It’s Raining Deals: Turbo-Charge Your Shopping And Save Money With Booly [Firefox]

We, at MakeUseOf.com believe in the idea of saving. Usually, it is time and effort as we give you tips and tales of the best technology offerings out there. But sometimes, we try to save you some hard green bucks too. That’s when we come across a cool application that helps you to win at online shopping or passing the message about real world sales tactics.

There are dime a dozen tools that watch out for the next price drop or a bargain grab. From price notifications to deal hunting, browser extensions and add-ons have been a favorite for long. In this brief article, we will take a look at a handy Firefox add-on called Booly which could qualify for a try out as shopping accessory.

Turn Your Search Engine into a Shopping Basket

You can think of Booly as a search enhancer or a search augmenter. The Booly browser add-on intelligently watches over your search and boosts it up with real time price comparisons, latest coupon codes and money saving deals. Booly tracks your shopping search across search engines like Amazon, Google, Yahoo, Bing and Blekko.

You can expect to get the best real-time price gathering and deal finding updates from top retailers in the U.S. and U.K. (Yes, shopping info is limited to these countries only for now. Australia and Europe will be covered soon), and across thousands of product categories. Booly has its own database on retailers and it has also tied-in with retail intelligence companies like Shopzilla and Shopping.com for price comparisons (with coupons and deal alerts).

Going Shopping With Booly

Booly is available as a browser extension for Firefox, Chrome, and Internet Explorer. We are focusing on the Firefox add-on for the purpose here, but all of them work in the same manner. The manner of Booly’s working is easily understood by the walkthrough of the deal-hunting process Booly puts us through after the add-on is installed.

Save With the Help of Booly’s Price Bar

As soon as you do your search, the blue bar pops up after a second or two and tells you if the product you are shopping for is cheaper elsewhere, or this is the best price you can expect to get. In some cases, you can also view similar items and also search for more products by clicking the green search button. You can retract the blue price notification bar to the extreme right of the browser and keep it unobtrusive till you need it again.

The shopping window displays all the prices, relevant savings, deals and coupons if any, and of course a direct button to the sites where you can grab all of these. The same shopping window also gives you a study in price comparison across popular retailers. Thus, you can make a more informed choice.

Bargain Hunting With Your Favorite Search Engine

Search for a product on your shopping list using regulars like Google or Bing. Booly powers up the search with the help of colored Booly icons to indicate potential savings. As the screen above shows, you might get coupon information related to the product right on top of the search result. You can click on it to reveal a few more details.

You can also get to the deals by clicking on the green icon next to the search results. Remember, a Green tag indicates that only deals and coupons have been found. A Red tag casts a wider net and could mean that Boo.ly has found favorable price comparisons for the product, possibly with related deals and coupons for that merchant. A red tag is obviously better because it gives you a few more price options.

Bargain Hunting With Friends

I would advise you to keep the news about a potential saving to yourself…you never know, there might be limited stocks available. But if you are the unselfish kind and want to crow about the bargain, make the social sharing buttons work for you. There’s nothing like a deal or a sale to make the world a happier place.

So, Is It A Good Deal?

Booly is fairly unobtrusive. I don’t have to feed it extra data, and it does not feed on mine except what I am searching for. You don’t have to change your search behavior, but just look for the red or green tag for the price info. Booly of course does not succeed every time and there are instances when it will not get you a price comparison or a bargain even on a shopping site like Amazon and for a common product like a leather folio tablet case. That is a bit frustrating because you would want instantaneous results from a search engine add-on always. This is one area where Booly really has to smoothen things out. As a shopper you don’t want to be kept waiting – online or offline. Though, when it does, it goes a long way in helping you make certain that you aren’t getting ripped off.

I couldn’t gather the entire list of online retailers Booly pings for price comparisons, but from what I could get, it does seem that it is dominated by the bigger players. Smaller niche retailers are given a miss.

I would also wish it to have a shopping list feature that would allow me to save the results for a later time. Booly is real-time while you may want some time to deliberate and come back to your shopping later.

So, what did the first run with Booly and an item on your wish list tell you? Do you think there’s money to be saved out there with some smart shopping? Is Booly one of the better decision support applications when it comes to shopping and deal-hunting? Thumbs up for Booly put it on our Best Firefox Add-ons page. There are specialized shopping tools especially for Amazon. So, does it deserve a place there or is there a comparison engine that’s better than Booly?

