Kmart and IKEA don't come up on Google or Bing Shopping. Is that a biz opportunity?
Is There a Site or App Comparing Prices across IKEA, Kmart, Bunnings, Spotlight & Co?
wisdomtooth on 09/08/2020 - 18:43
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Surely one can compare prices within product categories (say, floor lamps). That's precisely how Google and Bing Shopping work. Not a new concept.
I think there is not much to compare, because all shops have their own audience and products:
- Kmart - cheapest possible "just works" solutions
- IKEA - more pricy than Kmart but looks a lot nicer
- Bunnings - a bit on expensive side but very convenient and a big range
- Spotlight - overpriced stuff only "specific" people buy because they don't know any better
It's like saying is there a website that compares Toyotas and BMWs - the two are in completely different categories it doesn't make sense to compare.
Also, because IKEA and Kmart doesn't bow down to Google's formatting just shows that they are earning so much money they don't care that Google doesn't show them in the "spotlight" (lol).
It's like saying is there a website that compares Toyotas and BMWs
As a matter of fact, there are. Loads! There are even targeted YouTube reviews comparing the two.
I've got a crazy idea. Open a browser tab for each retailer you're interested in and search for the product category on each retailer's website. It's how people survived the pre-app ages.
I've got a crazy idea. Instead of sending an email, type it all out on paper with a mechanic typewriter and mail it via snail mail. It's how people survived the pre-email ages 🙄
username doesn't check out
It's definitely a great idea but you would need to pull the data from each website and then populate then into your own database for data manipulation and handling unless you can make a website to do that on the fly like price hipster or something.
Good idea bug hard to do.
Being able to sort an aggregator website of all the online catalogues available from various websites would definitely be a great time saver and possible business opportunity.
Basically a search engine for search engines focused on online shopping.
No idea but I wonder if the U.S. has something like that they probably would maybe you can message them and ask them to do one for Australia or Oceania.
Good luck.
Basically a search engine for search engines focused on online shopping.
That's what GetPrice, Shopbot, MyShopping, Google Shopping and Bing Shopping do—not exactly a new idea. Just haven't found one that includes Kmart, IKEA, etc. Bunnings, OTOH, is often featured in Aussie price comparison engines.
Not the same. This is hard to do when each retailer have different products.
I guess we could start with just selecting items based on name searches.
Even if they have different products you could get a list of products with say the name brush in it or towel and then sort it using a list of options of normal search criteria.
Then you could have some sort of tag feature like we have in ozbargain.
It is not perfect or anywhere near ideal but it is better than nothing at the moment.
Even if they have different products you could get a list of products with say the name brush in it or towel and then sort it using a list of options of normal search criteria.
That's exactly how price comparison engines work (Google Shopping, Bing Shopping, MyShopping, etc). Not exactly a new concept.
@wisdomtooth: I know but I feel like none of them do a thorough job and each miss something making them useless but please correct me if I'm wrong I haven't used any ever yet because I didn't want to be disappointed or rely on something not foolproof complete.
@AlienC: Let me get this right… You haven't used any of them and already know they're useless?
Now I see what you mean when you say you need them to be foolproof.
See also Price Hipster
The developer of Price Hipster created this long running thread on OzBargain - I spent the past year creating Price Hipster, a product search engine and price watching website for the OzBargain community!
From that thread, I have learned that some shopping sites are very difficult for a search engine to extract product and price information from. If Kmart and Ikea are not in any of the popular shopping engines, it's probably because those companies don't want to be included.
For IKEA and Kmart the reason is they don't have most of their products online, at least not the last time I checked.
Kmart used to be on Price Hipster but I removed them. This was a long time ago but I think the reason was they removed even more products from their online store.
For IKEA and Kmart the reason is they don't have most of their products online
Uh, yes, they do. Not most; ALL. And with availability per store even! Perhaps not for *sale online, but that's another matter entirely.
@jazoom: If you add them in, you'll have me hooked! Currently, the retailers you have there are not that interesting to me.
Price Hipster does have Big W and Bunnings.
What prices will you be comparing as they have their own unique products?