ASU team tries to streamline Web shopping

Jane Larson
The Arizona=20 Republic
Dec. 15, 2005 12:00 AM

Hasan Davulcu = used to watch=20 the inner workings of a friend's online store, curious = about=20 shoppers who plugged in keywords and never found or = never=20 bought the items they were looking for.

It made = him=20 think there had to be a better way for consumers to = find=20 exactly what they want online. As an assistant = professor of=20 computer science, he thought the answer would be in = capturing=20 and storing search terms to make searches faster and = more=20 effective.

Applying a team of computer science = students=20 to the problem led to Usuggest.com, a = comparison-shopping Web=20 site that goes beyond product reviews to offer cash = rewards to=20 helpful shoppers.=20

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The=20 team won Arizona State University's Technology=20 Entrepreneurship Challenge this fall. The victory = earned them=20 the $20,000 first prize and entry in the inaugural = Intel+UC=20 Berkeley Technology Entrepreneurship Challenge last = month.=20 That contest was won by a University of = California-Berkeley=20 team developing new semiconductors for cellphones, but = the=20 Usuggest.com team still sees potential.

Tom = Duening,=20 director of entrepreneurial programs in the = engineering=20 school, said Usuggest.com combines a variety of trends = in=20 online retail:

=95 Consumers' = increasing use of=20 the Internet to comparison = shop.

=95 The ability=20 to rank suggestions according to their usefulness to=20 others.

=95 Rewards. Usuggest.com is = unique in=20 that it pays commissions to users whose suggestions = result in=20 new sales for vendors, Duening=20 said.

Comparison-shopping Web sites have grown = in=20 popularity in recent years. Some 31 percent of North = American=20 online consumers reported using them in 2004, up from = 18=20 percent the year before, according to Forrester=20 Research.

Forrester analyst Carrie Johnson even = warned=20 this year that a shakeout was coming, saying the sites = aren't=20 differentiated enough and that portal giants Yahoo! = and Google=20 would have the edge in attracting new = users.

Novice=20 users, though, could be just the target for=20 Usuggest.com.

"People were constantly shopping = and=20 failing to find things," Davulcu said of his friend's = Web=20 site. "So how can we get them to talk to each other? = Then this=20 idea of suggestions came up. Whenever they find = something they=20 buy, they just hit a button and submit it to a central = Web=20 site."

But that raised the question of why = successful=20 shoppers would bother to share their finds. Prabhdeep = Singh, a=20 computer science graduate student at ASU, got the idea = for=20 Usuggest.com to split its 10 percent commission from = merchants=20 with the shopper who suggests the product and its = particular=20 search term. The more popular a product and the more = intuitive=20 the search term, the more commissions the shopper is = likely to=20 earn.

For example, a shopper who claims the = search term=20 "leather chairs" and recommends the leather club chair = at=20 Brookstone would earn a commission if another shopper = types=20 "leather chairs" into the site and buys the Brookstone = chair.=20 When suggestors' commissions top $10, Usuggest.com = will invite=20 them to register so it can send them checks. =

The site=20 also tracks how many people have searched for a = product, and=20 offers links to related items. The idea is to tap the = Internet=20 trend known as social networks and create online = communities=20 of people with similar interests and = tastes.

"Nobody=20 has actually thought of bridging the social networks = with the=20 actual commercial online shopping," Singh=20 said.

Usuggest.com has a team of 17 students at = the=20 State University of New York-Stony Brook, Davulcu's = former=20 school, fine-tuning the technology behind the = suggestions and=20 rankings. They plan to use the ASU prize money to hire = the=20 students for another semester and complete the=20 technology.

Usuggest.com's Web site is still in = the=20 prototype stage, but it is attracting 10,000 clicks = per day=20 and generating more than $70,000 in sales a month for = its=20 vendors, Duening said. Arizona Technology Enterprises, = the=20 technology-transfer arm of ASU, has filed for two = provisional=20 patents on the Usuggest.com technology, he said.=20

Reach the reporter at jane.larson@arizonarepubl= ic.com=20 or (602) 444-8280.

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