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As you know, CPC Strategy, which has a retail market research firm released their Comparison Shopping report each quarter which is compiled from data comprised of four million clicks and more than eight million dollars in revenue. CPC Strategy’s report ranks the retail industry’s top comparison shopping engines for online retailers based on significant metrics such as revenue, conversion rate, cost of sale, average CPC, overall traffic and merchant response ratings. ECommerce retailers can use report to personalize their online marketing budget to increase product visibility on the comparison shopping sites and make more sales. Here are the top seven comparison shopping engines that you can include in your product search marketing campaign.
- Google Shopping – Google’s cost per click (CPC) model has been around for some time and many of the five billion Google searches happen through the Google Shopping platform. According to the latest Comparison Shopping Report, Google’s CPC program is the top performer, which generates highest search traffic and conversion rates for online merchants. During the first quarter of 2014, Google Shopping drove the highest user traffic and ROI among the major comparison shopping engines online. When it comes to paid shopping engines, Google’s COS is the lowest with 14.27 percent and it offers the simplest merchant tools for advertisers and marketers. Online merchants need to review the new Google data feed requirements before signing up for the Google Shopping program.
- Shopzilla – It is another high search traffic generating CPC model which highlights similar products from various online retailers. For merchants, the paid shopping site Shopzilla offers easier bidding tools and allows merchants to zero-bid on products that are poor-converting. Utilizing the partnership with Bizrate, Shopzilla merchants can take advantage of Bizrate reviews i.e., both on Shopzilla and Google. According to the CPC Strategy report, Shopzilla has a high conversion score at almost four percent. In addition, the most popular comparison shopping engine supports bulk feed uploads through a File Transfer Protocol (FTP).
- PriceGrabber – It is a paid comparison shopping engine which offers weekly specials, coupons and deals. PriceGrabber is not a minimum cost per click model, but it allows online merchants to penny-bid or bid as low as $0.01 on their products. When it comes to low cost of sale PriceGrabber comes only after Google, but it is a leading shopping engine for search click traffic. If you are using PriceGrabber then you can send your product lists to yahoo shopping which is an added advantage.
- Amazon Products Ads – The most online shopping site Amazon.com have their own paid ad platform named Amazon Products Ads which consist of search, buy boxes, tower ads and product detail pages. Amazon’s CPC model mostly benefit from brand recognition and Amazon’s Marketplace traffic. But unlike Marketplace, Amazon Product Ads connect shoppers to a retailer’s external online store for transactions, including retargeting and branding value for the retailers. For retailers who are already have listed on the Marketplace, the Amazon Product Ads program is a viable option for them.
- eBay Commerce Network – Formerly known as Shopping.com, the eBay Commerce Network is a paid shopping engine and for retailers eBay’s CPC model offers greater flexibility with category level bids. According to CPC Strategy, eBay Commerce Network induced second highest traffic of all the comparison shopping engines for the second quarter in a row. It is because the merchant listings in the eBay’s CPC platform receive more exposure on Google Shopping.
- Become – It is a smaller online shopping engine which aggregates research on products consisting of consumer reviews, expert reviews, forums and buying guides. According to CPC Strategy’s report Become has performed impressively when compared to both eBay Commerce Network and Nextag with 18% COS.
- Nextag – It is a paid comparison shopping site that permit business enterprises to list products online which include travel plans, tickets and real estate. Nextag generated the highest revenue that is prior to Google Shopping and sales conversions for paid shopping engines With a 20.66% COS, the Nextag shopping engine converts at almost 3% although Nextag surpasses the majority COS of the comparison shopping engines. Also, Nextag’s CPC bidding platform allows retailers to bid even at the brand level.
There are many other comparison shopping engines such as Pronto, Bing Shopping Ads and Yahoo Shopping which can be utilized by merchants for getting proper exposure to their products and for getting ROI benefits.
