5 Super Easy Ways to Save Money Shopping Online

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I love online shopping. It’s convenient and fast, especially in the winter months, when I want to avoid getting both my young kids all bundled up in their winter snow gear and strapped into their car seats before heading out on snow-covered and icy roads.

If you’re a fan of shopping online, make sure you’re taking advantage of these five ridiculously simple ways to save money on most of your purchases:

  • Free shipping: There are many times I’ve abandoned an online purchase because I don’t want to pay expensive shipping costs. Using FreeShipping.org is a quick way to check and see if there’s a free shipping code you can use at your favorite retailer.
  • Promo/coupon codes: With so many coupons and promotional codes just waiting for you to use them, don’t be too hasty to click “submit” on an online order. In fact, if you don’t have a code to put in that promo code box, you’ll likely benefit from spending a couple of minutes searching the following sites for a code that could save you big bucks: PromotionCode.org, PromoCodes.com and PromoPro.com. Good sites to check for retailer coupons include: RetailMeNot, FatWallet and CouponCabin. Also, if you’re shopping on a site that allows you to stack coupons, make sure you apply the coupons in the right order to ensure maximum savings. For example, if you have a coupon for $15 off your total purchase and a promo code for 20 percent off your order, you will want to apply the 20 percent off promo first, and then put in the $15 off coupon.
  • Shopping portals: Using a cash back shopping portal is truly one of the easiest ways to put money in your pocket. In fact, if you’re shopping online, there’s really no downside to using a shopping portal, where you earn back a percentage of your total online purchase just by clicking through the portal site first. Shopping portal sites like Ebates (my personal favorite), Upromise, Extrabux and Be Frugal are all popular cash-back sites. If you’re not sure if your favorite online retailer has a cash-back portal option, you can use Cashbackholic to check.

  • Shop on the right day: Sometimes scoring a great deal on your online purchase is as easy as shopping on the “right” day of the week. A number of retailers roll out discounts and specials on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays.
  • Leave items in your cart: If you have a registered email account with a retailer and you leave your online shopping cart full of unpurchased goodies, there’s a good chance that the retailer will email you a coupon code discount that you can use to complete your purchase. So you may want to do your shopping, then wait a couple of days to check out.

How do you save money when shopping online? Share your tips below or on our Facebook page.

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