Easily one of the best online shopping hacks involves using price comparison tools. They can save up to 20% of the shopper's money by comparing prices in several websites before they make their purchase. Websites such as Google Shopping or PricesGrabber show customers the most up to date prices, so they can avoid overpaying. That may explain the growing use of price comparison tools, which 64% of online shoppers who were surveyed in a study by Adobe and Advanis said they actively used to find discounts.
Another strong performer is the almighty coupon — it turns out that 90% of online shoppers redeem digital coupons at some point. Big names such as Amazon or eBay may sometimes advertise promotions by coupon code, which can be found anywhere from 5% all the way up to rarely-seen-even-25%. According to a 2021 study, the frequency of online coupon use was found to have shot up by some 20% year on year, showing that they are only ever becoming more common among shoppers.
Said Warren Buffett: “Do not save what is left after spending, but spend what is left after saving.” That same mindset is applicable to shopping on the internet — and really, it does matter how much you save online. A lot of these sites give special discounts through newsletters or first purchase deals, so it allows a coupon shopper to save money too.
A shopping hack that tends to fall through the cracks is using cashback apps and credit card rewards. Katie Russo, a personal finance expert at Earntown estimates that Rakuten and Honey range from 1% to as high as 10% cash back on purchases made through their platforms. This number shows just how much money these portals make for people who shop online extensively: in 2023 Rakuten states their users brought more than one billion dollars back home on cashback.
With browser extensions like Honey and Capital One Shopping, people can apply the best coupon codes at checkout automatically. And these tools have already saved users hundreds of millions (Honey alone said it had net over $1 billion in savings returned back to individuals and enterprise customers through 2022). It looks up codes from across the internet and automatically applies the best one within seconds, saving you time and money.
A good example of a strategy is by holding off on buying anything until either Black Friday or Cyber Monday where costs drop 70%. According to a Statista report, 52 percent of customers held off on making big buys until these events took place in 2022 because they knew that this was when the vendors would be charging for their items.
So, as always there best way to help reduce your spending and increase savings is by being educated on the matter, understanding all of the resources that are out there. Coupon codes, cashback apps and price comparison sites can save shoppers hundreds of dollars in totality over the course of a year. See how much more money you can save with the Ultimate Online Shopping Hacks Guide here on your next purchase.
