How to rank a price comparison website?

[jamie3000]

I'm thinking of starting a price comparison website.

I've had varying levels of success with websites with 10k+ pages over the years. Google seems to be getting much more stricter, I would assume due to the tons of AI content now getting pumped out.

Does anyone have any advice for ranking a site like this? Because its a huge amount of pages and each page is not going to have a lot of content.

I know that it's absolutely possible because I've seen price comparison websites getting huge volumes of traffic but I suspect they are held back until they meet a certain level of trust. Which I assume is perhaps a mix of links and age and perhaps some manual review, who knows.

Thoughts anyone?

 

[tazarbm]

Because its a huge amount of pages and each page is not going to have a lot of content.

I'm not sure how well product review / price comparisons sites rank nowadays, but if they do, I think you would miss out on a huge opportunity by not having a lot of content.

When I made product comparison sites (2014-2015) for my Amazon affiliate sites I was able to put up A LOT of quality content for products that seemingly had no / very little content themselves.

For example, one of my successful niches back then was "car lights / headlights", and - although there isn't much to say about headlights besides the usual technical stuff (light intensity, material quality, etc) - I could easily find 1000+ words worth of content on various (specific, of course) forums and even on Amazon itself. I would take all of the info that Amazon provided (easily over 200-300 words) for my target product, or even for my target category (LED headlights, incandescent headlights, etc), along with peoples' reviews that purchased and used those headlights / types of headlights.

Of course, it would take a lot of time for someone like me (non-native English speaker who gets tired quickly and has low energy levels most of the time, I am talking about at least half a day) to gather up all information about a specific product or category by visiting the forums and by reading people's reviews on Amazon, and then to organize all of this info (pulling out the technical specs for the 2 products I'd compare, pulling out the pros and cons of each product, etc) and then create the actual content

But the point is that - even though it does take a long time - when you have all of the information organized and ready to put into your comparison chart you will end up with a lot of content because what can't go into the comparison table you'll be able to put underneath the table (the comparison chart should always go above the fold, of course, for better visibility and quick access by content skimmers, while those who like your comparison so much you can rest assured they'll scroll down and read everything you have to say about those products which - by the way - it's almost imperative that you bring your own personal touch and - even better - your own critiques where needed, so that your visitors can see that you're a real dude that wrote that content and that they can trust you because you don't come across as a shill since you find critiques to those products)

Anyway, if google still ranks such websites, I think you should definitely put up a lot of content on the price comparison pages, even if you feel like nobody's going to read all of that fluff. Probably many won't read it, but the few that do almost always convert into sales if you're going to make it easy for them (add an enticing CTA in the middle / at the end of the content, add a small section at the end of the article containing your own thoughts / recommendations / verdict / critiques about the product(s), add a lot of bullet points and even infographics where appropriate to make your content pretty and easy to understand and digest, etc)

I know that it's absolutely possible because I've seen price comparison websites getting huge volumes of traffic but I suspect they are held back until they meet a certain level of trust. Which I assume is perhaps a mix of links and age and perhaps some manual review, who knows.

yeah, trust (however that thing is measured / assessed) seem to be a big deal.

So, if you're going to tackle this niche it's probably best to use a strong, clean expired / non-dropped domain in a niche as similar / close to this one as possible. It's possible that even if you get a good domain that's had a very similar niche (but not exact one) that you won't rank. Like you said, google had become much more strict lately, so it's possible that you won't rank in google with such a domain.

This being said, seeing how google weeds a lot people out of their search engine and how many other people are seeing success with other SEs (Bing and DDG more specifically) I still think it's worth a try to use a good expired domain even if the niches don't match up perfectly.

Besides, as google's hegemony comes to an end and as other traffic sources emerge you never know when your site and domain will pay off for their quality even if google's so hateful that they'd love to ban the entire internet if they could (this was in their plans a few years ago, I've seen it on YT, so they are this psychopathic and we should stop relying on them)...

