The Art of Saving Online

Ever wonder why your next door neighbor keeps having the UPS or FedEx truck stop by everyday and drop of packages? Are you wondering why they seem to always have the latest of gadgets and toys, while you are having a hard time keeping up with your monthly budget with regular billing expenses?



Americans love to shop, and more importantly, we have an inherent need to keep improving our lives. However, in hard economic times, Tech Savvy shoppers have an edge in today’s connected economy and are often able to afford more for less, compared to the less Tech Savvy amongst them. They may not be Extreme Coupon users at the Grocery Store (though some are,) but they try to avail of all available promotions in their Online Shopping. Online stores like www.Amazon.com, www.JcPenney.com , www.OverStock.com, www.buy.com and more often target these connected shoppers by pushing discount offers targeted at them. Online sites like www.DotDeals.com and www.techbargains.com specialize in listing online coupon, discount and freebie offers from thousands of online retailers (and sometimes even brick and mortar stores) in an attempt to lure the shopping dollars of tech savvy buyers, who religiously search out offers, and discounts from online merchants prior to making any purchase.



Visiting www.DotDeals.com on a daily basis, one may not realize the depth of promotional offers available on the site, since some merchants list literally hundreds of their offers on the site. However, a quick scan of the 20+ product categories on this site, and you may find offers like $10 off a $25 purchase at www.delias.com to $20 off of $100 at www.buy.com – this site covers a wide range of promotional offers. A savvy shopper would be wise to bookmark such sites and visit them on a regular basis to uncover coupons and promotions that may not appear on the Merchants own site.



You should also sign up for the daily or weekly emails from sites like http://www.DotDeals.com or TechBargains.com for consistently being kept in the loop on new promotions being floated by retailers to urge you to shop at their store. If you have an unlimited text messaging package with your Cellular Provider, you might consider signing up for TXT Message Promotions from both online and brick and mortar retailers to further your shopping dollars. OldNavy, Gap, Kmart, Sears are known to send out discount coupon information via text messages to their regular shoppers. While these weekly (or sometimes even daily) promotional messages can get annoying for some, those of us who spend a lot of time shopping (due to family size or sheer habit) – can often end up paying lot less than the next person in line at the checkout register!



You might also consider becoming a "fan" of your favorite retailer on Facebook. Retailers lately have made many limited use promotions available to their Facebook and Twitter fans, in an attempt to gain popularity on these emerging, and critically important Social networking platforms.



In this context, the email recipient becomes the "early bird" and as the old saying goes: "the early bird catches the worm"  Happy Shopping !