The best 7 sites to organize your shopping wish lists

January 18th, 2010

Tired of last minute gift shopping? Always getting the wrong size for that special someone? Well then you should start making wish lists! Lists are a handy way to remember gifts for any special occasion like birthdays, holidays, weddings, anniversaries and baby showers. They’re even good for general shopping, house warmings, or just keeping up with items you’d like to find on sale or for back to school.

There are at least 4 great reasons for maintaining your wish list online.

1. You can add products that can be purchased from any store.
2. You can consolidate everything in one secure place, and restrict access to some or all of your lists.
3. You can easily share the list, and your gift-givers can view and reserve items on your list, or even split the cost of an item.
4. You can organize charitable or cash contributions.

I looked at two dozen different free online wish lists, with a wide range of features. Some of them only offered the option to create and share simple lists, while others incorporated social networking and many more advanced features. Here are some of my favorites:

I particularly liked MyRegistry because it offered the option to import existing store registries from Target, Crate and Barrel, Williams-Sonoma, and The Land of Nod to sync and display within the MyRegistry gift list, which is great for consolidating into one list. When purchases are made in the store, the online list is automatically updated, and purchases made through MyRegistry automatically update the store gift registries as well.

• Unlimited items – Add as many items as you wish to your registry, from as many stores as you like – whether they are online or offline.
• Any entry type – Add anything and everything to your registry, even scuba diving equipment, French lessons, or a dream trip to the Caribbean. Register for spa services, dinner-for-two at your favorite restaurant, or airline gift certificates.
• Receive cash tastefully – You can even start a college fund for your new baby using the Cash Gift Fund.

Amazon’s simple gift and wish list has been improved by the addition of their Universal Wish List button and Firefox add-on. You can create multiple lists, easily add items from any web site, and make the lists private or visible to the public. But there are no access levels or advanced features.

• Firefox plugin for quick wish list updating.
• Integrated with the most popular online shopping site around.

Wishpot is more of a free social shopping service, making it easy to save and share interesting things you find in stores and online.

• Price alerts – The most outstanding feature of Wishpot is an option to alert you whenever there’s a price drop on any of your wish list items at a long list of merchants that the site monitors.
• Amazon wish lists can be imported.
• Wishpot also lets wish list owners set up contributions, so multiple people can contribute to a single item or fund.
• Wish list owners can share their wish lists  through an assigned URL with friends and family, members and non-members alike, and they can reserve items for purchase.

Wishlistr’s simple interface makes it easy to use, while incorporating some unique features.

• Import – You can add items from your Amazon wish list or your del.icio.us bookmarks.
• Formatting – Choose from 18  templates to change the appearance of your page.
• Easy link to share – Your wish list URL is www.wishlistr.com/YOURNAME.

TheThingsIWant allows you to create and maintain a list for each family member. Having these types of lists ready, will help reduce the stress of shopping for them for any occasion. They can also be used to organize surprise parties, allowing the gift-givers to organize their celebration without  the knowledge of the recipient. Finally, thethingsiwant.com offers parental controls so even kids can create and maintain their own wish lists. Just make sure you let your child understands he’s not getting every present on the wish list!

• Management of the accounts must be controlled by someone 13 years or older, so that children under 13 will need the consent and help of their parents to add an item to their lists.
• This is a great way to reduce the clutter of getting unwanted toys or duplicates.

Wantz.it is another universal wish list, with a couple of unique social features.

• Connects with the other web applications that you use everyday – like facebook, twitter and delicious.
• Your own exclusive URL – YOURNAME.wantz.it.

WishList is a basic wish list site without any of the social networking bells and whistles. But one excellent feature worth mentioning is the ability to use a camera phone to send items directly to your account while you’re out shopping.

• Easy to use for a short learning curve.
• Adds pictures to your wishlist.

I’m ready to start my virtual wish list and keep it updated, and I want my family and friends to do the same. The next time anybody buys me a gift or I need to buy one for them – thanks to our online wish lists – we’re going to get it right!

Entry Filed under: Shopping