We’ve seen already how much help Twitter may be when it comes to online shopping:

Twitter is a great way to research the seller’s reputation, find new deals and ask for unbiased opinion. Besides, you can reach plenty of brands providing alternative customer support on Twitter.

And here are 5 more Twitter-based tools that will help you with daily shopping: 5 fun Twitter bots:

1. Buy it Later:

Buy it Later is the Twitter bot that The bot requires a FireFox addon to work properly. So here how it works:

• Install the FireFox addon;
• Follow BuyItLater on Twitter;
• Go to any item page on Amazon and click “Buy later” button;
• The tool then checks Amazon for updates every minute;
• If the item price and/or availability changes, the bot alerts you via Twitter DM or email.

2. TinyMassive

TinyMassive is a nice Twitter bot that helps you quickly find out what’s the lowers price for the given product. Here’s it how it works:

• Tweet your product search to @tinymassive
• The bot will reply with the Tweet containing: the minimum price found and the link to the product search results.

3. Track This

Track this is the fun Twitter bot that will track your online purchases while they are being delivered to you:

• Register at the site and follow the bot;
• Enter a tracking number and a nickname for a package;
• The site will continually monitor the package and each time the package changes location you’ll be getting a Twitter DM.

4. MindMeTo

MindMeTo is a simple Twitter reminder that will remind you of your planned purchases:

• Follow mindmeto on Twitter and wait for the bot to follow you back.
• @ or DM the bot what you want to remember to buy (e.g. d mindmeto buy some milk tomorrow);
• At the scheduled time, the bot will send you a private direct message to “buy some milk”.

5. MultiMap

MultiMap twitter bot helps you find any store nearby. Here’s how it works:

• Add the bot to friends;
• Send it the DM containing your current location + the shopping facility, e.g. Closest shopping to Tampa, FL (the syntax is described here).

Have you ever come across the product you would love to buy … if you had enough money for that? I’ll bet everyone has. In order to find the suitable price you are forced to drive from store to store or check back the price comparison sites again and again in the hope the price has dropped.

Luckily, nowadays we have a better, more convenient solution – a set of various price-watching tools that will monitor the product you want to buy and notify you as soon as its price drops to fit your needs (unless you want it for free of course).

Let’s overview those handy free tools that might come quite in handy – it is all about what other features (along with price-watching) you expect to see in the tool. The table below lists 4 most awesome shopping tools that allow to monitor the product price and have more handy features as well:

Trackle is a comparatively new free feature-rich tool that allows to track any product price. Just give it the direct product URL, your target price and the period of time when you would be interested in. The tool also offers to set the notification frequency and even the mobile SMS option.

Along with price tracking, Trackle offers a variety of monitoring options for a smart online shopper:

• Track sales on Craigslist: locate the best deal ever by monitoring Craigslist;
• Track new entries on the New York Times Best Seller List: Find out when the NYT Best Seller List includes a new book and be the first to suggest it at book club!
• Track store specials: find out about deals and sales from over 500 stores.
• Track deals on Amazon to find out when their prices fall within a price range you’re willing to pay.
• Track availability of a rare book on Amazon;
• Track deals on Shopping.com: monitor prices from thousands of online merchants to find the best deal for an item you’re seeking.

Yotify is another cool tracking utility that watches the product price for you on Shopping.om, eBay or Amazon. It offers handy notification options and report lifetime:

Yotify also allows to track LifeHacker, Craigslist, as well as any site you’d wish to get email updates from.

BeatThat! (already mentioned by me here) is a user-driven website of deal hunters who compete with each other by fetching lowest prices they were able to locate throughout the Internet. Not only the site allows to easier find the best deal, it also offers you to earn money by being a bargain hunter: most active and reliable members are paid for finding great deals.

The price drop notification looks as follows:

Along with price monitoring feature, the site offers quite a few useful options: store ratings, user reviews, price comparison, etc.

PriceGrabber is the huge portal for budget shoppers allowing to locate the best price available on the net. PriceGrabber price drop notification looks like this:

Apart from price-watching, you’ll find various nice social shopping features here:

• Create wish lists;
• Share your experiences and shopping lists with friends;
• Discuss deals and stores.

Post image by Lordcolus.

