New Become.com ‘Search Zoom’ Feature Categorizes Web Search Results Cutting edge label and sort technology helps consumers find what they want faster

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – July 20, 2006 –Become.com, the only vertical search engine to combine Web-wide product-focused search with comparison shopping, today announced “Search Zoom,” a new feature that lets customers sort and prioritize research results by information type. Users can select the product information that is most relevant to them from several categories: buying guides, product reviews, discussion forums and product details. Become.com provides a one stop resource for product research and comparison shopping by offering more than 3.2 billion web pages of product information combined with 20 million products from nearly 5000 merchants.

Using its industry leading, patent pending AIR™ technology (Affinity Index Ranking), Become.com crawls billions of pages to find the Web’s most relevant and useful product information. Search Zoom categorizes that information, enabling users to easily browse only their preferred research sites. Then, with one click, Become.com’s “Shop” function allows users to view a range of merchants and prices from which to buy the product. Users who prefer seeing all research results will benefit from Search Zoom’s labeling of results by type.

“Consumers tell us they are frustrated with sites that waste their time with hundreds or even thousands of irrelevant results and that’s why they use Become.com,” said Become.com Founder, President and CEO Michael Yang. “Now, with Search Zoom, we are making our relevant search technology even more useful by sorting results to provide customers only the type of information they desire. Become.com’s technology continues to advance beyond other comparison shopping and search sites by providing the most integrated, customized shopping experience online.”

Search Zoom is easy to use. Visitors to Become.com simply type in a product they are interested in and click the “Research” button. When results appear, they can then zoom in on their preference from the top menu to instantly prioritize results. For example, a customer shopping for a “digital camera” would type that into the “What are you shopping for?” box, select the “Research” button and get hundreds of relevant results. Then they can instantly fine tune these results from the Zoom menu. And, when they are ready to buy, users simply click on the “Shop” button to see a detailed view of all the merchants and prices available for that item.

Become.com’s integrated search and shopping service stands out in a market saturated with general search engines that deliver increasingly irrelevant results and comparison shopping sites that only provide price information without comprehensive product reviews. “Become.com is an integrated solution that empowers customers by providing the best of product research and comparison shopping in one easy to use, convenient site,” Yang added.

The Search Zoom categories are:
• Product Reviews: Includes professional published reviews from sources like Consumer Reports and CNET as well as consumer opinion sites.
• Buying Guides: Overviews and tips on buying a specific product from reputable resources
• Discussion Forums: Online communities where users talk about products.
• Product Details: Includes technical specifications (speeds and feeds) and/or descriptive information (color, sizes, features etc.)


About Become.com
Become.com is a powerful vertical search engine and comparison shopping service. Founded by industry pioneers Michael Yang and Yeogirl Yun, creators of MySimon, Become.com helps people make better buying decisions and purchases online. Become.com searches over 3.2 billion web pages and uses its patent-pending AIR™ (Affinity Index Ranking) search technology to provide the Internet’s most useful product reviews and guides, and then makes it easy find and buy products from brand name retailers at the best prices. With over 20 million products from 5000 merchants, Become.com provides the Web’s most robust and easy to use combination of relevant product research and product availability. Please visit us at www.become.com.