There’s only so much a merchant can do to separate themselves on the CSE’s from the masses in the eyes of potential customers.

The three main things that can catch a customer’s attention is generally a low price, high feedback ratings, and perhaps a logo from a recognizable brand such as Sears or Staples.

Nextag then is introducing a new way to allow merchants to separate themselves from others who list their products along theirs.

Merchants will now have the opportunity to highlight any price (similar to Shopzilla), shipping, or tax discounts, along with rebate information–as well as have the ability to convey any type of message they’d like about their products at a cost of $0.05 additional per click.

For example if a merchant is having a Father’s day sale in which they offer a 20% on items over $50, or if they’re willing to provide free shipping for all items, they can do it through the Nextag bidding system. All that needs to be filled out is the details of the deal, along with the dates that a merchant wants it to run through (see below for an example):

We’re also told that Nextag will also provide a method for merchants to do this through their feeds as well.

How much this will help out merchants on the CSE’s is something we plan on keeping an eye on, but studies have shown that consumers love to save money, and that free shipping is a particular great attention grabber:

In a 2008 survey conducted by PayPal and comScore, 43 percent of shoppers said they abandon their shopping carts because of unexpectedly high shipping charges. Forrester Research reports that 61 percent of online shoppers prefer to shop with a retailer that offers free shipping than one that doesn’t.

Source: Ecommerce guide

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.

It isn’t too often that you see the words “Microsoft”, “Apple”, and “help” bundled together in the same sentence–without the words “push off a boat” in it at least–but for the bargain hunters of the world it’s been a known thing that one of Live Bing Cashback’s biggest allure is the discount that they provide on the iPhone.

While most merchants and retailers listed on Cashback generally offer a 5-10% “discount” on their products, AT&T began offering the iPhone at a 35% discount rate compared to their online or in-store prices back late last year via Live Cashback. That promotion helped put Cashback on the map to other users looking for discount deals, albeit rarely as much as 35%.

A new deal that’s surfaced in the past few days then is Apple’s new iPhone, labeled the 3G S, will also be available with a 35% discount via Microsoft.

The deal is red-hot for bargain hunters and Apple fans , alikeand makes plenty of sense for Microsoft to promote since they don’t have a physical phone that directly competes with the iPhone.

Microsoft is the maker of Windows Mobile which is used in many smartphones out there, but based on their marketing budgets, their new search engine Bing, along with their shopping platform is where they would like to see the most growth.

Imagine that then, Apple and Microsoft teaming up, though very indirectly, to help take down Google. It’s quite the world we live in now.

For full details of how to get your 35% cashback, head on over to Fat Wallet.

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.

In an effort to help consumers who are looking for specific items, Pronto has launched three microsites, Pronto Home, Pronto Style, and Pronto Tech.

As their names would imply, the sites list only items for home decor goods, clothing, and tech products respectively.

The sites should help narrow the focus of consumers looking for specific products, and since most shopping engines are cumulative, it can make the experience slightly less intimidating since the crossover audience shopping online between say LCD TVs and couch cushions may be relatively low–not that we judge here

Pronto has yet to integrate the sites on their main home page yet, but since the sites are still in “beta” mode we should expect it to be promoted further in the coming weeks or months.

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.

Not long after requiring merchants to accept their new terms of service, Google Base is now requiring merchants to specify the “condition” field by June 30, or again risk having their products be taken down.

The options for this field are “new”, “used”, and “refurbished”.

This should allow users to more easily find exactly what they’re looking for, particularly if they’re in the market for used/refurbished items. There are a good number of merchants listed on Google Base that sell refurbished merchandise such as electronics, and this should help them be found as well.

Right now a search for say refurbished ipod or refurbished LCD TV on Google Product Search, a majority of the top results don’t have anything to do with refurbished products at all, so hopefully this can be improved as well.

In other news, the astute Google Product Search user will notice that Google has updated their logo, as seen above.

