At any point in time there are hundreds of commerce sites online offering money-saving bargains that you may never notice. These include discounts, rebates, freebies, two-fers, free shipping, coupons and more. The challenge is how to spot these bargains before they are discontinued or sold out. Sitting 24/7 in front of your computer isn’t reasonable for most people so given that how can you find these bargains before they disappear?
In some cases if you have favorite retailers you can monitor their web sites if they have a predictable schedule of sales. For example every Thursday morning LL Bean has a Thursday markdown sale on a single item where they offer significant savings. Amazon.com also special bargains daily by selecting Today’s Deals on their website. Newegg.com is another commerce site with special bargains focusing more on tech items. Look under Specials for recertified items, combo deals, volume savings, clearance items, open box items, items with gifts and items with rebates. Searching for bargains this way can be time consuming unless you restrict the list dramatically.
Many internet users are familiar with web sites that invite viewer participation in listing bargains they have found. Some specialize in certain areas such as computer equipment or electronics or freebies. Some have email options where they will automatically send you an email when a new listing is added. Finding one of these sites that is well maintained and reputable can be a daunting challenge. It is frustrating to chase down one of these bargains only to find the listing is incorrect, not complete or expired. When looking for worthwhile sites in this category it helps to browse around through the site and notice the volume of posts, how recent they are, and whether the site is easy to navigate and pleasant to use.
Examples of some interesting sites focusing on bargains are: AnandTech forums (electronics and computers), Fatwallet (miscellaneous), Slickdeals (miscellaneous), DealTaker (miscellaneous), DealCatcher (miscellaneous), and Techbargains (electronics and computers), Ben’s Bargains (miscellaneous).
An example of a weekly email newsletter focusing on rebate bargains is FreeAfterRebate. You can sign up for the newsletter at freeafterrebate.info.
As can be seen from this abbreviated list there are more then can be reasonably scanned on a daily basis. One answer to this challenge is found at a site called boddit.com. This site does a lot of the work for you by scanning on a real time basis a number of different sites similar to those listed in this article. Boddit.com has basically four sections. One deals with hot bargains while another focuses on newly appearing bargains, the third covers freebies, and the fourth lists one day deals. The listings will cover online retailers as well as conventional bricks and motar stores on occasion.
To streamline your bargain seeking boddit.com allows you to list by categories such as computers, audio, home, consumer, coupons, etc. Each listing has a time stamp as well as the site (Fatwallet, Slickdeals, AnandTech, etc) that has the original listing. When you find a bargain that interests you, click on it and you are taken to the original listing when you can look at the feedback of those that have investigated or acquired the bargain. In addition boddit.com grades each site by popularity. Boddit also offers a search engine that works both with the boddit.com listings as well as looking on the web for a low price on a specific item. There are other bargain hunting aggregator sites similar to boddit.com but they do not seem as full featured or as easy to navigate.
If you want to stay on top of online bargain hunting you should consider trying out a site like boddit.com where multiple bargain site results are aggregated.
