squeezifying 101

as a self proclaimed deal guru i’ve done quite a bit of research on the art of getting the best deal. in the past few months, having to use my keen “dealing” skills i’ve learned of a few ways to maximize all the deals that are out there. on this page i am going to share my secrets on squeezifying a deal- getting the most bang for your buck! if you’re spending the $$$ anyway, you might as well be getting the most you can out of that hard earned cash! below are some tips on where to begin…

first- for all you online shoppers it is KEY that you sign up for websites like ebates, upromise and fat wallet. using these sites to navigate to your favorite online stores you can earn CASH BACK on all your purchases! not only that, but they even have coupon codes for added discounts! oh, and let’s not forget the sign up bonus you’ll get from ebates a cool $5. not too shabby

here’s a tip, if you download the toolbar from upromise you can always be signed in to upromise and you don’t have to shop through their site to get the discount- it’ll automatically appear when you go shopping! For example, if I go directly to Macys.com to shop, I’ll see a pop up across my tool bar that says “congratulations! you can now earn 4% cash back with upromise + any additional savings for shopping at Macy’s” it’s that easy!

second- check with your credit card companies or airline loyalty programs. nowadays these guys will do anything to get your business so they’re offering cash back, mileage bonuses or even just % savings by shopping at your favorite online haunts vis a vie their website. everyone knows all about amex and their membership rewards points- 1pt=1$ but not everyone can get an amex these days, and frankly, i’m fed up with mine so i’d rather take my business elsewhere! here are some other options:

• discovercard has a great cash back program that you can apply towards your balance! best part is you don’t have to wait a year to see your money, soon as you earn $20 you’ll have your chance to apply it to your account, cash out, or go shopping at one of their partnered sites!

• bank of america has the world points mall offering its customers bonus points for shopping thru this site. so, if usually get say, 1 point for every $, they’ll give you double or triple if you shop thru the mall so you can earn rewards even faster!
• delta skymiles offers its members a chance to earn extra bonus miles for shopping thru their site- a great way to earn miles for free flights!
• amex , of course as i mentioned has their membership rewards “it pays to be a member” bs. here are my thoughts on amex. #1 as of late they have been arbitrarily cutting off their customers and taking their points away too! #2 now, they’re trying to buy off customers – $300 in exchange for canceling their cards and paying off their debts. blech. here’s a lil side bar from squeezy: i have 3 amex cards one for business two for personal. i signed up last year for a blue cash back amex. well, the way it was sold to me was like this: earn 1% cash back on all your purchase, once you hit $6000 you’ll start earning 5% cash back!! gasp! amazing! right? wrong. that 5% cash back bs is only for certain purchases like gas, drug store and groceries. yea…i dont frequent the grocery store so my 5% cashback bonuses? still at the 1%. oh, i spent my $6g’s dontcha worry bout that- but i’m still earning 1%!!! here’s the real kicker though, you ready? my card had a measley limit of $1000, which was perfect for a lil extra spending money each month. paid that baby in full every time. so, where’s my cash back? hahaha. you’re funny. apparently the cash back part happens ONCE A YEAR!!! this means, in the 10 months that i’ve had this card and the $10,000 i’ve spent on it i’ve earned only 1% in cash back rewards and i won’t see that cool hundred until APRIL!!! what the effffff??? i could have been earning points- miles- anything!! but nooooo. so like i said before DISCOVERCARD is the best cash back EVER!!

hahaha wow that was a rant. ok, but i digress.

third step- combine steps one and two. if you are lucky enough to get a card that offers a great cash back bonus just for using the card- not necessarily going through the card’s shopping site- you can utilize ebates, fatwallet or upromise discounts PLUS get a % back by using your credit card! here’s an example of a windfall i was lucky enough to get:

in december sephora gave its beauty insiders a $15 gift card to use toward a $35 purchase, they also had a 15% off coupon floating out there on the web. usually you cant use more than one code, but since one was a ‘gift card’ and the other a coupon code it was allowed. my dicovercard was offering 20% cash back and upromise was offering 4% cash back too! so i logged into sephora through discovercard’s site to purchase my $110 bottle of chanel allure perfume and when all was said and done i paid $52 out of pocket!! amazing.

lastly, research. i know some of you think its a pain in your balls to have to spend time figuring out what’s the best deal, but no pain no gain people! believe me, i could spend the $110 on perfume, but why should i when i could spend half that and put the other half into my ing savings account and get a cool 1.8%/yr in interest! hahahaha. seriously though, it might take a little longer, but believe me you’ll be laughing all the way to your mattress (banks are for suckers these days, duh)!