Couponing: A Complete Guide

Money saving is always a priority of many people as almost everyone want to save money so that they could achieve that for which they are working for. So coupons can help you to save money while you are out for shopping. Coupons are vouchers that can be redeemed to avail discounts on many things. I am sure you would heard of coupons before and today in this article I will let you know how can you collect coupon and how could you save from them. As couponing is easy and you can get addicted to it and by addiction I mean you will be spending more money in the temptation of saving some. So in this article I will help you to learn this art but not going to the extreme level and by that next time you will be able to save some dollars on your grocery shopping. So let’s start –

 

How to find Coupons

This is one of the question that you need to answer before you start couponing. There are many ways you can find free coupons to use. For years the only source to get the coupons was the newspapers but now as the world is going paper free so the coupons providers have also transformed the coupons to digital coupons and now you can find coupons on apps, websites that help you save on shopping. Some other traditional ways to get coupons is from the newspapers or directly from the store. So let us start from where we can find coupons that will help us to save money.

1. Groupon

Groupon is one of the website that helps you to save money on shopping. It is basically a shopping store where you can buy items and get special deals from restaurants to travelling deals. Other than that this site has also an option to search for online coupons and on this section you can get discounts deals for some stores and can get direct coupons. Although you have to do some work and spend some time for finding the best coupons but your time investment will pay off in a good way and you will save some good amount.

 

2. Coupons.com

This is one of the most famous website for finding coupons. Coupons.com is very easy to use and you could get coupons in just minutes. This site has really simplified the way you find and use a coupon and it has become super easy. The process is very easy you just have to go their website and there is no need to join their website for coupons. You can do that for free without joining. As you are on their site you will see coupons that you can use on their front page. After that you will have to select the coupons that you need and want to use and when you are finished with the selection then you just have to click the print button. Here your coupons are ready to use and you can take them to store and avail discount.

 

3. Red Plum

They are the manufacturers of the coupons and you can get their coupons from Sunday newspaper or they also send coupons by mails to their users. Other than these if you do not use the Sunday newspaper you can download coupons from their website. The website is easily accessible and you can view different type of coupons and if you want any you can print that for free.

 

4. Smart Source

Like the Red Plum, Smart Source is also a manufacturer of coupons and you can get their coupons from the newspaper or through your mail. They also have a website that you can use to get coupons. There website is easy to use and you can search according to the category of shopping you are going to do. You can find coupons by brands or your city code easily. Thus this makes it super easy to find coupons that can redeemed near your location. Like others you can print these coupons for free from their website.

 

5. Retail Me Not

Retail Me Not is an online store that will let you to avail many discounts and offers. There sites has a lot of online coupons that you can use. You can also get in store coupons that means you will not have to search the coupons on a different site to use it on their store. All this could be done automatically on their site. You can get coupons that you can use for multiple categories like clothing, restaurants or grocery.

 

6. Rakuten

Rakuten is one of the most famous apps to get free digital coupons. This is an app that gives you cashback for shopping in almost 2000 stores. This site is a multi-purpose site, here you can earn cashbacks, activate in-app offers to get discount or you can find digital coupons. You can download the coupons or you can use them directly on the stores online. Rakuten pays you from their earnings and the amount you earn as a cashback is the percentage of amount they are earning as referral money. This site works with stores like Target, Walmart, Amazon, Safeway, Best Buy and thousands more. You can get the cashback amount through a check or PayPal if you want. You can get more points while referring their site to other people.

 

7. Ibotta

The most famous app for digital coupons is Ibotta. You can save a good amount in the form of cashbacks and discounts when you shop from Ibotta. Ibotta works with many famous stores like Walmart, Target etc. This is a very easy to use portal that you can use. You just have to download the app and search for the deals on the stores you would like to shop in. Then the app will give you the details about available coupons. Then to use these coupons you have to scan your receipt of shopping the coupons will activate on that and you will get points that will be saved in your Ibotta account. You can ask for a payout when you have $10 in your account and the payment will be made through PayPal.

 

8. Traditional Ways to get coupons

Coupons can be still found by some traditional ways such as from the newspaper. So if you are still subscribed to the Sunday newspaper then you have can have many coupons every month. Don’t worry if you are not subscribed for the Sunday Paper because Smart Source, Red Plum and P&G will mail the coupons to your house.

Another method to get coupons is to get it from the products you are buying. Sometimes it is sealed inside the pack whereas sometimes it is attached with the product. One more method to get coupons is to get it directly from the stores and they sometimes mail coupons to their customers.

 

Organizing the Coupons

After finding the coupons, now the important task is to organize the coupons because if you will not organize it then you would not be able to use them to gain maximum benefit. While organizing your coupons you need to think about what store you can use them and on what product you can use them. Another important thing to be kept in mind is the expiry date of the coupon and make sure you use it within the time limit. By organizing your coupons with the expiry date will help you to utilize them on time. Next thing you need to do is that organize the coupons in different boxes according to their kind of usage because some coupons can be used at any store while some are limited to some certain stores. So you should place them differently.
This organizing is a very important thing because by that you will be able to find the correct coupon to use at the exact time. Remembering these three things mentioned above you could easily place your coupons in an organized way. Although it will take your some time but it will help you a lot in your shopping.

 

Get the Maximum Out of Your Coupon

Now after finding the coupons and organizing the coupons it is the time to save the most from the coupons and now I will give you some tips about so that you could gain the maximum out of your coupons.
If you have a coupon for a certain item then check whether that you can get that item in sale days or not because buying that item in the sales day could double up the savings. Now there are days when the stores double up the coupons amount that means you get double discount on single coupons, these days are termed as Double Coupon Days. Make sure you do your shopping on these days so that you could get maximum discounts.
Sometimes there are store coupons that you can use on certain products while sometimes it is the manufacturers coupons that you can use. You can use them both on the same product if you have them so maximum your saving by collecting them all.

 

Drawback of Couponing

The only drawbacks of couponing is that you could be tempted to buy those things you would not buy and use. This may happens when you have a coupon for a product that you usually do not buy and after getting a coupon you think that it could be a chance of saving while it is a chance of extra spending. This is because sometimes you think that you got an amazing deal by this coupons but in fact it is temptation for you to spend your precious money that you would not have spent otherwise.

So this was a complete guide for you to use coupons and I am sure you now you will be able to use coupons in a way that could increase your savings. Do comment in the comment section below and share your experience of using coupons with us.

Posted on: 08/01/2020

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