There are a lot of powerful online apps out there, but not many are as cool as Visual Ping. You might think being able to detect website changes isn’t that sexy, but you’d be wrong.
What is Visual Ping?
Basically, Visual Ping is web service that will detect website changes and notify you. There is a free version you can try out which gives you limited sites and checks. Now, you’d be forgiven for thinking that sounds pretty boring, but trust me, this is a very powerful tool. Simply pop in the site you want to track, how often you want to check it and how severe a change you’re waiting for. Visual Ping will then let you know when that site changes.
Why would I want to detect website changes?
The vast majority of us are totally guilty of not harnessing the power of the internet. Services like IFTTT can make the internet do a lot of heavy lifting for you. If you’re smart about it, Visual Ping can really give you the edge – here’s how.
Cracking deal out of stock? Get notified when it’s back
Online shopping is great craic and there’s nothing better than finding an absolute steal. On the flipside, there’s little worse than missing out. Take this classic Sega Mega Drive for example:
Using Visual Ping, you can track this page for slight changes. The free version of the app will check this page daily for the slightest changes. So when the ‘out of stock’ Â message changes to ‘available’, you’ll be one of the first to know. It’s that simple.
The eagle-eyed among you will quick spot that you’ll also learn price drops by using this method. This is true, but we prefer PriceSpy for that job.
Track Ticketmaster for availability and Black Friday bargains
Missed out on tickets to your favourite act? Set up Visual Ping to track the right page in Ticketmaster and you’ll get the jump on the masses when extra dates are announced. Actually, when it comes to getting the jump on people, don’t forget Black Friday.
Every year, the people of Ireland lose the plot over Black Friday. Irish online retailers react by changing their sites to reflect the madness. Setting Visual Ping to track websites like Currys and DID in the weeks building up to the big day could bag you some bargains.
These are just two examples of how Visual Ping can be of great benefit. You’ll probably be able to think of some unique uses yourself. Either way, give it a try. It won’t cost you a penny but could save you a packet.
Visual-ping is worthless during the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of vaccine alerts. Alerted me an hour after every appointment was already filled. Says it pinged the site after the changes – well, on the dashboard, it reported no changes at the moment I was looking at a totally new set of appointments on the health dept. site. An hour later, it reported the changes I had been observing an hour earlier. Within minutes, 700 appointments were full! Useless and frustrating considering that I had it set for every 15 minutes of ping