Green shopping doesn’t have to mean sacrificing quality or paying more. In fact, you can buy environmentally-sound products and enjoy all cool features of online shopping: compare prices, find deals and coupon codes and read product reviews and ratings. Let’s save both money and this planet at the same time!

Below I am listing most useful resources that will help you locate best green deal and find relevant eco-friendly product you need.

User-Generated Green Deals

GreenDealsDaily.com is a user-generated site that offers you to both save money and live green. In general, it is a Digg-like community that allows users to submit green deals and vote for deals submitted by others. You can add and view green deals in a number of categories: clothing, food and drink, transportation, entertainment, etc.

The site also has a blog that is updated in two main categories:

• “Green Product Reviews” covering earth-friendly products;
• “Green Deals News” featuring new eco-friendly deals, coupons and freebies.

Green Shopping Directory:

PriceGrabber has a separate section for green merchants. It highlights products that promote smart, sustainable, eco-friendly living. The site also claims to be giving 5% of all profits to a green charity of your choice! At PriceGrabber you will find a huge range of environmentally-sound products ranging from organic dresses to energy star laptops.

The products listed fall into one of the following categories:

• Energy Star-compliant products (that will help you save money by saving energy);
• Products made from organic or recycled materials;
• Products made from environmentally-friendly materials (products that are both eco- and health-friendly);
• Products made by noted environmentally-conscious companies, etc

PriceGrabber also maintains green blog featuring green deals and latest products.

Green Shopping Deals:

• RedFlagDeals posts green promotional codes valid in Canada.
• GoGreenDeals blog publishes one awesome deal per day. It features special offers in quite a number of popular categories.
• Ecobunga seems to update not that often but it does look like a useful resource. You can find eco-friendly deals there as well as green contests and giveaways.
• GreenMomFinds is a great blog featuring family- and earth-friendly deals, resources and events.

Comparison Green Shopping:

PristinePlanet is a comparison shopping tool allowing you to view any product reviews and compare prices of similar products. Choose the site search platform or browse by categories to locate the product you are interested in, click “similar products” link and you will see the table of all items of the type by various manufacturers. You can thus compare prices and choose the most suitable item for you. Strangely, there is no “Electronics ” and “Computers” categories at the site though.

GreenGenius is another green shopping resource that offers price comparison feature. The site seems useful but is really slow.

Image Credit: Istock

Comparison shopping is one of the hottest things you can do online. No need to spend hours driving from store to store, ask experts’ and friends’ recommendations to find the best product to suit your needs and wallet.

Find the best free online tools below that offer handy ways to compare any product prices, user and expert reviews and specs.

PriceGrabber lets members add and see others’ reviews and ratings.

The site offers a very handy search option: you can sort the search results by price, popularity or rating. The sidebar lists multiple options allowing you to refine the results: top manufacturers, price range, item specifications, etc. You will also be able to see top searches others users are likely to use.

Alatest has a very handy search suggestion option that provides you with the list of search hints as you type.

The site also saves your recently viewed items and allows to compare them any time.

You will also be able to compare prices for one product across several stores.

Overall comparison is performed in the form of a huge table allowing you to compare all core features, user ratings and reviews and, of course, the prices.

BeatThat lists user-submitted deals and allows you to compare deals with Amazon and BestBuy.

CNet represents product comparison in the form of a table containing item photos, prices, ratings, descriptions and core features.

With it you have the least customizable options but it provides plenty of information in a user-friendly interface:

PriceRunner allows to compare prices offered by different retailers (just click “price range” link). You will be able to see each retailer’s user rating, price and even product availability.

The site lists both users’ reviews as well as reviews given by ‘experts’ (aggregated from other product review sites). The site also offers a handy “compare side by side” feature listing product features and letting you choose.

Search results can be customized in a number of ways: view results in a table, grid or list. A number of sorting options are also available: by popularity, retailer’s name, price, user rating, etc.

NexTag has a pretty nifty advanced search option that allows to narrow search by price, by brand, by product specifications or suggested keywords.

You can also set the price alert for any product you want and get notified when the item’s price reaches or falls below your target price.

When registered, you can add items to your shopping list, compile your wish lists and save your recent searches. Apart from that you can also see other members’ product lists.

Another cool feature is called “Recent price drops” listing products with recently dropped price. What’s more, you can see how pricing has been changing for each product in a graph:

More Fun With Each Tool: