Shopping Toolbars - March Recap
There had been some buzz this month in the shopping toolbar industry, so I thought I would provide brief recap. Although I still am not certain about how users perceive downloading a toolbar to their browser, they seem to be rolling full steam ahead.
Pronto
Pronto is a price guiding toolbar for Windows that will compare prices on the fly while you browse merchant sites. It is similiar to Dealio and ActiveShopper which I have blogged about in the past. You can read more in this article Pssst! You Can Get It Cheaper Over There.
ActiveShopper
Shelron had a few press releases this month regarding some new happenings with ActiveShopper.
First was that it is launching a UK based site, which their release stated “The UK’s Leading Online Comparison Shopping Site Provides Content to ActiveShopper.com“… In real terms, they will be using Shopping.com’s UK API to run their UK website.
The other release, is about the launch of the mobile version of the ActiveShopper website, which continues to give the idea of price comparison while in a retail store… Which is still an interesting concept, and I wonder how well normal consumers will adapt to it in the future.
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We’ve tested pronto extensively and despite the apparent benefits of such a toolbar, their integration is a bit too intrusive. It appears to be more like spyware than a useful service.