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This help section consists of a knowledge base that we hope answers your questions about TicTap. If it cannot be found here, please ask us. Popular questions will be added to the knowledge base regularly.
TicTap is your personal price hunting mobile service. By using your cell phone, you can search for cheaper product prices from anywhere in the United States.
You send product searches using SMS messages, and TicTap will reply to you. We also offer other ways to view your search results online.
To use TicTap, you require the following:
It is 763-807-3927. Store it in your cell phone's address book for easy recall.
Follow these simple steps:
An access code will be sent if it's your first time using TicTap. We also have some tips on improving the quality of your search results.
Have you ever stood at the store wondering if there are alternatives to a product you fancy? Let TicTap's product recommendations help!
To find recommendations, text r<space><ISBN or UPC code>. For example, you may be intererested in products similar to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Do these:
Call your wireless carrier to see if it can increase your SMS quota for an additional fee. Most charge less than $10 a month for an extra few hundred SMS messages.
Alternatively, you could start your search phrase with the words 'no reply'. This tells TicTap not to send replies back to your phone. More information be can found here.
TicTap saves you money in 4 ways.
We thought it was convenient to say 'Hmm, sells for $69 here. Let me TicTap for a better price', or 'I TicTapped for this book at the bookstore, and found that Amazon.com sells it 20% cheaper'.
Although your search history can be viewed online, your cell phone number and email address are never revealed anywhere or to anyone. Read our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy for more information.
This also means that if a stranger stumbles upon your access code and TicTap history, there is no way he can identify you.
We do not charge you for using TicTap. However, your wireless service provider may charge you for sending and receiving SMS messages. Please check your wireless plan to make sure.
Currently, we are focused on price hunting only. However, your feedback can help spur on new services! Tell us what you want.
The TicTap access code is a unique code we give all TicTap users. You will be given one when you receive a search result for the first time.
Using your access code, you can view your TicTap history at this website.
The access code also ensures your anonymity. Since your cell phone is never displayed or shared, there is no way anyone can identify you by your TicTap history unless you told them.
TicTap stores all the search results you have ever received, and this list is called your TicTap history. You can view your TicTap history by keying in your access code into the text box at the top of the page.
SMS stands for Short Message Service. It is a text messaging service offered by all wireless service providers, and comes with most phone plans.
ISBN stands for International Standard Book Number. It is a code used to uniquely identify a book. The ISBN of a book is usually found at the bottom of the back cover.
It is a 10 character code, usually prefixed by the word 'ISBN'. The first 9 characters are numbers, and the last character is a number or 'X'. Below is an example of the ISBN code.
In this example, the ISBN is 0201177331.
UPC stands for Universal Product Code. It is the original barcode used widely in the US and Canada to uniquely identify products.
You can usually find the 12-digit UPC under the barcode. The first digit is typically (but not always) 0, 6 or 7. Below is an example of the UPC.
In this example, the UPC is 012345678905.
RSS is commonly known as Rich Site Summary, Really Simple Syndication or RDF Site Summary, although they mean the same thing. RSS is the language of RSS feeds, which is simply a way of presenting information.
Still confused? Ask us.
TicTap is not a shopping comparison site.
Our SMS service allows you to compare prices at the shopping mall with those from a highly reputable and affordable online retailer like Amazon.com. We don't think it benefits you to see the cheapest prices from an unknown online retailer.
The TicTap history does not provide price comparsions at all. We think that showing you prices from a dozen online retailers actually slows you down because you end up with too many choices! Our research shows consumers care about customer service, shipping time and costs, return policy and trustworthiness too. In Amazon.com, customers can enjoy these attributes. Furthermore, since Amazon.com sells used and new products, you can see a range of prices already, just like any shopping-comparison site!
Our future plan is to include 2 more establised online retailers in the TicTap history, so you have more choices.
You will encounter [?] links placed besides words or images throughout the TicTap web site. These are actually 'Help' tips to explain the meaning of those words and images.
By clicking on the links, you will see the knowledge base articles relevant to them.
You can find our blog and forum at http://blog.tictap.com and http://forum.tictap.com respectively.
In order to avoid duplicate posts, we think the best place to do this is at the TicTap Forum. Of course, you can also contact us directly.
The phrase 'The Long Tail' was first coined by Chris Anderson in a 2004 Wired Magazine article to describe certain business models such as Amazon.com.
He noted that products with low sales volume can collectively make up a market share that rivals the relatively few current bestsellers and blockbusters, if the store or distribution channel is large enough.
It is believed that 25-36% of Amazon's sales occur within their long tail!
We want to bring the hidden gems within Amazon's long tail to your attention. Long tail items have sales ranks of at least 100,000.
We created the TicTap history for our users because people tend to forget what they want to buy. So think of your history as the shopping list that you will never lose!
Using it, you can see your search results in more detail. Any TicTap history can be accessed simply by using the access code associated with it.
We encourage you to share your TicTap history with friends and family. You can do that by giving them your access code, or sending them the URLs that point at it.
Your TicTap history URL is http://www.tictap.com/code/<access code>. Replace <access code> with your access code.
There are 2 ways you can view your TicTap history.
One more thing. The only way to see the entire TicTap history is to view them at this website. The email method only shows new TicTaps, where as the RSS feed can only show 30 of the most recent search results.
We are aware of this anomaly. The prices you see in the TicTap history are updated every 24 hours and they come directly from Amazon.com.
Even then, we cannot ensure the prices are consistent for all products. The fail-safe way is to click on the product links to visit Amazon.com.
Your access code is unique to your cell phone number, and your TicTap history is accessible using only that access code. Therefore, ensure that you TicTap using the same phone or your search results will not appear in your TicTap history.
You cannot request for an access code or apply for one. Instead, your access code is sent to you in a text message the first time you receive a search result.
