I like to shop. My days of lackadaisical shopping in the clearance isles of my favorite stores are long gone (I mean how do these mommas shop with their 2.5 kids?!). I have embraced online shopping even moreso now that Eli is here. We have free shipping with Amazon Prime right now and man is it dangerous...a few clicks and I can have something at my door in two days! YIKES! (Did you know that you can get a free year trial of Prime if you are a student? Think .edu email address. Now, be careful or you could end up with some fancy kitchen tool hand-delivered to you by some hard-working UPS guy).
I digress.
The real reason for this post is to encourage you, when you are not shopping at Amazon, to jump on the bandwagon of cash back sites. Seriously, folks, this is like free money. And since it's almost gift-giving official season, I am helping you here.
The basic concept?
- Your mother-in-law needs a crock pot. A fancy one.
- You comparison price-shop online and find one at cooking.com for $100.
- You sign up for a free account at Ebates because they have 5% cash back at cooking.com.
- You click on cooking.com link from your Ebates page, find said crock pot, and buy that baby.
- Ebates in it's magical cyber wisdom knows that you bought a $100 crock pot from their link and therefore they owe you $5.
- You become smart and keep shopping online through Ebates.
- Ebates sends you a quarterly check.
- You deposit check at your bank and do a happy dance. Also, you do not tell your MIL you made $5 off her crock pot.
Okay, get it?
I am going to tell you about the two cash-back sites I use.
Ebates is my favorite. You don't have to do anything to get your money. You just go to Ebates (be signed in), find whatever store you want to shop at (literally thousands of stores), click that store and Ebates will open up a "tracking ticket" that looks like this for a few seconds:
Then it will just take you to the site (Target in this case). You shop and check out as normal (without closing the window, doh!). Ebates will post your money a few days later into your ebates account. Then you get a check like this (this is mine from August along with my freaky, beady eyes staring at you):
If you've earned less than $5.01 cash back in a three month period, they'll carry over your money to the next check. I've been doing this for a few years (made $50) and I've never had a problem. Money just shows up. Awesome.
If you click my referral link here and sign up, I get $5 if you ever actually purchase anything over $25. Or you can click on this logo to sign up:
I've never referred anyone (besides my sister... um, Am, where were you on this like a year ago?) but I think more people need to be doing this!
The other site I started using this summer is ShopAtHome. Sometimes Ebates doesn't have the store I'm shopping at OR they have a higher percentage of cash back (because both sites have double cash back days and other such fun incentives). It works in the same way, but opens a new window and has different wording for tracking.
ShopAtHome payments are made each month when your account reaches $20. If your account balance is less than $20, it rolls over to the next month. I haven't received a check from them yet but a check for $47.71 will be mailed after 10/31 to me! Heck yes!
ShopAtHome payments are made each month when your account reaches $20. If your account balance is less than $20, it rolls over to the next month. I haven't received a check from them yet but a check for $47.71 will be mailed after 10/31 to me! Heck yes!
I have a referral link with ShopAtHome, too. If you sign up and make a $30 purchase in 60 days, I get $5 and you get $5 too! Click here or this logo to sign up for an account.
Random Thoughts on Cash Back Sites:
That's enough. Go. Sign Up. Shop. Make money.
-Heather
- Don't accidentally close your window and then start a new window without going through the cash back site! I have done this! Bad.
- I find it easiest to shop around, add stuff to my cart even, then close the site. Then I go through the cash back site and go straight to my cart. Most often my items are still there and I can do an easy check out without the worry I screwed something up.
- I'll sometimes use the search tool on either site to help me find the best place to shop for a certain thing or to find the most cash back. Some decent sites are 10%!
- Both sites also list coupon codes if they have any when you search for your store. These nifty codes have given me free shipping or percentages off more than a few times.
- If you are buying your husband an expensive guitar, get cash back! Then you can take the cash back and spend it on yourself.
- Amazon is not on any cash back sites but you will be surprised at how many other sites are (Target, Wal-Mart, Sears, Children's Place... think almost every site ever).
- You can check your tracking at both sites if you are curious.
- Sometimes I buy stuff for really cheap (okay, all the time, I'm a deal shopper) and I think "this isn't worth it for cash back." That's dumb. I may get just 17 cents here, 9 cents there (yes, these are actual amounts I have made) but they will add to whenever I do buy something big.
- With Christmas coming up this is a great time to online shop. And with the money you make, you could give better gifts or give it to someone who needs it! Giving is FUN!
- It really is easy. I hope you are already doing this. And I needed an even ten to round out this list.
That's enough. Go. Sign Up. Shop. Make money.
-Heather
PS - Does anyone use a different site and like it? Let me know if so. I'll jump on another bandwagon for sure.
1 comment:
Also check out Amazon mom. It's like Amazon prime - you get delivery in two days, but you can sign up for subscribe and save so diapers, for example, are delivered every month without you having to order them and any item you subscribe to you get a discount on and you can cancel any item anytime. It's great for diapers, wipes, and anything else you order over and over again. And compared to Sam's or Costco, with the discount, it's cheaper.
Teresa
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