Next Generation Shopping

Last week Yahoo and eBay announced a broad partnership. What’s next? Yesterday a report of Microsoft considering a bid to buy eBay. Keith Regan from E-Commerce Times reports

“Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) is considering making a bid to buy eBay (Nasdaq: EBAY) , according to a published report, a move that could dramatically alter an e-commerce , Web portal and search space already in a state of flux.”

But why eBay…

“The Post reported that Microsoft founder and Chairman Bill Gates favored eBay over Yahoo as a takeover target because of the technology that eBay would bring to the table, including its PayPal online payment system and its Skype VoIP subsidiary.”

Ok, guess that makes sense.

Read the full post at E-Commerce Times.

Technorati Tags: ebay, microsoft, yahoo, ebay microsoft merger, ebay yahoo partnership

SecretPrices.com was recently mentioned in the article “How Web 2.0 is built” posted April 6th on Yahoo! France. I can get the general gist of what it is saying from the translated version, but not 100%. If anyone knows French, I’d like to know really like to know what it says exactly.
(Links: Article Link | Translated Link)

Ok, it is official, a lot of things happened today. Yahoo! has finally added the incentive of revenue sharing to their API (so look out Shopping.com!). While this is a huge win for them, apparently they are not integrating the affiliate program into Yahoo! Shopping for a few months. So I will followup on how the program will work and find out what kind of payment structure they have for it.
Straight from Yahoo!

“Yahoo! is now accepting applications for a commercial version of our Shopping APIs featuring product search, price comparison, ratings & reviews, and shopping browse. The program, which is now in limited beta, is similar to an affiliate model in that it enables websites to share in income generated from providing shopping search and other services powered by Yahoo! Shopping on their sites. Whether you are building a local shopping mash-up, a next generation social commerce destination, or you simply want to integrate shopping comparison features into your content site, this program is a first major step in providing you with tools to help you generate revenue.”

Also, note that it is in beta and currently it is only “accepting a small number of applicants with special consideration given to sites with high traffic volume and fresh, unique content”.

Currently, our site SecretPrices.com utilizes the Shopping.com API as a backend. But close tabs will be kept on the Yahoo! Shopping program as it continues to evolve. The API is not only fairly well documented, but has an open developer community to back it. Shopping.com really needs to start paying attention…

Technorati Tags: Yahoo!, revenue share, comparison shopping, API, mashups

The Yahoo! Developer Network announced today an update to the Yahoo! Shopping API:

“Based on developer feedback, Yahoo! Shopping has enhanced its APIs with a new browse navigation feature that helps consumers quickly narrow their product search by providing the user with a menu of sub-categories and product attributes to further refine their search results. A browse shopping experience with category and attribute based refinement can also be built, allowing users to drill down and obtain product results meeting their preferred product criteria.”

If you are a developer, you can jump right to the new (v2) Product Search features page to see for yourself all the new capabilities it allows for. It is great to see that developers are not only working with the API, but also providing quality feedback on it… Now if only some other comparison engines would learn from this (ehm ehm).

Speaking of which, I hope to hear back from Yahoo! soon about Yahoo! Shopping being integrated into its affiliate program. If they can compete with the Shopping.com (SDC) payout rates (which honestly I don’t think they will be able to), I think they will give SDC a run for their money (no pun intended) in the realm of API utilization by affiliate sites.

On another note, back in October 2005 Y! Shopping Web Services added user product review content from their system to the API, which was a great win for developers to be able to access that quality content… And oddly enough I just posted a comment on that blog entry late last night.

Thanks Brian for the heads up on this story.

Technorati Tags: Yahoo!, Shopping.com, web services, shopping, comparison shopping, API, REST, programming, developers, mashup

I talked to a Y! Affiliate Program Representative and she informed me that Yahoo would be integrating the Y! Shopping into their affiliate program sometime during 2006.  This would work in conjunction with their Shopping API.  I assume it essentially will be a revenue share of the revenue generated from merchant sites, probably on a per-click basis based on their CPC rate card.  This could be a great opportunity for niche webmasters to monetize their web site.  Specifically for mashup sites, like BaeBo (and others), that utilize the Y! Shopping API.  Also, deal and coupon sites could point to Y! to earn revenue from merchant sites they may not be affiliated with directly.  Great potential.  I’ll post updates when I have them.

Technorati Tags: Yahoo! Shopping, API, Price Comparison, Online Shopping, Revenue Share, CPC, Affiliate

Off Topic for this site… but seems to be big news today…

For those who haven’t heard yet today, there is speculation that Yahoo is to buy Digg for over $30 Million…  Sources are Jeremy Burton and Kevin Burton (Mashable.com)…  Kevin Rose (of Digg) of course denies any of these rumors.

Will the madness ever stop?