• by Shankar Gupta , November 7, 2006

Microsoft has launched a beta e-commerce service that allows online merchants to upload their product inventories to the Live Search index.

Code-named "Agora," the Greek word for "marketplace," the service is similar to Google Base, which also allows the uploading of product information into a database. Google, which launched the service last year, in April began adding the Google Base listings into its main search engine results page.

Access to Microsoft's service is limited to Internet retailers who pre-register with Windows Live. They can upload images, descriptions, prices, and links to online stores; their products also will be added to the index of Windows Live Product Search, Microsoft's beta shopping search engine.

The Microsoft service, which quietly launched over the weekend, potentially is a boon to online retailers, said Greg Sterling, principal of Sterling Marketing Intelligence, because general consumers do much of their product research at general search engines, even when they plan to purchase offline. "This sort of product information in search results is very valuable--that's why everyone's making such a big push around it," he said. "Consumers use the Internet to do product research, so getting that information in front of them is important."

Sterling added that this offering, along with services like Google Base, will potentially draw users from comparison shopping engines. "It's a threat to the shopping comparison engines, because search engines are used so much more frequently than those engines for product research," he said. "It simplifies the process for marketers--you just upload your products in one place."