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A New, Completely Redesigned MySpace Is Now Open To The Public [Updates]

Remember MySpace? It’s back, and it has Justin Timberlake all over it. The new version of MySpace, or the “New MySpace“, is a completely re-imagined version of the pioneer social network, and it’s now officially open to the public. Anyone who’s up for a second round of MySpace can create an account, or log in using the old MySpace account, Facebook or Twitter.

After creating the account, you’ll get the chance to choose your artistic profession, upload a photo, write a short bio, and you’re ready to go. You can use the New MySpace to discover new artists, songs, albums, mixes, and even radio stations. You can easily listen to music, “connect” with songs or artists, and watch trending videos. MySpace’s new interface is barely recognizable compared to the old version, and it’s so wide it was actually cut off at the side even on my 19″ monitor.

The New MySpace was first announced back in July, and in September we got a first visual glimpse on a preview video. The video was promoted by Justin Timberlake, one of site’s biggest investors, whose face is now all over the New MySpace’s landing page, advertising the release of his new single. After a being invite-only since the initial announcement, the New MySpace now opens its gates to a new generation of budding artists, fans, and the generally curious.

If you’ve had music in the old version of MySpace, you can import it to the new version using what they call the “classic MySpace” login option. Even if you’ve never had a MySpace account before, it’s worth taking a look, if only to see how a website can turn 180 degrees and make a complete change.

What do you think of the New MySpace? Will you use it, or is it this effort doomed from the start?

Source: MySpace via The Verge

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Automatic Coupon Finders – Do They Really Help You Save Money?

Like many good things in life, coupons and promo codes are elusive. Saving money is never an easy thing, after all, and when you’re trying to find valid codes for something specific, you usually end up with many useless or expired codes, and lots and lots of open tabs. Think about it, how many times have you wanted to buy something and actually managed to find a discount code that helped you save money?

Before you get excited, this post is not about the perfect coupon source, or a dream-come-true way to get instant discounts just by thinking about them. I wish it were. Instead, I’m going to take a close look at three different coupon finder services that promise to take the pain and annoyance out of the coupon-finding business, and help you find the right coupon for the right purchase at the right time. These are not mere coupon websites I’m talking about, but browser add-ons and bookmarklets that find discount codes based on the checkout page you’re already on.

So do these services really work? Do they really save you money? Is finding coupons and codes going to be FUN from now on? Read on to find out.

The Coupon Finder Services

For the purposes of this article, I’m going to try to save money using three different automatic coupon finders: Promofly, Honey and Coupons at Checkout.

Promofly is a browser bookmarklet which I’ve looked at in the past, and is compatible with Firefox, Chrome, and Safari. Promofly is still in beta, and while you can request an invite and sometimes even get it immediately, you still can’t start using it right away.

Being a bookmarklet, there’s nothing to install when using Promofly, and after dragging the button to your bookmarks bar, you can click it at any time to start looking for codes. The nice thing about Promofly is that you can use it as soon as you enter an online store to find available discounts before you even start shopping. You can also browse its database for currently available coupons on hundreds of stores.

Honey is a browser add-on which works only with Chrome. After installation, it adds a “Find Savings” button to checkout pages in the stores it supports, and automatically finds all available coupons. But this is not Honey’s unique feature. Not only does Honey find relevant coupons, it automatically enters them in the promo code box and hits enter, thus testing whether the code actually works. It does this, one by one, to all the codes it finds.

Coupons at Checkout is a browser add-on made by coupon database CouponFollow, and is compatible with IE, Firefox, Chrome and Safari. When you check out of an online store, clicking on the promo code box will reveal all the coupons Coupons and Checkout managed to find. When you choose one, it’s copied into the box and you can see if it works. You can then mark whether it worked or not by clicking on the box again.

All three of these services are super easy to use, and all three by far beat browsing in numerous coupon websites looking for Mr. Right Coupon. But do they really work?

Target.com

On Target.com I tried buying the Baby Einstein Sea Dreams Soother you see above. The regular price for this toy is $42.99. What was it after looking for coupons using Promofly, Honey and Coupons at Checkout?

Promofly: Upon entering the Target website, Promofly notified me immediately that it found a coupon for it. On checkout, I launched the bookmarklet, clicked the coupon, and managed to drop the price to $37.99 – $5 off the original price.

Honey: Honey tested 10 coupons for me when I clicked on “Find Savings” on checkout. Unfortunately, it couldn’t find any code that fit this item.

Coupons at Checkout: Coupons at Checkout found three codes for me to try: one for a $5 discount, one for a $7 discount for $70+ purchases, and a third one which it told me was likely be expired. I tried all three one by one (I added another unit to my basket to try the $70+ one), but unfortunately, none worked.

