Recently I started asking myself why anyone would want to visit a product site to buy anything? The question is a bit extreme I realize but when there’s sites like Amazon I think it’s a question worth asking. There’s a couple features that Amazon has that no one product site would dare have (as far as I know). When a person starts clicking away on Amazon depending on brand or feature they get options not from just one company, but results from all companies. The second is the written reviews. Typically a person can see both the good and the bad. Now compare that type of experience with your favourite product site. There are few if any product sites that are willing to show competitor products alongside their own. You might ask, well why would they? The thing is, habitually a person that is shopping is going to want to compare. Are they going to want to check out five different sites or one? My guess is that it’s easier to just visit one site, do a search and see what people have to say. I’m slowly starting to product sites slowly bring in comments though they usually tend to rate quite highly. Because a person doesn’t know who or why this person would feel the need to comment it usually feels like it’s coming from the inside of the company.

For most companies it’s unthinkable that they would show competitor products to compare. But because it’s unthinkable it’s also holding them back from from the truth which is that people are going to compare products whether one site is willing to do it or not. Why not beat them to it and if their product really is the best why would they fear the competition?