurance
610:Shopzilla
447:a price.
397:Singapore
342:Accenture
318:retailers
212:Help desk
189:Ticketing
1374:Category
1227:DIE WELT
988:BBC News
900:Archived
756:See also
658:shopping
604:Germany
442:Services
413:Thailand
409:Malaysia
378:Experian
310:products
123:Pharmacy
88:Auctions
62:Software
1335:31 July
1310:31 July
993:31 July
967:31 July
962:NPR.org
723:updated
675:vendors
580:Priceza
534:Brazil
530:Buscapé
405:Jirnexu
332:History
314:reviews
304:, is a
294:shopbot
184:Payment
113:Grocery
93:Banking
1012:
897:Forbes
857:
750:Google
624:Egypt
620:Yaoota
600:idealo
564:Japan
370:NexTag
362:Excite
346:Netbot
166:Wallet
133:Travel
1351:"8-K"
489:crawl
401:China
340:(now
57:Ebook
1337:2018
1312:2018
1037:help
995:2018
969:2018
930:2017
855:ISSN
851:Time
521:Site
356:and
403:),
300:or
1376::
1353:.
1328:.
1303:.
1278:.
1249:.
1225:.
1214:^
1197:.
1186:^
1134:.
1123:^
1028::
1026:}}
1022:{{
986:.
960:.
918:.
882:.
849:.
464:,
296:,
292:,
288:,
284:,
276:A
1363:.
1339:.
1314:.
1289:.
1264:.
1235:.
1208:.
1180:.
1159:.
1039:)
1035:(
1018:.
997:.
971:.
932:.
886:.
867:.
835:.
735:)
731:(
725:.
407:(
265:e
258:t
251:v
20:)
Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. Additional terms may apply.