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.

Microsoft has just officially launched its new search engine, Bing, which some facetiously say stands for either “But It’s Not Google” or, as a reciprocal acronym, “Bing, It’s Not Google”.

Whatever it may or may not be shorthand for, Microsoft has officially thrown on its gloves and challenging Google at what it does best, search.

Whether or not users will begin to adapt to the new engine is something that only time will tell, so for now we’re going to focus on the shopping experience it provides to users.

First things first, directly on the Bing homepage is a link for Shopping, which didn’t exist before when it was called Live (and currently exists on Google).

Clicking on the tab takes a user, appropriately enough, to the Bing Shopping page, where as we’ve discussed previously, highlights Cashback toward the top.

But now by virtue of the shopping page receiving exposure via the home page should certainly increase the amount of users who actually enter the shopping page and use it as a platform the way they’re using Google Product Search.

We’ve certainly noticed a steady increase in our merchants revenue via the Cashback platform as of late–though it’s hard to tell if it’s directly because of this change.

As with before as well, a search that Microsoft recognizes as a popular product search will be highlighted with popular brands, and price ranges that a user can click through (similar to Google’s “one box” feature):

We will continue to monitor if user adoption of Cashback continues to increase as users begin to adopt Bing either plain curiosity, or because their shopping section is now directly on the home page–or simply by the natural increase of online retail in general.

We here at CPC Strategy though certainly approve of any methods that make the online shopping experience that much easier.

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.

Google Base has updated their terms of service, and any merchant listed on there (and there’s no reason one shouldn’t be) will have 30 days to log into their account and accept the new terms or risk having their products being removed.

The process is as simple as logging into the Google Base dashboard, which will take you to the new terms, and checking off that you indeed accept them.

This is generally not an issue for anyone doing manual uploads via Google’s site, since Google requires feeds to be updated every 30 days before they’re taken down–but for merchants who automatically upload their products via FTP or another method, it could potentially be an issue to be aware of.

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.

After releasing a new tiered price structure just a few weeks ago, their down-under counterparts au.Shopping.com have announced a major slash in certain tech categories: Digital Cameras,  Flat Panel TVs, and Mobile Phones. Each click costs a mere $0.25 AU now, resulting in saves of up to 58% from previous rates.

The format of their e-mail certainly shows this is not something they want merchants to ignore either:

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.

For the past month or so, Pricegrabber’s Deal of the Day page has included a chart that shows both the average price history and lowest price of that particular product, giving users a good indication of what sort of deal they’re getting on the deal:

For those who aren’t familiar–Pricegrabber’s deal of the day is similar to Woot’s One Day, One Deal experience, in which a new product is released every day at 12pm PT from a specific merchant which is generally at a much lower price than one can find anywhere else on the internet.

Thanks to Twitter user @juney for bringing this to our attention, and don’t forget to follow us on Twitter as well.

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.

For astute, regular users of Google Product Search, one may have noticed that Adwords have begun to be displayed along the free product listings:

In theory, adwords listings within Google Product Search results should help improve conversion rates since the traffic should be much more qualified. Generally users will receive such results within normal Google search results or hidden away as advertisements on other sites–by being displayed alongside actual products that people are searching for, a consumer is automatically seeing something that is relevant to them.

For more information on how to get this done, be sure to check out Google’s help document”.

Source: Search Engine Roundtable.

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Google has also released a special feature for their own “Google phone”. Users of Android handsets now have the ability to scan barcodes which directs them to a Product Search results page, allowing them to compare the in-store price with that of various vendors online.

This would be a great way for a consumer to go into a store, check out the product in the flesh, and decide whether he can save by buying online–or if it’s worth the premium to purchase it right away.

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CPC Strategy was founded by former employees of the comparison shopping engines and understands first hand what it takes to manage a successful comparison shopping campaign. Contact us to find out how we can make the shopping engines work for you.