The winner: In this case, the clear winner is Promofly, which helped me save $5 off my purchase.

Sears.com

I went for two different items on Sears. The first was a $207 Grand Resort Thomas 9ft umbrella, which was already on sale, and the second was a $204 Stork Craft baby crib.

Promofly: When looking at Promofly, I found a $20 discount coupon for every purchase over $200 in Outdoor Living. This promo code actually worked for the umbrella, and I managed to get my purchase down to $187. There was no code for the crib.

Honey: Honey’s button didn’t appear anywhere on this checkout, despite its website claiming to support Sears.

Coupons at Checkout: Coupons at Checkout showed three different coupons for the umbrella, none of which worked, but managed to find a 15% discount code for the crib, which worked and brought my purchase down to $173.

The winner: There’s actually one loser instead of one winner, and in this case it’s Honey, which failed to even show up to the party. Both Promofly and Coupons at Checkout worked well for their respective items, with Promofly having the advantage of telling me about available coupons in advance.

Starbucks.com

On Starbucks, I decided to buy a $90 Cuisinart coffee maker. After all, I need my coffee in the mornings. But did I manage to get it for slightly less?

Promofly: Promofly found a 10% discount code for new customers, which worked like a charm.

Honey: Honey’s button didn’t appear, perhaps the service doesn’t support Starbucks.

Coupons at Checkout: Coupons at Checkout found the same 10% discount code Promofly did, and it worked well.

The winner: Coupons at Checkout and Promofly performed well, although it should be mentioned that the coupon they found was advertised on Starbucks.com. Honey didn’t deliver yet again.

More Tries

Among some other stores I tried were Amazon, Newegg, Old Navy, Gap, Walgreens, Best Buy and Barnes & Noble. Naturally, many websites simply did not have any promotions going at the time, and none of the services found discounts. In other stores, the promotions were explicit all over the website, telling me exactly which promo code to use to get a discount. In these cases Promofly and Coupons at Checkout sometimes offered the same coupons. Not once did Honey manage to find a coupon for me, except on Walgreens, where the discount was applied automatically, but Honey still claimed to have found it for me.

Conclusion – Can You Save Money Easily Or Not?

When I started testing these coupon finder services, I thought it would be a piece of cake. Open some websites, click some buttons, see what happens. It turned out it’s slightly more complicated than that, and not surprisingly, it looks like saving money will never be really easy.

With that in mind, Promofly is a truly great service because of how effortless it is to use, and mainly because it tells you right off the bat if there are codes available, and on what. You can use Promofly on checkout, but you don’t have to wait until you’re there to see what’s available, and this makes this service a true winner. It also comes with a pretty good database for both stores and coupons

Since Promofly is still in beta, and you might have to wait to get your invite, the next best choice is Coupons at Checkout. It’s just as effortless and many times just as efficient, but it does lack Promofly’s ability to see the available codes before checkout. Here too, you can enjoy a good database and a huge list of supported stores.

As for Honey, I loved the idea behind it, but at the moment, its database and supported store list is just not up to par.

All in all, none of these coupon finder services are a sure thing, and more often than not you won’t find a coupon for what you want to buy. But if you’re tired of searching and want to feel like you’ve at least tried, they’re highly recommended. Who knows, you might even save some money on the way!

How do you find discount codes? Do you actually manage to save money this way? Share your experiences in the comments.

Image credit: piggy bank image via Shutterstock

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Neat Facebook Chat Hacks To Keep You Enjoying IM Via Facebook [Weekly Facebook Tips]

Facebook chat is one of those things that’s fantastic when everything is going well, yet very annoying when something’s not right. Sadly, most people don’t have the time to navigate all of the options and set their preferences just so.

There’s also a number of useful tricks and Facebook hacks you can do with chat messages that many people just don’t realise is possible. That’s why today we’re going to quickly run through some of the most useful Facebook chat hacks for you. We’ll have you set up comfortably in no time.

Forward Facebook Chat Messages

There are a number of reasons you may need to forward chat messages, but very few people realise that it’s in fact possible. To do it, go to your Facebook Messages screen and highlight a conversation with a particular friend. In the top right, there’s a menu with a gear icon and “Actions“. Click on that and choose “Forward Messages“, then you’ll be able to choose which items of the full chat history to forward.

You can forward these to either a Facebook user or an email address.

