Has anyone figured out a way to automate searches for deals?

[onyxrhino]

This may be a stupid question, but here goes...

In the course of the next couple months, I have to buy a substantial amount of photography gear for work. I know what I need to buy, but since it doesn't need to be purchased for a couple months, I can wait and see if certain items go on sale and buy them then. But my question is, rather than just checking the vendor sites each day or a couple times a week, is there a way to set up a search engine to keep an eye on the various items and alert me when one goes on sale? I figured with the prodigious music gear shoppers here, someone might have an answer.

[Chankgeez]

Ask "echorec". He's the "search for deals" guy.

[onyxrhino]

Ask "echorec". He's the "search for deals" guy.

Thanks. There's only one?

[Chankgeez]

Maybe there's more than one? Also, maybe echorec just subscribes to everyone's mailing list to find all the deals.

[Dandolin]

there can only be one

to live in a world where all music is lower-part-of-the-curve-Queen

[friendship]

I consult Cerebro

[Blood_mountain]

Sounds like a good idea for an app.

[coupleonapkins]

Not exactly what you're looking for, but I've had success lately placing items in my cart on Ebay & Amazon & leaving them there, only to be offered a deal within the next 24-48 hrs (the ebay item was OBO/25% off, the Amazon item from a 3rd party seller at 50% off). B&H is where I've gone for specific camera equipment in the past, and they do offer some deals as the newer/updated models are ushered in & the older ones phased out, depending on the manufacturer/stock on hand (likewise, Amazon sellers excel at going to the absolute bottom price during these periods, too). In terms of negotiation, B&H doesn't budge, though if you're spending upward of 10K, they probably will eventually (buy another battery or two!). Most sites will allow haggling via the live chat option, which can swing you around 10-15% off a majority of the time, if you know what you're doing - calling a human being via their phone number also helps, especially with a substantial purchase, if you'd rather not wait for a sale.

Also, maybe echorec just subscribes to everyone's mailing list to find all the deals.

[BetterOffShred]

There's a guy on Reverb who has a book on how to make money flipping gear .. what a dildo.

A flipper app to really capitalize on people's passion. Cool

[tremolo3]

Some skills in any scripting language will do it.

I made one (in Perl: https://github.com/ramonovski/GASHuntin ... ter/gas.pl) looking for specific items on TGP, I had it checking every minute on their forum looking for "piece of gear" and alert me once it's a winner.
I got a couple of goodies doing that.

It will be waaaay easier if the website you're looking for has a standard form for their postings like most modern ecommerce websites (ie. reverb.com, etsy, ebay, etc) but they all have alerts. Have you tried that yet?