Before You Buy Online… Do 30 Seconds of Research and Save Money

Online shopping is booming these days. The ease of finding just about anything, the convenience of shopping from home, the joy you feel when the UPS truck arrives… there are many reasons to shop online. But before you buy, you should take 30 seconds to see if you can save money. Think of it as cyber coupon-clipping, only easier.

The process? Pull up another window and do a search in Google (I recommend Google because it’s the biggest search engine, and it pulls up these types of searches better – side note: Bing is better for research-type searches and gathering information).

It really does work. When I bought my husband a soccer jersey for his birthday, I found exactly the one he wanted at a soccer shop online. So I put it in my shopping cart, but before I paid for it, I opened a new browser window and pulled up Google. Then I typed in the store’s name and “discount code.” The search brought up several pages. I opened a page and found a code right away. I copied and pasted it into the coupon section of the soccer shop page. It didn’t work. So I tried a few more of the results from Google until I found one that saved me nearly $20! Some of the codes have specific requirements (i.e. did you spend a certain amount, or is it the month of June?), but try a few codes until you find one that works. It is definitely worth the time!

Another thing I’d recommend doing is searching for the specific item you found to see if you can get it cheaper somewhere else (maybe you can get it cheaper AND use a discount code or promo code!). If you have the product description or the model number (for example, if you are looking at a specific TV or computer, search for the model code to find the same one) then you can paste it into Google and see what comes up.

Saving money doesn’t have to be a lot of work. You will find that taking a few minutes here or there and developing money-saving habits can save you a lot of money – it all adds up!

Tags: coupon, discount code, money-saving, online shopping, promo code