Josh Elledge - Chief Executive Angel
When you are looking for the best prices on your groceries, you can easily go to SavingsAngel.com to see how good the deal is.
But what about non-grocery purchases? How do you know if you are getting a good price on electronics, toys, clothes and household items?
For those purchases, you definitely want to be using a price comparison website. In the industry, these are called Comparison Shopping Engines or CSEs.
There are tons of CSEs out there, but only a few are really worth your time. Here are some of the best comparison sites on the web and why you may want to check them out:
Google Shopping: It's Google. Need I say more? It's the biggest name on the web and the most popular comparison website available. It's also most likely to find the greatest number of results for each search.
PriceGrabber: Back in 2010, Consumers Reports found PriceGrabber was the best shopping comparison site on the web. The magazine found PriceGrabber displayed the lowest price for six of the eight things it searched for. Even today, the website remains a good choice for online comparison shopping.
Nextag: This one is an oldie but a goodie. Nextag has been helping shoppers find the best deals since 1999 ““ a time when many of us were still excited if we could get 33.6k speeds on our dial-up modems. Nextag continues to be a good choice for price comparisons, and its Matchmaker service can personalize results based upon your previous browsing and Facebook activity. You can also sign up for price drop alerts using its Radar function.
Shopzilla: Shopzilla is a popular comparison search engine in its own right, but the company also operates a number of specialty comparison sites. The oldest one is Bizrate which has been in existence since 1996. Other sites in its portfolio include Beso for fashion, Retrevo for electronics and two German sites. Its Robot Oatmeal website allows shoppers to search for online coupon codes.
Become: Although Become has been around since 2004, it is not as well-known as some of the larger price comparison websites. It has more of an emphasis on household goods rather than electronics. Its search results are clean, and items on sale are clearly marked with the percentage off.
Pronto: Another lesser known site, Pronto offers big pictures of search results and a separate category for sale items. You can even filter the sales to show those that are at least 20, 40, 60 or 80 percent off. The one downside to Pronto is that you have to scroll through a group of Google ads before you reach your results.
The Find: If you like simplicity, check out the The Find. It has a clean, streamlined interface and big photos for the search results. It boasts pricing information from more than 3,000 stores.
Bing: Bing is MSN's answer to Google, and the search engine includes a robust shopping component. Unfortunately, it is not necessarily obvious where to go for shopping results. While Google has a shopping option under its “˜More' button, Bing does not. Instead you have to search for the item of your choice ““ let's say it's a coffee maker ““ and then scroll down until you find the “˜Shop for coffee maker' link.
So there you have eight of the best price comparison websites on the web. You may be wondering why you need eight. Why can't you just use Google for everything since it's the biggest?
Well, the reality is that search results are not necessarily unbiased or comprehensive. Some sites require retailers to pay for their stores to be included. Others may prominently feature items from preferred, paying retailers while burying other search results at the bottom of the list.
A good rule of thumb is to always check at least two price comparison sites before making a purchase. And then double check on sites like RetailMeNot for a coupon code that can save you even more money.
What is your favorite price comparison website? Tell us in the comments or on our Facebook page at www.facebook.com/savingsangel.