Filter Who Sees You Online In Facebook Chat

Chatting to friends on Facebook can be great, if they’re the friends you wanted to catch up with. If you’re always getting hassled by workmates or other acquaintances, then maybe it’s worth setting a few things up to ensure they only see you online when you actually want to chat.

You may or may not already know that it’s possible to filter who can see you online in Facebook chat. There are two ways of going about it: either with a blacklist or a whitelist. Both the blacklist and the whitelist can be made up of individuals or friends lists. So, you can choose to chat with anyone except people on list xyz. Or, you can choose to only chat to people on list abc. It’s your choice how you do it. All you need to do then is make an appropriate friends list to suit your needs.

To make changes to your Facebook Chat settings, head to the bottom right of your Facebook Chat and click on the gear icon, choosing “Advanced Settings“. From there, you’ll be able to either enter friends you DO want to chat to or friends you DON’T want to chat to. I’ve chosen to make lists of acquaintances and people I don’t normally want to chat to, thus leaving myself open to chat with anyone else on my friends list.

You may choose to do it the other way around and only chat to your best friends.

For more on how to set up filters for Facebook chat, check out this article to Decide Which Facebook Friends See You Online & Which Don’t, The Easy Way.

Hide Offline Friends In Facebook Chat

For some reason, certain friends will always show up in Facebook chat regardless of whether they’re online or not. If this bugs you, there’s a Chrome extension to fix this, which simply hides all the people who are currently offline.

Disable Read Receipts In Facebook Chat

If you don’t want your friends to know that you’ve seen a certain message, you can disable read receipts using a handy browser extension called Chat Undetected. It’s available for Firefox and Chrome.

Turn Off Chat By Default

To turn off Facebook chat, head to the gear icon at the bottom of Facebook Chat and choose “Turn Off Chat” from the menu (or turn it back on again using the same method). It’s also possible to turn off Facebook chat by default using the “Advanced Settings” from the same menu, then choosing “Turn Off Chat“.

Turn Off Facebook Chat Sounds

Again, all you need to do is head to the gear icon at the bottom of Facebook Chat and un-check “Chat Sounds”. No more annoying notification sounds!

Hopefully, your Facebook Chat is now very well set up and ready to make your life a pleasure rather than a pain. What else would you like to see Facebook chat do?

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Facebook Joins The Search Game, Introduces Graph Search [Updates]

Facebook has announced a new and improved search experience called Graph Search, which helps you navigate Facebook’s vast amount of information and find new people who share your interests, specific activities, specific photos, and more. It’s different from regular Web search in that it utilizes Facebook’s database to show you information from people you know or might now, along with popular Facebook results.

Graph Search will make use of details people choose to share on Facebook, and will only use them according to each user’s privacy settings. This means that the same search for different people can yield completely different results, and this is what can make Graph Search unique. For example, you can search for friends who like to ski, for photos your friends took in Paris, for people who work in your company and like to dance, etc.

Graph Search is currently in limited beta testing for English-speaking users only. If you want to get a glimpse of the action, you can join the waiting list here. At the moment, not all the promised features are available, but these will be added shortly, as the service expands.

Privacy wise, Graph Search shouldn’t pose a serious problem as it will only use information you choose to share, and will only show it to people you chose to share it with. It remains to be seen how exactly this aspect will work, considering Facebook’s not-so-trustworthy reputation when it comes to privacy issues. You can read more about privacy and Graph Search here.

Will you use Graph Search once its available?

Source: Facebook

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Facebook Joins The Search Game, Introduces Graph Search [Updates]

Facebook has announced a new and improved search experience called Graph Search, which helps you navigate Facebook’s vast amount of information and find new people who share your interests, specific activities, specific photos, and more. It’s different from regular Web search in that it utilizes Facebook’s database to show you information from people you know or might now, along with popular Facebook results.

Graph Search will make use of details people choose to share on Facebook, and will only use them according to each user’s privacy settings. This means that the same search for different people can yield completely different results, and this is what can make Graph Search unique. For example, you can search for friends who like to ski, for photos your friends took in Paris, for people who work in your company and like to dance, etc.

Graph Search is currently in limited beta testing for English-speaking users only. If you want to get a glimpse of the action, you can join the waiting list here. At the moment, not all the promised features are available, but these will be added shortly, as the service expands.

Privacy wise, Graph Search shouldn’t pose a serious problem as it will only use information you choose to share, and will only show it to people you chose to share it with. It remains to be seen how exactly this aspect will work, considering Facebook’s not-so-trustworthy reputation when it comes to privacy issues. You can read more about privacy and Graph Search here.

Will you use Graph Search once its available?

Source: Facebook

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