So anyway, before I go fully off-topic (it wouldn't be the first time ), I would say

1) grab a quality expired / non-dropped domain in a niche as close / similar to your niche as possible, even if it won't rank in google
2) spend some time doing research on specialty forums and on Amazon / Alibaba / Etsy / Shopify / etc for the products whose prices you intend to compare and gather up as much info about these products as you can
3) segment and organize all of this info in such a way that your visitors will find the most value in your site (tackle topics like quality vs price, warranty and refunds, why you think one price tag is better than the other by giving your personal experience and / or research you've done on these products, etc)
4) create compelling CTAs
5) build up the authority of the domain so much that you'll have no problem breaking into at least top 10

Of course, you can do much more than these like advertise on social media, image sharing sites (price comparison tables are great content for people who spend a lot of time on sites like Pinterest, Imgur, DeviantArt, etc), forum marketing on the exact forums where you've done research for your site on, etc... But the 5 steps above I think will help you get a good start (should google still rank such sites that is...)

 

[AdventureSeeker]

Tôi không chắc các trang web đánh giá sản phẩm/so sánh giá hiện nay được xếp hạng như thế nào, nhưng nếu có, tôi nghĩ bạn sẽ bỏ lỡ một cơ hội lớn nếu không có nhiều nội dung.

Khi tôi tạo các trang web so sánh sản phẩm (2014-2015) cho các trang web liên kết Amazon của mình, tôi có thể đưa lên RẤT NHIỀU nội dung chất lượng cho các sản phẩm dường như không có hoặc có rất ít nội dung.

Ví dụ, một trong những ngách thành công của tôi khi đó là "đèn xe hơi / đèn pha", và - mặc dù không có nhiều điều để nói về đèn pha ngoài những thông tin kỹ thuật thông thường (cường độ ánh sáng, chất lượng vật liệu, v.v.) - tôi có thể dễ dàng tìm thấy hơn 1000 từ nội dung trên nhiều diễn đàn (tất nhiên là cụ thể) và thậm chí trên chính Amazon. Tôi sẽ lấy tất cả thông tin mà Amazon cung cấp (dễ dàng hơn 200-300 từ) cho sản phẩm mục tiêu của mình, hoặc thậm chí cho danh mục mục tiêu của mình (đèn pha LED, đèn pha sợi đốt, v.v.), cùng với các đánh giá của mọi người đã mua và sử dụng những đèn pha / loại đèn pha đó.

Tất nhiên, sẽ mất rất nhiều thời gian đối với một người như tôi (người không nói tiếng Anh bản xứ, dễ mệt mỏi và luôn ở mức năng lượng thấp, ít nhất là nửa ngày) để thu thập tất cả thông tin về một sản phẩm hoặc danh mục cụ thể bằng cách truy cập các diễn đàn và đọc đánh giá của mọi người trên Amazon, sau đó sắp xếp tất cả thông tin này (lấy thông số kỹ thuật của 2 sản phẩm mà tôi muốn so sánh, lấy ưu và nhược điểm của từng sản phẩm, v.v.) rồi tạo nội dung thực tế.

Nhưng vấn đề là - mặc dù mất nhiều thời gian - khi bạn sắp xếp và sẵn sàng đưa tất cả thông tin vào biểu đồ so sánh, bạn sẽ có rất nhiều nội dung vì những thông tin không thể đưa vào bảng so sánh, bạn sẽ có thể đặt bên dưới bảng (tất nhiên, biểu đồ so sánh luôn phải ở trên cùng để dễ nhìn hơn và những người lướt nội dung có thể truy cập nhanh, trong khi những người thích nội dung so sánh của bạn có thể yên tâm rằng họ sẽ cuộn xuống và đọc mọi thứ bạn nói về những sản phẩm đó - nhân tiện - gần như bắt buộc bạn phải đưa vào đó nét cá nhân của mình và - thậm chí tốt hơn - những lời phê bình của riêng bạn khi cần, để khách truy cập của bạn có thể thấy rằng bạn là một người thực sự đã viết nội dung đó và họ có thể tin tưởng bạn vì bạn không giống như một kẻ lừa đảo vì bạn tìm thấy những lời phê bình cho những sản phẩm đó)

