Did your holiday gift budget shrink considerably this year? Your friends and family need never be the wiser: You just need to know where to find the best deals. Photo by ginnerobot.
Earlier this week we asked you to share your favorite sites for finding great deals online, and now we're back with the five most popular answers. Let's take a closer look at the best sites on the internet designed to help you stretch your dollar further this holiday season and beyond.
Slickdeals
Slickdeals.net is a comprehensive deal-finding web site with an active user community dedicated to scouring the web for great deals. Slickdeals posts deals in a blog-like format, providing a uncategorized and steady stream of deals on their home page covering the gamut from tech to toys and clothing to appliances. Avid users emphasize that while you should certainly come to Slickdeals for the front page deals, you should stick around for the thriving and thrift-conscious forums.
DealsPlus
Relative newcomer DealsPlus is much like the other popular deal finders listed but with a twist: It integrates social bookmarking features à la Digg or Delicious to help the most popular deals rise to the top. DealsPlus users submit deals and vote on the submitted deals they like; popular deals make the DealsPlus home page. If you're nuts about deals and user-driven content, DealsPlus may be right up your alley.
Dealnews
Dealnews is a popular deal finder "where every day is Black Friday." In contrast to the blog-like style of Slickdeals, the Dealnews front page organizes deals by category. While Dealnews has a clear emphasis on tech, it's no slouch when it comes to covering other categories, like clothing, home, and toys. It's friendly interface—complete with large pictures of featured product deals—makes it a fun and easy scan for the casual deal-searcher.
FatWallet
FatWallet is a popular deal-finding web site that aims to help you maintain a healthily plump wallet. Probably best known for it's active community of prudent spenders, FatWallet is an excellent resource for saving money online and off. As deal finders go, FatWallet doesn't do the same front page style as sites like Dealnews or Slickdeals, but if you do a little digging, you can find plenty of great deal streams—like in their Hot Deals forum.
PriceGrabber
Unlike the rest of the competition in this Hive Five, PriceGrabber is a comparison shopping web site that searches and compares prices from popular online retailers to bring you the lowest price available price. Apart from the simple search, PriceGrabber supports Price Alerts and rates products based on expert and user reviews.
Now that you've seen the best, it's time to vote for your favorite.
Which Is the Best Site for Finding Deals Online? ( surveys) This week's honorable mentions go out to the always-popular
Amazon (not strictly a deal-finder, but it certainly has consistently competitive prices),
Ben's Bargains, and
Craigslist. Whether or not your favorite made the short list, tell us more about what makes it so great in the comments.
