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I am shopping online more and more lately and discovering more and more ways to save money on online shopping.
By stacking deal on deal you can make a good deal a great deal on line. Sometimes however it is hard to remember all the different ways to stack discount on discount so today I am giving you a point by point list that you can refer to whenever you are placing a order online to make sure you got all the discounts possible.
7 Questions Thrifty People Ask Before Placing An Order Online
1. Can you find a sale?
Never pay full price, everything comes on sale. I find out about sales for the stores I shop at most by making sure I sign up for their email updates. I have a special “deals” email account just for this purpose.
2. Can you earn cash back or points?
- Ebates
- Top Cashback
- Swagbucks
- ibbota (now offering rebates for several online clothing sites)
By signing up for several different point programs and cash back sites you increase your odds of finding a discount or a point reward to save you more off the sale price. Make sure to compare the discounts if the site is offered through more than one cash back or point site as they do vary from site to site and you want to make sure you maximize your savings.
3. Can you save even more with a code?
Before I go through checkout online I always check retailmenot.com for a free shipping code, or a coupon code that I can enter.
I also sometimes find codes printed on coupons found inside my free magazines, that can be used both in store and online.
4. Can you pay with a discount gift card?
Cardpool is my favorite online discount gift card site. They sell both physical gift cards and e-cards. The e-cards sometimes take only a few hours to arrive in your email inbox, so I always check to see if I can snag one on the site I am using and then wait for its arrival before I complete the checkout process.
I don’t do this for deeply discount items that might not be there if I wait too long. For instance wouldn’t use it during an Old Navy clearance sale on jeans, since my son is an odd size that sells out fast, but when I bought a blender at Walmart.com then I ordered a discounted gift card and waited for it to arrive to order .
For stores that I shop at regularly, I might grab a gift card in advance with no item yet in mind to spend it on, knowing I will use it next time I need an item from that site. I am extremely careful to do this advanced discount gift card shopping only with stores we shop at again and again.
5. Can you pay with a point earned gift card?
This sometimes take a bit of thinking ahead since most times point program gift cards take days to weeks to be delivered but it can be a great way to save.
For instance just recently I knew my son was needing jeans. Knowing that Old Navy jeans fit his slim build best I stocked up on Swagbucks Old Navy gift cards and waited for a sale, then I used a discount code, got free shipping due to the size of my order, and paid for most of the order with my Swagbucks Old Navy gift cards, and since I shopped through Swagbucks I earned Swag Bucks on the order.
6. Can you share your deal with your friends and get a referral credit?
Got a great deal on a name brand pair of shoes you know that your friends also love at Zulily. Share your find on Facebook and if your friends were not Zulily customers before and order you get a referral credit you can put toward your next purchase.
ThredUp and Twice are online consignment stores that offer your friends $10 off their first order when they sign up through your link and you $10 when your friend first order is processed. So it is a win win situation.
7. Can you snag a daily deal help pay for it?
I often grab daily deals for Lucky Vitamin one of my favorite sources online for vitamins and endurance sport products. These often make my orders 1/2 price.
Oh and don’t forget to see if your point programs or cash back sites are offering points or cash back on daily deals purchased through their links.
By taking the few extra moments to ask yourself these 7 questions you can save your household hundreds of dollars over the course of a year.
Wanting to become more thrifty? The Complete Tightwad Gazette is the ultimate guide to thrifty living that will help you start thinking outside the box about how to lower your cost of living.
For a list of 52 different websites, apps, and stores our thrifty family uses to help us keep our expenses low, click here to visit our Thrifty Tools Resource Page.
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These are great tips. I always look for coupon codes and use my swag bucks to purchase things. I always been a little concerned about using the gift card sites but I’m going to check out cardpool. Your post reminds me I have some ThredUp credit I need to use up.
I have been very happy with Cardpool. The biggest thing is to really think through your gift card purchases. I look at our plans for the next few months before visiting the site. For instance right now we are working on remodeling a open area off the kitchen into a bedroom for our son, so I had my husband estimate the cost and purchased Lowe’s gift cards for just under that amount off Cardpool so that we will use them all. I also usually grab ones for our local movie theater as they have no expiry date and I know we go to at least one movie all together as a family each year (again I grab just under what we might spend so that we have no balance left on the gift cards).