Dù sao đi nữa, nếu google vẫn xếp hạng các trang web như vậy, tôi nghĩ bạn chắc chắn nên đưa nhiều nội dung lên các trang so sánh giá, ngay cả khi bạn cảm thấy không ai đọc hết những thứ vớ vẩn đó. Có lẽ nhiều người sẽ không đọc, nhưng một số ít người đọc thì hầu như luôn chuyển đổi thành doanh số nếu bạn tạo điều kiện thuận lợi cho họ (thêm CTA hấp dẫn vào giữa/cuối nội dung, thêm một phần nhỏ vào cuối bài viết chứa suy nghĩ/khuyến nghị/phán quyết/phê bình của riêng bạn về sản phẩm, thêm nhiều dấu đầu dòng và thậm chí là đồ họa thông tin khi cần thiết để làm cho nội dung của bạn đẹp và dễ hiểu, dễ tiêu hóa, v.v.)


Vâng, lòng tin (bất kể thứ đó được đo lường/đánh giá như thế nào) có vẻ là một vấn đề lớn.

Vì vậy, nếu bạn định giải quyết ngách này thì có lẽ tốt nhất là sử dụng một tên miền mạnh, sạch đã hết hạn/chưa bị xóa trong một ngách càng giống/gần với ngách này càng tốt. Có khả năng là ngay cả khi bạn có một tên miền tốt có ngách rất giống (nhưng không phải là ngách chính xác) thì bạn cũng sẽ không được xếp hạng. Như bạn đã nói, gần đây Google đã trở nên nghiêm ngặt hơn nhiều, vì vậy có khả năng bạn sẽ không được xếp hạng trên Google với một tên miền như vậy.

Mặc dù vậy, khi thấy Google loại bỏ rất nhiều người khỏi công cụ tìm kiếm của họ và có bao nhiêu người khác đang thành công với các SE khác (cụ thể là Bing và DDG), tôi vẫn nghĩ rằng việc sử dụng một tên miền đã hết hạn tốt vẫn đáng thử ngay cả khi các phân khúc không hoàn toàn phù hợp.

Hơn nữa, khi quyền bá chủ của Google kết thúc và các nguồn lưu lượng truy cập khác xuất hiện, bạn sẽ không bao giờ biết khi nào trang web và tên miền của mình sẽ được đền đáp xứng đáng với chất lượng của chúng, ngay cả khi Google ghét cay ghét đắng đến mức họ muốn cấm toàn bộ internet nếu có thể (điều này đã nằm trong kế hoạch của họ cách đây vài năm, tôi đã thấy trên YT, nên họ thật sự là kẻ tâm thần và chúng ta nên ngừng dựa dẫm vào họ)...

Vì vậy, dù sao đi nữa, trước khi tôi lạc đề hoàn toàn (đây không phải là lần đầu tiên ), tôi muốn nói rằng

1) nắm bắt một tên miền chất lượng đã hết hạn/chưa bị xóa trong một phân khúc càng gần/tương tự với phân khúc của bạn càng tốt, ngay cả khi nó không được xếp hạng trên Google
2) dành thời gian nghiên cứu trên các diễn đàn chuyên ngành và trên Amazon / Alibaba / Etsy / Shopify / v.v. về các sản phẩm có giá mà bạn định so sánh và thu thập càng nhiều thông tin về các sản phẩm này càng tốt
3) phân đoạn và sắp xếp tất cả thông tin này theo cách mà khách truy cập của bạn sẽ thấy giá trị nhất trong trang web của bạn (giải quyết các chủ đề như chất lượng so với giá cả, bảo hành và hoàn lại tiền, lý do tại sao bạn nghĩ mức giá này tốt hơn mức giá kia bằng cách đưa ra kinh nghiệm cá nhân và/hoặc nghiên cứu bạn đã thực hiện về các sản phẩm này, v.v.)
4) tạo CTA hấp dẫn
5) xây dựng uy tín của tên miền đến mức bạn sẽ không gặp vấn đề gì khi lọt vào ít nhất top 10

