Who here is a good Amazon Sale shopper?

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Cindylouwho

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This year I'm in the position where I need to seriously cut down my shopping time down -- but without breaking the bank as I have a LOT of gifts to purchase. I HAVE to shop smart. I've decided I need some tips from the pros. I'm sure someone on this board is a really good online shopper. Would you share your skills?

I know from previous years that Amazon jacks its prices as we get closer to Christmas. I'm online this week looking at their Black Friday deals but the way the page is laid out it just takes FOREVER to go through the deals. Wish it would let me load them ALL and then go back and delete by category just to reduce the clutter. But no. For instance, if I am looking for a product but don't recognize the brand that is on sale then I'm going to want to research it a bit. By the time I'm done looking around that first item I was looking at is past its sale window. I'm telling you I can spend days on Amazon if I'm not careful and I think that is part of their plan.

I do have a set list. And I use my shopping cart to stash things of course, so I can go back and compare. But I also know that the Amazon Cart does not default to the lowest price on their site. If you put something in there that is $50 one day and it goes on sale for $25 the next, they are NOT going to update that price unless you happen to go back in, find that deal and reload it into the cart. So I can't just load up the cart in advance.

It is all so tedious. Is there a better way? Or an app? Or something? Does anyone have a strategy they use? Maybe I just need to be more decisive. Or maybe I just need to shop other websites.

But anyway, if you have have some tricks I'd love to hear them! Thank you in advance!
 

AuntJamelle

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Oct 22, 2007
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Hmmm...will think about this some more but here are a few initial thoughts.

Instead of loading items into your cart ahead of time, perhaps create a list. You can create multiple Wish Lists under your account and name them whatever. I have one called "Shopping List" for example. I fill it with things I plan to buy, not the things I want others to pick from when looking for gift ideas for me.

If you have the items in your list, you could tell if you see the sale price from their and there should be a button to "move to cart". Or you could click on the link to go to each product's page and add to cart from there.

Another way is to open a browser window ahead of time for each item, then refresh the page once the sale starts, then add to cart from there.

I know from doing online Black Friday sales that almost no company auto refreshes the price of items in your cart to the new sale price. You have to force it, which stinks.

I'll post again if I think of anything else!
 

AuntJamelle

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Ok, do you have Prime? Or are you needing to hit $25 to get free shipping?

Tip: If you find yourself a bit short of the $25 needed to qualify for free shipping, you can use the Amazon Filler Item Finder run by filleritem.com to search out an item that will bring you to the $25 threshold.

Last year they had sales all week of Thanksgiving. I bought most of my stuff in gold box, or lightning deals. They matched alot of the really good BF sales (B&M stores deals) during the lightning deals. Some of the lightning deals showed a picture of what was going to be on sale or just gave you hints and did not say what the price was going to be, it just dropped during the time slot. The really good deals sold out within minutes, so you have to keep a close eye a good ways ahead so you know what is coming up to be ready. I spent most of that week on my computer.....

Another thought - there are great toy sales on Amazon AFTER black friday. People will start a thread in the online deals section and you will see tons of deals listed. YOu might get more bang for your buck by purchasing then. Unless there is a specific toy your child wants that is on sale for Black Friday week.

Not sure if this is still there but halfway down the product information page under PRODUCT DETAILS there used to be a link that says "tell us about a lower price". If you click that link you see the lower price and what store has it if you want to go to them instead.

Finally, I use the site camelcamelcamel.com - I signed up and linked it to my Amazon account - it watches all my wish lists for price drops and alerts me (via email or you can choose Twitter) when it drops to at or below my desired price. This is just a nice tool for all year long, but might be useful to you now as well.
 

Holiday_Mom

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There is a Chrome Extension that I use on my computer called Keepa. It is an Amazon Price Tracker. Add it to the Chrome browser. Then go to the Amazon site and it will show you the prices for the last 3 months, 6 months or a year. If there is an item you want at a certain price point, you can set it up for the price point you want to pay and when the price drops to that price, it will alert you via email.

