We are approaching that time of year.  Heck, for some the time has already come.  Christmas/holiday shopping is upon us and we will all be asked (or asking) that age old question “what do you want this year?”  You might already have some ideas or you might be completely clueless, but one thing is for certain.  You don’t have it written down and you probably will never get that far.  Surprise your friends and family this year with a new response by using an online wish list.

Online wish lists are not a new idea.  Gift registries have been around forever for things like weddings and baby showers.  When the internet really started to take off and big retailers like Target, Best Buy and Amazon.com hit the web, they made it possible for you to add items to a “wish list.”  Unfortunately, you had to pick all your items from their store and then find a way to share that list with friends and family.  Not an easy task and, not surprisingly, I don’t think these applications ever got much use.

Fast forward to 2000.  Enter thethingsIwant.com.  This was the first tool of it’s kind.  Now, you could choose ANY item, from ANY store on the web, and enter it into your wish list.  Not only could you store a link to the item, you could also enter in details, notes and a priority number (depending on how badly you wanted the item).  Send a quick link to your friends and family via email and then they would have access to your list as well.  Not only could they reference the list whenever they wanted, but you could continue to add to the list over time.  You now have a live, fully functioning database of what you want for the holidays.

thethingsiwant.com main page

Sadly, thethingsIwant.com has not been updated much over the years and other sites have emerged with cleaner, easier to navigate interfaces.  A quick Google search reveals that there are now about 30 competitors in the online wish list business.  While I have not been to, or used, all of them, I did find a few that looked pretty promising.

• yourlistonline.com
• myregistry.com
• wishlistr.com (my choice for best looking site)
• amazon.com (they allow you to add products from any site)

I’ll be setting up my wish list later today and sending out links to friends and family later this week.  I know not everyone is as big a computer user as I am, but just think of the benefits you get from using such a service:

• People know EXACTLY what you want. (including pictures and descriptions)
• People know EXACTLY where to find the item(s). (links are included)
• You are giving everyone PLENTY of time to do their shopping.
• You are helping family avoid the dreaded DUPLICATE GIFT. (some of the sites allow gift givers to mark when something has been purchased)
• It is IMPOSSIBLE for anyone to lose the list.  (you can always send them the link again)

One of the best features of these online wish lists is the ability to add a “button” to your browser that will make it easy fo you to add any item you see to your list in seconds.  For instance, let’s say you are on Target.com and see a game or movie that you really want.  You simply click on the button, then fill out a small form.  The form allows you to add notes, enter a price range of the item and verify the location of where you found it.  Click OK and BAM!, the item is now on your list and instantly available to anyone you want to share it with.

So, you now have no excuse for being “listless.”  Choose one of the sites I mentioned above and begin creating your list.  Email it out to friends and family and maybe they will do the same.  Don’t forget, you could always use the ShareThis button below to tell them all about it.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 4th, 2009 at 10:28 am and is filed under Free Programs, Online Shopping, Tips and Tricks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.