Tất nhiên, bạn có thể làm nhiều hơn thế nữa như quảng cáo trên mạng xã hội, các trang web chia sẻ hình ảnh (bảng so sánh giá là nội dung tuyệt vời cho những người dành nhiều thời gian trên các trang web như Pinterest, Imgur, DeviantArt, v.v.), tiếp thị diễn đàn trên chính các diễn đàn mà bạn đã nghiên cứu cho trang web của mình, v.v... Nhưng tôi nghĩ 5 bước trên sẽ giúp bạn có một khởi đầu tốt (nếu Google vẫn xếp hạng các trang web như vậy...)

Great answer, you are an expert in this field. I have gained more knowledge about it. Thanks man.

 

[jamie3000]

I'm not sure how well product review / price comparisons sites rank nowadays, but if they do, I think you would miss out on a huge opportunity by not having a lot of content.

When I made product comparison sites (2014-2015) for my Amazon affiliate sites I was able to put up A LOT of quality content for products that seemingly had no / very little content themselves.

For example, one of my successful niches back then was "car lights / headlights", and - although there isn't much to say about headlights besides the usual technical stuff (light intensity, material quality, etc) - I could easily find 1000+ words worth of content on various (specific, of course) forums and even on Amazon itself. I would take all of the info that Amazon provided (easily over 200-300 words) for my target product, or even for my target category (LED headlights, incandescent headlights, etc), along with peoples' reviews that purchased and used those headlights / types of headlights.

Of course, it would take a lot of time for someone like me (non-native English speaker who gets tired quickly and has low energy levels most of the time, I am talking about at least half a day) to gather up all information about a specific product or category by visiting the forums and by reading people's reviews on Amazon, and then to organize all of this info (pulling out the technical specs for the 2 products I'd compare, pulling out the pros and cons of each product, etc) and then create the actual content

But the point is that - even though it does take a long time - when you have all of the information organized and ready to put into your comparison chart you will end up with a lot of content because what can't go into the comparison table you'll be able to put underneath the table (the comparison chart should always go above the fold, of course, for better visibility and quick access by content skimmers, while those who like your comparison so much you can rest assured they'll scroll down and read everything you have to say about those products which - by the way - it's almost imperative that you bring your own personal touch and - even better - your own critiques where needed, so that your visitors can see that you're a real dude that wrote that content and that they can trust you because you don't come across as a shill since you find critiques to those products)

Anyway, if google still ranks such websites, I think you should definitely put up a lot of content on the price comparison pages, even if you feel like nobody's going to read all of that fluff. Probably many won't read it, but the few that do almost always convert into sales if you're going to make it easy for them (add an enticing CTA in the middle / at the end of the content, add a small section at the end of the article containing your own thoughts / recommendations / verdict / critiques about the product(s), add a lot of bullet points and even infographics where appropriate to make your content pretty and easy to understand and digest, etc)


yeah, trust (however that thing is measured / assessed) seem to be a big deal.

So, if you're going to tackle this niche it's probably best to use a strong, clean expired / non-dropped domain in a niche as similar / close to this one as possible. It's possible that even if you get a good domain that's had a very similar niche (but not exact one) that you won't rank. Like you said, google had become much more strict lately, so it's possible that you won't rank in google with such a domain.

This being said, seeing how google weeds a lot people out of their search engine and how many other people are seeing success with other SEs (Bing and DDG more specifically) I still think it's worth a try to use a good expired domain even if the niches don't match up perfectly.

Besides, as google's hegemony comes to an end and as other traffic sources emerge you never know when your site and domain will pay off for their quality even if google's so hateful that they'd love to ban the entire internet if they could (this was in their plans a few years ago, I've seen it on YT, so they are this psychopathic and we should stop relying on them)...

