海角大神

Well, 鈥渦ltimate鈥� might be a bit of hyperbole, but I thought it would be useful to collect together all of the things I鈥檝e learned about saving money on Amazon.com in one place. If you ever buy items at Amazon, you might find some of these tactics to be useful.

Amazon Prime
听滨f you are a heavy user of Amazon鈥檚 services and products, I think that Amazon Prime more than pays for itself, so let鈥檚 focus on it first.

Prime is a service that allows you to get two day shipping on virtually any item that Amazon sells. There鈥檚 no minimum purchase threshold for this, either. Once you have it, you鈥檒l find that it鈥檚 much easier to buy gifts and many household items via Amazon than it is to go to the store and shop for them 鈥� and it鈥檚 often cheaper, too. You can truly use Amazon as part of your price comparisons, even on small items.

Along with that comes the Prime Instant Video library, which is a service that鈥檚 very comparable to Netflix. While the streaming video selection isn鈥檛 quite as good as Netflix (in my opinion), there鈥檚 enough unique content here that you鈥檒l have more than enough to watch for years. If you鈥檙e thinking of ditching cable, this is a pretty solid Netflix-esque replacement for it.

The Kindle Lending Library is another perk if you own a Kindle device. If you have a Kindle and are a Prime user, you can borrow one book a month from the Kindle Lending Library. It鈥檚 essentially a free book. I consider this a pretty minor perk considering I can get ebooks from my library, but there are a lot of good books in the Lending Library that are well worth reading.

To me, these add up to more value than the $80 annual cost of Prime. It does depend on your specific uses, of course, but it opens up several cost-saving avenues.

Super Saver Shipping
聽As mentioned above, Amazon does offer free 鈥渟uper saver鈥� shipping on most purchases over $25 if you鈥檙e not a Prime member. In my experience, 鈥渟uper saver鈥� packages tend to arrive in about a week.

This isn鈥檛 bad, but I find that it usually costs me money. I鈥檒l want an item that costs, say, $18, and then I鈥檒l see the shipping costs. Of course, if I just get something else for $7 that I don鈥檛 really need, then shipping is free. The catch is that I don鈥檛 really need that $7 item鈥�

If you find yourself with this dilemma more than once a month, Prime is worth it for these savings alone.

Price and Deal Watching
聽There are a slew of various 鈥渄aily deal鈥� and 鈥済old box鈥� and 鈥渙utlet鈥� and 鈥渨arehouse鈥� pages to be found within Amazon if you want them, but the problem with these types of 鈥渄aily deals鈥� is that they often convince you to buy stuff that you don鈥檛 really need. (I have the same issue with services like Groupon.)

My solution instead is to use a price watching tool that helps me identify when items I want or need drop below a certain price threshold. Right now, my preferred tool for doing this is .

All you do is set up a list of items you might buy if the price is right, define what that 鈥渞ight price鈥� is, and then it automatically watches all of the daily deal pages for you as well as other sale prices. When something shows up within your price threshold, it alerts you so you can buy it.

听滨 in detail a few months ago. I don鈥檛 view it as a big money saver, but I do view it as a time saver 鈥� or, at the very least, a time shifter (meaning you use downtime at one point to take some of the pressure off of more intense times later on).

It鈥檚 simple: find a household product that you use regularly, 鈥渟ubscribe鈥� to it on Amazon, and it comes to your house on a regular schedule. It works very well for diapers, laundry detergent, and so on, but the prices are a bit high for a single item. The prices get much better if you subscribe to five or more items, which earns you a 15% discount on all items you subscribe to.

Buy Used
听滨f you鈥檙e picking up a book or a DVD or something similar, it鈥檚 worth checking the 鈥渂uy used鈥� section on that item鈥檚 listing to see whether or not you can save some money by getting a used version of the item. I鈥檒l happily take a copy of a book that鈥檚 been read by someone else if it will save me 50% off the cover price or more.

Free Android Apps
听滨f you have an Android device, Amazon gives away a . Usually, the app is a mediocre game, but not always 鈥� occasionally, you鈥檒l find a really useful app or a great game.

Amazon Visa
听滨f you find yourself settling into a routine of buying items regularly from Amazon, the is a worthwhile additional tool. Use it solely for purchases from Amazon and you鈥檒l earn a gift card each month equal to 3% of your spending on Amazon (if you use it elsewhere, you earn a bit less). The nice part is that as soon as the gift card is available, it appears as you鈥檙e checking out on Amazon.

So, let鈥檚 say you sign up to buy several perishables via Subscribe and Save along with buying some Christmas gifts from Amazon. Everything totals up to $300. The next time you buy anything from Amazon, you鈥檒l have a $9 credit waiting for you, usable on whatever you鈥檇 like.

If you are even a semi-frequent user of Amazon.com, many of these offers stack together really well. For example, Subscribe and Save synergizes very well with Prime membership, as does setting low price thresholds for items you might buy if they鈥檙e cheap enough. Given that Amazon has pretty good prices most of the time on many items, if you鈥檙e a careful shopper that shops around a little bit, you can use these tips to get items you want and need quite inexpensively.