How to they do this?

Bizrate question

[CanadianChris]

I've been trying to figure this out for a while - how does Bizrate (and other similiar sites) use what looks like a mix of datastreams for the product information on their sites.

But they have datastreams from major computer vendors that I don't see any mention of affiliate programs or anything on the site. i.e. Dell Computers.

So my question is - how do they keep up with the product pricing, shipping prices, etc? Even if they do manage to use a bunch of datastreams, where on the vendor sites are the datastreams found? I can't find them anywhere :(

[Blue_Fin]

Datafeeds are available through the merchant's affiliate program.

[CanadianChris]

I know that's true for most sites. So lets take Dell - I don't see any mention of an affiliate program on their website, nevermind datafeeds. And yet bizrate and other websites use them.

[rfung]

Some websites that offer affiliate programs don't have it 'blatantly' on their main pages.

BizRate is a big enough site that regardless of wether the merchant offers it directly to joe webmaster, they might have direct partnersips with them still the same.

[MovingOnUp]

Dell has a couple affiliate programs.

BizRate and other similar sites don't work with affiliate programs. They charge merchants per click and they require all their merchants to build a special datafeed.

[howiejs]

The bigger players (bizrate, shopping.com, etc) can command custom feeds.

For us little guys - we have to use what we are given - or be aggresive and roll your own (scrape away)

[Rachel]

Chris, I'm pretty sure I saw someone post that Dell has an affiliate program through LinkShare, if you're interested in that company in particular.

[CanadianChris]

Ahh cool. Thanks for the info :)

[hannamyluv]

Most of the big shopping search engines are trying to get away from affiliate driven datafeeds and are moving to PPC datafeeds. So just because you see them on Shopping.com or Bizrate, does not mean the company has an affiliate program.

[gopi]

The big shopping comparison sites are *the* perfect Keyword arbitragers ... They dont have to worry about conversion as they mostly do CPC - just bid on the entire dictionary using adwords and hope someone clicks the merchant links in their landing pages!

There is an recent interesting article in CBS marketwatch regarding this by Bambi Francisco for those interested...