So anyway, before I go fully off-topic (it wouldn't be the first time ), I would say

1) grab a quality expired / non-dropped domain in a niche as close / similar to your niche as possible, even if it won't rank in google
2) spend some time doing research on specialty forums and on Amazon / Alibaba / Etsy / Shopify / etc for the products whose prices you intend to compare and gather up as much info about these products as you can
3) segment and organize all of this info in such a way that your visitors will find the most value in your site (tackle topics like quality vs price, warranty and refunds, why you think one price tag is better than the other by giving your personal experience and / or research you've done on these products, etc)
4) create compelling CTAs
5) build up the authority of the domain so much that you'll have no problem breaking into at least top 10

Of course, you can do much more than these like advertise on social media, image sharing sites (price comparison tables are great content for people who spend a lot of time on sites like Pinterest, Imgur, DeviantArt, etc), forum marketing on the exact forums where you've done research for your site on, etc... But the 5 steps above I think will help you get a good start (should google still rank such sites that is...)

Thanks for the detailed reply man. Lots of really useful info in there

I’ll think it over. Another difficulty with a project like this is once you’ve built the system to get all the prices and make all the pages how do you drive traffic. I always hate the promotional part of a business. I just want to built cool stuff haha.

 

[tazarbm]

I always hate the promotional part of a business. I just want to built cool stuff haha.

duuude, you have the same problem as I had (I stressed over every pixel and colour of my websites when I made them, but once the sites were finished I just stared at them for months, marveling in how pretty they were, but without making any money off of them because I dreaded promoting them )

I totally feel you

Another difficulty with a project like this is once you’ve built the system to get all the prices and make all the pages how do you drive traffic

I've no idea. That's why I said "should google still rank such sites".

That's also why I said that you should focus on making content for them. As long as they have content, even if google doesn't pick them, other search engines might pick them. And - should you be using a good expired domain (even an EMD if possible) - I dare predict that within 1 month you will pick up traffic from other sources without doing anything.

But the trick is to make your pages and content so beautiful and even intriguing (by using emotional triggers or controversy in your content) that people will feel compelled either agreeing with you, or hating you for hating on their favorite products that they'll brag about your site on social media, reddit, etc, which will bring you free and passive traffic

Also like I said, if you manage to craft catchy infographics / tables / images in general, you can share those on image sharing sites, but make sure to include in your images stuff like "best deal", "unbeatable prices", "25% off", "voucher available", "huge discount if you buy today", "cheaper than [whatever]" etc... basically, entice people to click on your image to visit the site and - once / when they do - be sure that you offer them EXACTLY what you mention in that image (discount, 25% off, best deal, etc) - otherwise they'll leave your site for good and think of you as clickbaiter / scammer...

Just get creative with your images and promote them wherever images / display ads are allowed and you should be able to build up traffic...

 

[NeedMyLink]

I think structured data markup is a must, but even that won't save a site that lacks authority. Large companies typically rely on partnerships, APIs, or editorial content to stand out.

 

[dahu888999]

I'm thinking of starting a price comparison website.

I've had varying levels of success with websites with 10k+ pages over the years. Google seems to be getting much more stricter, I would assume due to the tons of AI content now getting pumped out.

Does anyone have any advice for ranking a site like this? Because its a huge amount of pages and each page is not going to have a lot of content.

I know that it's absolutely possible because I've seen price comparison websites getting huge volumes of traffic but I suspect they are held back until they meet a certain level of trust. Which I assume is perhaps a mix of links and age and perhaps some manual review, who knows.

Thoughts anyone?