It's easy to retrieve your access code. Follow these steps.
If you do not receive a reply after a long time, please read this guide for assistance.
Sorry, we currently do not allow users to change their access codes.
By design, TicTap will send you your access code the first time you receive a search result. There are a few reasons why you might not have received it.
Sorry, we do not yet have a feature that allows you to do this.
If you TicTap from a new cell phone number, you will be given a new access code. Although your previous TicTap history is still accessible using your old access code, new search results will appear in your new TicTap history under the new access code.
We are working on a feature to port your access code to another cell phone number. In the meantime, if you cannot wait to change your cell phone number, contact us and we will help.
TicTap tries to help by storing your access code in your computer after you have used it for the first time. The next time you visit your TicTap history, your access code will automatically appear in the text box at the top of every page.
For this feature to work, your browser must accept cookies, which is enabled by default. Some software may also alert you that this website is attempting to store information in your computer. Do not block it as we're only trying to write a harmless string of text.
We also suggest that you use your browser to bookmark your TicTap history page.
In future, we may allow you to change your access code into something more easily remembered.
TicTap currently allows alphabets, numbers, % @ # & : " , . * $ ( ) ' - /
All characters not belonging to this group will be replaced with a space.
The words in search queries are not case-sensitive. For example, the words 'apple' and 'APPLE' are the same thing to TicTap.
For a product with an ISBN or UPC, we recommend you use it for an exact match. Instructions on searching using ISBN and UPC are here.
If the product doesn't have an ISBN or UPC, you have to enter words to describe it. Follow these tips:
We are doing our best to improve TicTap's search algorithm. If you received results that do not make sense, please let us know so we can do something about it.
TicTap currently understands English only.
Do not repeat a search using the same keywords or you will receive the same results.
Before changing your keywords, read this to learn how to create a more effective search phrase.
There may be occassions when you don't want to receive search results on your phone. This could be because you don't need to know it now, or you want to conserve your SMS usage.
You can do this by starting your search phrase with 'no reply' (don't include the quotes). This feature works whether you are searching using keywords, ISBN or UPC codes. Remember to look up your TicTap history later to review the results.
Please refer to the ISBN or UPC guides to ensure you know what they look like. It is easy to confuse the ISBN and UPC with each other and with other codes.
When composing your message, your ISBN or UPC should not be separated by any characters. Therefore, 012345678X and 012345678912 are valid, where as 0-123-45-678X or 0 123 4567-89-12 are invalid.
To help you conserve your SMS usage, you can send multiple ISBNs and UPCs in one message. To send such a message, separate the ISBNs and UPCs with a space.
For example, you can query 3 ISBNs and 1 UPC with the message: 0123456789 123456789X 0000012345 567894152675. A reply will be sent for each result.
To save you even more money, you can also tell TicTap not to reply to your cell phone!
TicTap returns information from Amazon.com. You will receive a mix of new and used prices and customer ratings.
Due to the limitations of an SMS message, we are unable to provide much more information. However, you can see detailed product information from your TicTap history, so remember to view them using one of the methods we offer.
We know that many users are charged for sending and receiving SMS messages, so we wanted to give as much useful information in as few messages as possible.
Therefore, we asked friends if they preferred to have the lowest prices from an unknown company, or low prices from a well-known and trusted company. All chose the latter, saying that besides price, they are mindful of customer service, shipping time and costs, return policy and trustworthiness too.
Amazon.com is rated highly in all these areas and we hope you think so as well. If you have another online retailer in mind, let us know.
However, we intend to add other well-known online retailers to the TicTap history in future.
You will receive at most 3 messages. Please note that for the first time you TicTap, you will also receive a message with your access code.
It takes TicTap at most 10 seconds to find answers to your queries.
However, you need to add the time it takes your message to reach us, and our messages to reach you over the wireless network. This transmission time is beyond our control.
We think a reasonable time is less than 2 minutes.
We think you should receive your search results within 2 minutes. In some cases, it will take longer, or you never receive it.
The most likely reason for this is a traffic bottleneck in the wireless network, which could cause your messages to be delayed significantly, or even worse, expire and be deleted.
Read this guide for more information. And if you consistently experience such delays, please inform us and we will try our best to help.
You could try TicTapping again, but read this guide first before you do so. It may help you to create a more effective search phrase.
Alternatively, you could visit your TicTap history later, and search Amazon.com directly from the product links.
If you feel your search phrase is reasonable and TicTap continues to make you unhappy, please inform us so that we can improve TicTap.
It means that you should receive 2 messages, and this is the first one.
TicTap sends out your messages in the correct order. For example, they are sent out as (1of3), (2of3) and (3of3).
Delays may happen in the wireless network that causes them to be received out of order by you. We hope you will understand that we are unable to help with this issue.
Please ensure that your cell phone has SMS capability, and you are subscribed to a wireless plan with SMS service.
There are a few known reasons if you still encounter problems:
We suggest that you ask your friends who TicTap to see if they face similar problems. You can also contact us and we'll try our best to be useful.
We think you should receive your messages within 2 minutes. If you consistently have to wait much longer than that, then let us help you.
In your email to us, give us as much information as possible. Also let us know if you able to send and receive SMS messages from other people within a short time. You should also check with friends using the same handsets and wireless provider as you to see if they face similar issues.
Try to retrieve your access code by following these steps. If it still doesn't work, contact us and we will attend to you personally.
This error message is returned when you attempt to retrieve your access code and it could not be found.
There are a few reasons why you received this message:
If you are sure that you are using the correct phone and was previously assigned an access code, please write to us and we will help.
You will receive this message if TicTap had to be taken offline for an unscheduled maintenance. This is usually caused by a server or network problem.
This message is returned if your search query yielded no results.
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