Switching from WebSite-Watcher to a hosted monitor, bookmark by bookmark

If you have decided to switch from WebSite-Watcher, the hard part is not signing up for something new. It is deciding what each of your bookmarks was really for. Years of filters, keyword lists and check macros pile up, and a few of them still matter. This guide walks through the move one bookmark at a time, so nothing important goes quiet while you change tools.

Why people move off a desktop watcher

WebSite-Watcher, made by Aignesberger Software, is a capable program. It runs on Windows 10 and 11 and on Windows Server, and it checks pages, feeds and documents from that machine. Aignes says it plainly on its own site: it runs locally and needs no cloud account.

That design is also why people leave. When the PC sleeps, reboots for updates or travels in a laptop bag, the checks stop. Aignes suggests a virtual machine for Mac and Linux users, which is one more thing to keep running. Its phone app can watch pages too, but it does the checking on the phone itself, with no cloud behind it.

AyeWatch takes the other route. Monitors run on its servers around the clock, and alerts reach you through the web app or the iOS and Android apps whether your computer is on or not.

Step 1: Sort your bookmarks into three piles

Open WebSite-Watcher and go through the bookmark list. Put each one in a pile:

• Move. Pages where you want to know when something meaningful changes: a vendor's release notes, a competitor's pricing page, a jobs board, a public tender list.
• Keep local. Pages that need a recorded login macro, PDF and Word files, local files, FTP folders, or a Basic plugin doing arithmetic. AyeWatch's site does not show support for these, so leave them where they work.
• Drop. Pages you stopped reading two years ago.

Most people find the first pile is the largest and the last pile is bigger than expected.

Step 2: Turn each filter into one sentence

In WebSite-Watcher, a bookmark's behavior lives in its ignore filters, highlight keywords and check rules. In AyeWatch you write what you care about in plain English, and a model judges each change against that sentence.

A few translations:

One rule can cover more than one URL, so three pages from the same vendor can share a monitor.

Step 3: Paste the pages in

There is no import file. For each bookmark in the Move pile, create a webpage monitor in AyeWatch, paste the address and add the sentence from Step 2. The source write-up from AyeWatch describes this as the whole migration, and it holds up: the slow part is Step 2, not this one.

If you also used WebSite-Watcher to read Facebook, X or Instagram pages as feeds, consider a topic monitor instead. AyeWatch can watch a subject across news sites, forums, blogs and social platforms, not only the pages you name.

Step 4: Choose how often and where alerts go

Pick an interval for each monitor. On paid plans, Auto mode speeds up when a page is busy and slows when it is quiet.

Then choose channels. Push notifications and the in-app feed come with every plan. Email, the daily digest email, Slack, Discord, webhooks and the REST API need a paid plan, and you can route each monitor to its own channel.

Step 5: Run both for a week

Leave WebSite-Watcher running on the Keep local pile and, for a week, on the moved pages as well. Compare what each tool flagged. If AyeWatch stays silent on changes you would have ignored anyway and speaks up on the ones you cared about, turn off the old bookmark.

What it costs

WebSite-Watcher is a license: €49 for private use or €299 per business seat, with a year of updates. AyeWatch is a subscription, with paid plans from $9 a month and no contract. For most teams the better deal is what comes with it: checks in the cloud, plain-English rules, summaries in every alert, and delivery to the places you already work. The Free Preview gives three lifetime runs across up to three topics, with no card.

When to stay

If you depend on scripting, check macros for logins, or a scraper exporting CSV, WebSite-Watcher does more than AyeWatch, and a machine that is always on solves its main limit. For everything in the Move pile, start a free AyeWatch monitor and test it against your oldest bookmark.