Your idea is correct. If price comparison websites want to gain stable rankings on Google, they do need a certain amount of trust accumulation, especially when AI content is rampant. Here are some optimization strategies to help you improve your indexing rate and ranking:

1. Website structure optimization
Streamline URL structure: avoid long URLs and make sure to include core keywords, such as yourwebsite.com/category/product-name/
Internal link optimization: use breadcrumb navigation and related product links to improve crawling efficiency and increase user stay time
Dynamic page SEO processing:
For sites that generate a large number of similar pages, you can use canonical tags to avoid duplicate content problems
Appropriate use of noindex to control low-quality pages to prevent affecting the overall site quality score
2. Unique content strategy
Google is now stricter on low-content pages, so even price comparison sites should provide unique content:

User-generated content (UGC): encourage user reviews and ratings to enhance the uniqueness of content
Additional information:
Add product purchase guides, price trends, and discount information
Combined with data analysis, such as price fluctuation trends, historical lowest prices, etc.
AI + manual optimization: AI generates initial content, but manual adjustments are made to ensure that the page is valuable
3. Solve indexing problems
Forced indexing: Use Google Search Console to submit key pages to avoid being considered "soft" by Google 404" or low-quality pages
Sitemap strategy:
Submit sitemaps in layers (by category, brand, etc.)
Update sitemaps frequently, especially for pages with fast price changes
External links and social signals:
Do external link promotion for key category pages to improve weight
Attract crawlers through social platforms such as Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, etc.
4. Increase domain trust
Google may limit the ranking of new sites until it builds enough trust:

High-quality external link construction:
Get external links from high-authority sites (industry blogs, news sites)
Increase natural links through cooperation (affiliate marketing, guest blogging)
Old domain strategy:
If possible, use an old domain with historical weight
Buy expired, high-quality domain names in related industries and redirect them 301
Behavioral signals:
Increase Google's trust in the website through brand search, social sharing, user stay time, etc.
5. Gradually expand the index
Don't release 10k+ pages at a time, which may cause Google to think it is low-quality content
Submit core pages first, and then gradually release long-tail keyword pages after Google handles it
Monitor GSC and log files, observe crawler behavior, and adjust indexing strategies
Summary: You are right, Google may limit the ranking of such sites until sufficient trust is established. Your strategy should be:

Gradually increase indexed pages to avoid large-scale low-quality indexing
Provide unique value (user reviews, price trends, buying guides)
Get external links and social signals to improve website authority
Continuously optimize indexing strategies, observe GSC and logs, and ensure that Google crawls core pages
Are you currently considering a specific price comparison industry? Optimization strategies for different verticals may be different.

 

[ristoriel]

I'm thinking of starting a price comparison website.

I've had varying levels of success with websites with 10k+ pages over the years. Google seems to be getting much more stricter, I would assume due to the tons of AI content now getting pumped out.

Does anyone have any advice for ranking a site like this? Because its a huge amount of pages and each page is not going to have a lot of content.

I know that it's absolutely possible because I've seen price comparison websites getting huge volumes of traffic but I suspect they are held back until they meet a certain level of trust. Which I assume is perhaps a mix of links and age and perhaps some manual review, who knows.

Thoughts anyone?

you're right that Google has become more stringent. To succeed, focus on creating high-quality, unique content for each page, even if it’s minimal – like product reviews, pros and cons, or comparisons that add value. Also, building trust through a strong backlink profile, consistent traffic, and positive user engagement is key. Over time, as your site matures and proves its reliability, you should see improvements in rankings.

 

[backlinkindexer]

I'm thinking of starting a price comparison website.

I've had varying levels of success with websites with 10k+ pages over the years. Google seems to be getting much more stricter, I would assume due to the tons of AI content now getting pumped out.

Does anyone have any advice for ranking a site like this? Because its a huge amount of pages and each page is not going to have a lot of content.

I know that it's absolutely possible because I've seen price comparison websites getting huge volumes of traffic but I suspect they are held back until they meet a certain level of trust. Which I assume is perhaps a mix of links and age and perhaps some manual review, who knows.

Thoughts anyone?

Many make mistakes doing it automatically with copied/duplicated content. While search engines prefer hand-written, deep research kind of content. Make sure you follow that