Here's a screen shot of what Keepa looks like on Amazon when it is set up. This is only for the month of November which makes me think that the set was recently released. upload_2016-11-22_8-35-37.png





Here's a screen shot of the Jane Austen action figure and the Keepa price tracker at the bottom for the last year.upload_2016-11-22_8-39-45.png


The other thing is the the "Deals You're Watching" tracking ability available on your phone via the Amazon App. From the Amazon site: Deals You're Watching Don't miss out on upcoming deals - click Watch this Deal to save it to your Watching list. Download the Amazon App on your phone and we'll notify you on your app when the deal is about to start. If you're using an iPhone and would like to receive notifications from Amazon when a deal you are watching is about to start, please go to your phone "Settings", select the Amazon app, then "Notifications, and "Allow Notifications".

Thanks, Aunt Jamelle, for the filleritem.com hint. This is new to me.
 

Cindylouwho

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AuntJamelle & HolidayMom ~ This is GREAT! Thank you! I knew I'd find some experts here! Yes I'm a Prime Member. But wow ~ I need to up my game!

Wish Lists -- That is a great idea. Perhaps these would be more likely to show the current pricing? I have not used these in the past. I always thought they were just for gift lists which I don't often use. I just checked mine and saw how they can be toggled to public and private. Glad I checked that as I actually had stuff IN one of them and it was marked Public. Glad it wasn't anything embarrassing! ;) I'm going to try one of these and see how it works.

Amazon Filler Item Finder -- Never heard of this. But this is brilliant! This might help with shipping overseas (where I often can't get Prime Shipping). I googled some of these types of sites and found that ShopFiller has one for different countries and you know what? I just loaded in $4 and came up with a whole bunch of stocking stuffer ideas! Love it!

Online Deals Section Thread: Where? On Amazon? Here?

Tell Us About A Lower Price ~ i'm going to look for that.

CamelCamelCamel -- :-O I need this! When it pings you on the deal does the product show up on your phone? My kids see the face of my phone all the time so it would not be good to have a photos of Christmas presents popping up there.

"Keeps" Amazon Price Tracker Extension -- Checking to see if there is one for Safari. (And Downton Abbey is a great gift idea!) Loved that show! Also, I've always know that Amazon has fluctuating prices but isn't it interesting to see how much it fluctuates!

Deals You're Watching -- In the Amazon App. Setting this up with my Amazon app. Think I will test drive it for gifts that are going to relatives to see if they pop up on the screen. Same for that CamelCamelCamel app.

This is all so empowering! Thank you! Will check back in case there are more! Gotta get the kids off to school here!
 

luludou

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Dec 28, 2007
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Thank you all for the info! I buy on Amazon but did not know many of those tips. I do use the gift list and knew about the filler items, but that's it.
 

Lana

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Back in Nov. they had prime for $79 for one day and 5 of us went in on it. A lot of shopping getting done on it. I will have to see if the OTHERS KNOW OF THESE TIPS!
 

Cindylouwho

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Okay I've been using the WishLists and the Filters within them that will show only those on the list with price drops -- THIS IS SO HELPFUL!!! A huge solution to my Amazon issues! Haven't been able to use the app much yet but just the Wishlists instead of the cart has made things much simpler -- and the prices will drop instead of being locked like they are once they are in the cart.

Here's a tip I can add re Amazon Confirmation Emails:
A few years back I was annoyed that the confirmation email went to our house email -- alerting DH of the cool new present I had just gotten him. Same thing happened to a friend of mine when her husband bought her diamond jewelry for an anniversary present. I called Amazon and learned that you can have different emails attached to one account -- as long as the addresses are the same I think it was. So now I have a special one that I use only for Christmas shopping. That's where I put the Wish Lists that AJ suggested (make sure those are private so your kids can't see). I double-checked and none of those lists show up on our regular account.

ALSO -- I turned off history tracking on both Amazon accounts so that if the kids check out anything on Amazon that they ar not seeing everything that I was browsing.
 

Ahorsesoul

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I'm going to copy this info into Word to keep on my computer. Thanks
 

sweetpumkinpye

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In the new year I must check Amazon again. The few times I look and found things I have realised that the postage to Australia is so expensive that it is just not worth it. I would love to be able to access the deals though.
 

tanya

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Katrina, I have used Amazon International a few times- sometimes you get free shipping.
It is not something that I have done but I know friends who pay for a US shipping address- then have the stuff forwarded here- apparently it makes things much cheaper- especially if they wait until they have a few items to be forwarded. May be worth looking into?