Ask HN: Why are most price comparison sites horribly outdated?

2 points·t_a_v_i_s··7 comments

A quick Google search of "price comparison sites" surfaces articles like this: https://www.shopify.ca/blog/7068398-10-best-comparison-shopping-engines-to-increase-ecommerce-sales

The majority of these sites look like they haven't been updated a decade.

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Seems like a second order consequence of optimizing for SEO. Google takes time to index websites and as a page accrues search index strength, by the time it becomes a top result, the actual content is likely out of date or irrelevant. An adverse network effect perpetuating less relevant information rewarding being first / existing for the longest period of time.

Because they don't want you to actually compare, rather to click affiliate links or an ad.

Are they as relevant anymore in a world of dynamic data driven prices and tons of personalized promotions?

Very few things have one price.

Yep. That's a real problem, only the solutions that get the data from the customer's browser work, but instead of showing you a price they show a range.

Interesting point. Can you elaborate?

There are extension to track prices. The prices depend on the browser making the request, so different users will get different prices, you then have to create a range when prices differ.

Because priced are hard to scrape from any retailer

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