Internet Tools and Sites I love: Money Saving Tools

As most of you have probably gathered, I spend a lot of time on the internet. It's kinda part of my job description and researching things is a much loved hobby of mine. So over time I have picked up some amazing websites and tools for different facets of my online experience. Most of these have been blogged about before, but in case you've missed them, I am going to provide you with a series of posts on my favorite tools and sites.

Money Saving Tools


Ebates

Ebates is an online shopping rebate tool. If you already shop online (even just occasionally) you need to become a member of Ebates. When you place an order through one of their affiliates, Ebates will give you a percentage back. Then every 3 months they will mail you your "Big Fat Check." Since I became a member last year I have received $93.71 back just for placing the occasional order for items I need anyways. Plus when you join and place your first order, you will relieve an automatic $5. Pretty sweet, right? Ebates also offers 15% cash back on all purchases made from my next money saving site...

Restaurant.com

Restaurant.com is a restaurant gift certificate purchasing site. There gift certificates are more like coupons though. For instance you can purchase a $25 of $35 purchase gift certificate for $10. Therefore you save $10 at the restaurant you would usually eat at anyways. Now the real savings key to Restaurant.com though is to wait to place an order for when they have their 80% off sale. These come quite often (about every other month or so) and you will receive an email notification. We stock up during these sales because you get $25 certificates for $2. Add your 15% cash back from Ebates, and you can get a $35 dollar restaurant dinner for $11.30! Talk about eating out on the cheap!

Now if your interest is peaked by this whole coupon savings for online shopping, you have to check out:
RetailMeNot
RetailMeNot is an online coupon database. Once you find the site you want to order from (preferably through Ebates), go to RetailMeNot ad type in the name of the store. They will then list all the possible promo codes you can use. Nearly every store I have tried has a coupon listed and you can rack in some serious savings.

So now that you are converted to buying online with coupons, lets talk about Daily Deal Sites. This is the biggest rage right now, and economists say they are what is turning my generation (20 & 30-somethings) onto coupon shopping. Here are my leading favorites that i have actually ordered from:

Groupon
Groupon is arguably the original daily deal site. It uses the buying power of group discounts to help you save money on local purchases or adventures. You see most businesses will offer crazy discounts if more than x number of people are buying the the same thing. But most often, we don't know that many people. So Groupon organizes so that you and 100's of other random people in your city will purchase that item and each of you gets the discount without having to know the other people. Some examples of deals I've scored are: 56% savings on an activity day in Dallas and 3 Redbox rentals for $1.

LivingSocial
LivingSocial follows the exact same premise as Groupon except if you can get 3 of your friends to buy the same deal as you, then you will get yours for free! I've snagged a $20 Amazon gift card for $10 and 2 Fandango movie tickets for $9. Great savings on places I already order from!

Woot
Woot is the Groupon of tech gadgets. So if you are a gadget addict, this is the place to go because you can score some serious deals. They have other devisions though too such as kids.woot, shirt.woot, sellout.woot & wine.woot.

But before you buy from any of these daily deal sites, you need to become a member of...
Swagbucks
Swagbucks is a points gathering and hunting website where you redeem your Swag Bucks for prizes, items, gift cards, or cold hard cash via Paypal. There are tons of ways to earn on Swagbucks. The easiest being simply searching online with Swagbucks search engine.
But you can also earn 300 to thousands of Swag Bucks by ordering from Groupon and LivingSocial through the Swagbucks website. Once I rake up 450 Swag Bucks, I like to redeem them for a $5 Amazon gift card. You also earn 10 points for every coupon you print before going grocery shopping.

Speaking of which, Erin Chase of $5 Dinners has put together the ultimate coupon cutters tool...
$5 Dinners Coupon Database
Not only is it really simple to find coupons for everything on your list but it also comes with a video tutorial so you know all the tricks for finding the best grocery deal.

Now to any true frugal person knows that the only way to actually save money when you make these purchases, is to make sure you have the money o spend. If you use a credit card and don't pay it off immediately, you wind up paying out the yin yang in interest and all your savings go bye bye. So that's where saving ahead comes into play...
SmartyPig
SmartyPig is a free savings program that links your bank account to a secure saving account that helps you reach specific savings goals. And with a 1.35% return interest rate, you can reach goals faster. Plus SmartyPig has some creative ways for inviting friends to help chip in for a specific goal. It's perfect for weddings, vacations, and other toy purchases.

Tomorrow I will cover some internet tools and apps designed to help you stay organized.


Disclosure: I was not compensated in any way for writing this post. I just wanted to share some awesome sites with my dear readers :)