With the holidays coming up, there is no doubt that many of you FrugalDad readers are already thinking about what you are going to get for your friends and family members, and more importantly, how you are going to get those gifts as affordably as possible.

When you have an idea of what you want to buy – either a specific product or even a general category – shopping online can be not only fun, but it is often the shopping method that leads you to the best deal. We at CouponCactus.com want to provide you with some tips that will help you do just that.

1. Always check online and ALWAYS check for Coupons

Many frugal shoppers clip coupons from the paper and take them to the grocery store, but there are still many who are unaware that they can use coupons (also called coupon codes or promo codes) online! Making a habit of checking prices online and checking for coupon codes each and every time you shop will shave serious money off of your budget.

If you use Mint.com or a similar budget/finance tool, try keeping track of your online purchases and start adding up how much you’ve saved over time – you’ll be surprised!

2. If you know generally what you want to buy, but not from what store – Let Coupons and Cash Back Guide You

Price comparison sites like Pricegrabber and BizRate are great for checking prices at different merchants for a specific product, but they don’t include discounts from coupons. Plus, if you only generally know that you want to buy some shoes, or a laptop, then start with our category pages on CouponCactus.com, which will allow you to “drill down” to a specific category and view all of the best coupons for stores in that category.

By allowing the coupons and discounts to be your guide, you can browse merchant pages for exactly the product you will eventually buy, all the while knowing you’re going to get a great deal!

3. Take advantage of free shipping whenever possible

Many online merchants offer free shipping by default when you place an order over a certain amount. You can often find “coupons” that will give you free shipping on those orders as well, but check the merchant’s site to see if they offer it without one so you can use a better coupon or combine the free shipping with the coupon. Eliminating shipping charges makes online shopping an even clearer winner over in-store shopping.

4. Check to see if the merchant offers a discount when you sign up for their newsletter

Many stores will give you an extra discount off your first order when you sign up for their promotional newsletter. It’s easy enough to forward those emails to a special folder or unsubscribe later if you don’t find value in them, but it’s certainly worth signing up if they are offering 10% off!

5. If you’re not getting cash back, you’re missing out

It’s easy to see a coupon on a coupon site or in an email (sometimes directly from a merchant) and click through to use it without thinking about how much cash back you’re throwing away by doing so.

Even if the cash back for a specific store is only 2-3%, it’s certainly worth the extra 15 seconds to come to our site, sign in, and click the coupon to save that much more.

We allow you to easily see the cash back you’ve earned on each of your purchases, and what you’ve earned on purchases from friends and family members you’ve referred. Over time those numbers add up, and you’ll get a nice check or Paypal payment each quarter.

If you love clipping coupons, you may not enjoy this post or agree with my premise. But I am convinced that coupons are a huge contributor to overspending.

In fact, let me ask you a question: When you spend time thumbing through the paper or surfing the net for great coupons…aren’t you really just thinking about spending money?

Of course you are.

Coupons are directly tied to spending.. You don’t collect them for those amazing graphics. Right?

In fact, for many people, browsing for coupons is part of an overspending ritual. This may not describe you, but I’ll guarantee that people who spend lots of time looking for coupons spend much more time thinking about spending than they spend time thinking about saving and investing.

Ever heard someone tell you they bought something just because it was on sale?
That’s almost as bad as someone saying they spend a ton of dough and tried to justify it because “it’s deductible”.

Coupons weren’t developed by Debtors Anonymous. Coupons were created by the Retailers Association of America probably. They did it to give you a reason to get into their store and spend money. That’s it. They know that once you’re there, you’ll keep spending. You might get a deal on toilet paper, but they’ll get you on the breakfast cereal.

Coupons were not created to save you money or help you save for your retirement.

And you know what…..it works.

If it didn’t, you wouldn’t find any coupons in the mailbox, newspaper or on the internet.

Of course, some people use coupons to stop spending money they don’t have — and I hope that describes you. But most people get sucked in. Coupons get you to buy stuff you really don’t need.

Don’t believe me?

Look at your trash can.

It’s full…right?

That means you are buying more than you need.

That’s why I don’t spend any time looking for coupons. I don’t want a “spending” mindset.

I want an investor mindset.

When I need something I go out and get it. I don’t clip coupons and then find a reason to need something. Maybe I pay more for the stuff I need than you do. But I don’t buy anything I don’t really need. At the end of the day, I spend less money as a result of not collecting coupons.

So if you’re looking for a good personal finance or a great small business idea, just say no to coupons from today on.

Am I wrong? Do you only buy stuff that you absolutely need or do coupons get you to bring home more than you intended to?

Note from Frugal Dad: When I read Neal’s title my immediate reaction was, “Are you nuts? You want me to run this post on Frugal Dad?” But after reading the guest post, I must say Neal makes a good point.

