I was psyched when Groupon Coupons contacted me for the following sponsored post — because it meant that I could share some of my favorite tips for getting the best deal online while promoting a service that I actually use.

Whenever we have to buy something that’s a little pricey, I will always compare prices to see how to get the lowest possible deal. Is my time really worth the $5 I’ll save in shipping or get as cashback? Probably not. But I love to comparison shop and I hate to pay too much, so there is a big psychic reward for me.

I’ll walk you through my process with an example. Something that’s been on my mind lately is that we don’t have seasonally-appropriate pajamas for Baby Stapler in the fall. He has been growing like a weed, and his brother’s hand-me-downs won’t cut it.

Here’s how I find the best price online:

1. Compare prices on Google Shopping

If you haven’t already used this awesome feature in google, I recommend giving it a try. In the past, I have cut and pasted the exact model number from Consumer Reports, into Google, and it tells me who carries the product and who has the lowest price. It even gets into the cost of shipping and taxes.

Google Shopping

Using the sidebar to the left, you can filter your results by price range, brand, seller, and category. For a pair of Carter’s footed pajamas, Kohl’s prices are $12 each. I need about five sets, so that’s a total of $60 — well above my price point for pajamas, but fall is approaching, so I am running out of time to find a better price. I know that Kohl’s frequently has sales and coupons, so that’s just a starting point in my shopping comparison.

Once I’m at the Kohl’s site, I see that they offer $10 of Kohl’s cash for every $50 spent. So, if my purchase is big enough, I can return to Kohl’s and use a $10 off coupon, with no minimum purchase required (and you know how much I love those “no minimum purchase required” coupons!).

2. Look for current coupons on Groupon Coupon

I pick out a few stores with the lowest prices and search for any available coupon codes. I like to go to Groupon Coupon to find those codes, because a google search just isn’t going to cut it when you’re looking for a coupon for a specific store in a specific time frame. Just try googling “Kohl’s coupon” and you’ll get sites listing deals from 2013 — things that are 100% not helpful.

Groupon Coupon has over 9,000 stores and 77,000 coupons. If there is an online coupon available, you’re probably going to find it there.

Here is the Kohl’s page on Groupon Coupon:

Groupon Coupon Kohl’s Page

Not only do I find a coupon code that I can copy and paste into my Kohl’s cart, but I also find that there is a coupon code available if I sign up for the Kohl’s email list. I can’t stack the coupons in the same transaction, but now I know that if I’m ever stuck with no Kohl’s coupon for what I want to buy, I can sign up for the email list.

Groupon Coupons also lets you sign up for alerts whenever there’s a new coupon available at a certain store. This is great if you’re looking for an item and you know only a handful of stores carry, but there isn’t a coupon currently available. Subscribe to alerts and you’ll know when it’s time to make the big purchase, because you’ll get an email about the new coupon.

3. Go to the store through a Cashback Site

Once I’ve found the lowest price on the item I want, I compare cashback options on sites like Ebates and TopCashBack. Ebates offers 6% cashback and TopCashBack offers 4%. Which one would you choose?

In the end, I got the price of Carter’s pajamas at Kohl’s down from $12 each to $7.59. After Google Shopping sent me to Kohl’s, I used Groupon Coupon to get the $12 price down to $10.20 with a coupon code. Then, with Ebates, the price went down to $9.58 each, and Kohl’s Cash gets the price down to $7.59 each.

Photo by StockImages, via FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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