I have to admit that I’ve been skeptical of Become.com, but after doing about 10 separate searches for books to burglar alarms on a number of the top online comparison engines and general search engines, I’m starting to see the value. However, with no online price comparison engine integrated into the results (the price comparison engine will debut later this summer), it’s hard to envision exactly what Become.com will become in the near future.
My initial skepticism stemmed from the fact that I approached Become.com as someone far along in the buying cycle; I was ready to purchase a Sony Trinitron Wega (Flat Screen TV) or an Ademco Vista 15p (Alarm Control Panel). However, if I move back in the buying cycle and search for a flat screen TV on Yahoo!, Google, Shopping.com, Epinions, NexTag, etc. and don’t understand the first thing about flat screen tvs, then the general price comparison engines are almost pointless. At the same time, Become.com becomes valuable because it provides me with the tools to understand why I should purchase a flat screen TV and what features are important and therefore moves me along the buying process. Not all of the results (in the top 10) were that useful, but as someone just trying to learn more about flat screen TVs, Become.com was more useful than the other engines.
The question now becomes whether or not Become.com can actually move the users down the buying cycle and then KEEP them on the site or get them to come back so Become.com can make money off of the final click to a merchant’s site.
So in my mind, Become.com has now become a meta search engine gathering reviews, buying guides, etc. from across the web. But how will a consumer know which review or buying guide to pay attention to? Will sites being indexed just tweak their code (read: optimize their site) to get better placement on Become.com. In this way, the ‘authority’ on a certain product category might not always make it to the top of the results. Because of this, CNET (for tech products) or ConsumerReports.org starts to look a lot more attractive than Become.com. The TV section of Consumer Reports provides a Step-by-Step buying guide, reviews, and ratings on tons of different types of TVs. Unfortunately, Consumer Reports doesn’t recommend where to purchase the product (they probably should team up with a price comparison engine). Also, I had to pony up $4.95 for a one month subscription to Consumer Reports in order to get full access to the site – something that will probably never happen on Become.com. However, if I’m going to make a large purchase, maybe it’s worth it. CNET’s TV Section has the buying guide, reviews, price comparisons (from MySimon) and it’s free. The downside is that CNET is just for tech products.
In the end, Become.com seems smart, but I definitely have some questions for Michael Yang. I’m meeting him tomorrow and will try to post my interview by the end of the week.
At one point I believe Consumer Reports was displaying BizRate data; not sure if that contract’s been continued.
The description of the ‘Internet Researcher’ position on Become.com’s website strongly suggests that some of the SERPs are manually tweaked. That alone should make it harder to game.
IBD Under the Radar: Michael Yang – Founder and CEO of Become.com
http://www.podtech.net/?p=25