Looking back on my own experience with coupons, I remember making some impractical decisions in the name of “saving money” because I had a coupon. Honestly, how many squeezable mayonnaise bottles does one family really need? With the exception of stockpiling a few essentials using coupons, our family has found that we generally come out ahead by skipping the coupon and simply buying the store brand.

Pick up just a few reputable coupon code directories and monitor them effectively.

There are plenty of coupon code sites and blogs and keeping track of all of them would be too time consuming (and time is money too!), so pick just a few ones. How to choose? Here are my tips:

• It should be easy to navigate and user-friendly;
• It should provide some handy tracking options (for example, newsletter or RSS);
• It should be updated daily.
• It should focus on your needs (in other words, pick the one that mostly lists products you buy often).

Here are my personal picks:

• FreeShipping.org (for its clear interface and quality selection of coupons);
• QponCutie (for its RSS subscription and female-oriented coupons – just what I like).

Don’t trust the seller’s word, check what other buyers say!

I love it when the site not only list deals and coupon codes, but also allows their members share their experience on each one.

This way you save your money by choosing only trusted deals and retailers. My favorite site for that is Buxr.com. Let me tell you why:

• Each deal has ratings, votes and reviews.
• The site is attentively moderated, so totally spam-free (each deal should be approved before it goes live).
• It offers quite a few Web 2.0 goodies (like wish list and deal alert);
• Best deals are daily rewarded with cash, so members do their best to deliver most useful codes and deals.

Make sure you know how to track

Email box is by far not your only way to get updated on new deals. Use your couponing toolbox wisely:

• Try various RSS readers to choose the one you like best (my personal favorite is Wizz RSS FireFox plugin because it doesn’t take much space and is well-organized);
• Use Twitter! Many sites now offer Twitter as an alternative way to subscribe to their updates. The best thing about this tool is that Twitter delivers updates right to your mobile phone (if you are in the United States), so you can get new deals even when you are offline (again, don’t go too much into it, pick only one to follow closely).
• Use services that allow alternative subscription methods (for example, FreeShipping.org mentioned above allows to subscribe only to those sellers you plan to buy from via their “Favorite Coupons” option).

Use your calculator!

Right, your own common sense is your best weapon! It is a commonly-used trick to offer “fake” coupon: first increase the price and then offer a discount – so that the end price just ends up to be even higher just in the nearby store that offers no discount at all. So take your time, compare prices and make the right choice!

Good luck!

The guest post was provided by Ann Smarty, an SEO Consultant. I hope you will find it useful!

Often times we found ourselves buying things we didn’t really need just because there was a great coupon deal. We decided to focus our coupon strategy, taking advantage of store sales, coupon-doubling and eBay to maximize savings on the few items we actually used.

How it Works, a Recent Example

Our family likes adding I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter spray to vegetables such as corn on the cob. It has zero fat, is calorie free, and is generally healthier than real butter alternatives. It is also expensive, especially in the spray bottle packaging. Our local Kroger store recently offered I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter 2/$3.00 dollars. The $1.50 price was competitive with other stores, including Wal-Mart and another smaller, regional grocery store. The deal also included larger 16oz. tubs, and smaller double packs of 8oz. tubs.

eBay to the Rescue

Unfortunately, I didn’t have any coupons for I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter. Luckily, there are many people out there making a small living as “coupon clippers,” selling their time to clip coupons on eBay and other coupon exchange sites. It is important to emphasize that selling coupons is technically prohibited according to the terms of use on most manufacturer coupons.  However, coupon clippers make the distinction that they are merely selling their time to clip them, not selling the coupons themselves.

A quick search on eBay shows several auctions for a lot of 10 $0.40/1 coupons for I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter, expiring at the end of June. The buy-it-now auction price is $1.00 with $0.42 shipping. I ordered a lot of 10 coupons and they arrived a couple days later. Our local Kroger store doubles up to 3 manufacturer coupons per item per transaction up to $1.00, so we will actually save $0.80 on each product we purchase. If we buy just two products the coupons will more than pay for themselves ($1.60 in savings versus $1.42 cost). But the savings don’t stop there. I picked up three spray butters, and my wife picked up another one along with two large tubs that we will use in recipes. Total savings, $4.80 off the retail price. Take away our $1.42 cost to acquire the coupons and we saved $3.38, or roughly 37.5% off the sale price.

Check the Expiration

Notice in the explanation above we only used 6 of the 10 coupons I bought from the eBay coupon clipper. I could have gone back in for a separate transaction and purchased three more units, but based on our average length of use for each item they probably would have expired long before we could have used them up. The $0.70 spray bottles we did buy, and both tubs, will keep in our refrigerators until ready for use, but it is a good idea to check the expiration for any perishables when stockpiling food in the manner I’ve described. After all, the point of being frugal is to eliminate waste from our lives, not add more to it!

Do you have a similar coupon strategy?

photo by: ninjapoodles

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