Comparison shopping sites add features and battle for shoppers

[mandy]

Nowhere does the battle for the hearts and minds of Internet users rage more fiercely than among sites that would like to help them shop.

A plethora of new services offer every gimmick imaginable to aid the online shopper. NearbyNow Inc. tells shoppers what products are available in malls near their ZIP code. MyTriggers.com lets users enter “persistent searches” and receive notifications by e-mail or RSS feed when the engine finds their Amazing Spiderman #300 comic or bottle of 1989 Ducru-Beaucaillou at the price they’ve specified.

Kaboodle Inc. and StyleHive are where shopping meets social networking, as members swap news of cool stuff at good prices. Like.com searches through pictures to find close matches for the perfect brown boot or red dress. Pricenoia searches across all the international properties of Amazon.com to find out whether a given book or CD can be had more cheaply from Amazon.ca or Amazon.jp. Dealio, operated by Vendio Services Inc., offers a browser toolbar that lets members send “deals” to the site whenever they find them, so other members can take advantage of them, and notifies them when someone else has found a deal that will interest them. Become.com aggregates both pricing information and product reviews...

full article: http://www.internetretailer.com/article.asp?id=21569