6 Insider Secrets to Get the Best Online Deals from a Marketing Veteran
With holiday consumerism in full swing, it’s time to shed a little light on how you can use the marketing engine to your advantage. Understanding how marketers think — the tactics they use to hook you, the strategies they employ to entice you to purchase, the technologies they deploy to intensify and speed up your need, and thus, your purchase — provides you with a tremendous opportunity for big savings.
Getting the inside scoop from a marketing industry veteran is the equivalent of being let behind the proverbial curtain to see The Wizard. Here are the 6 things marketers will never tell you. Why? Because they add up to big savings (in your pockets) from online retailers.
- First things first, create an email account that is exclusively used to sign up for special deals
The best way to get marketers to respect your inbox is to not give them access to it. Instead, create an email account that is specifically used to sign up for special deals and offers from your favorite retailers. This is a beautiful way to keep all of your coupons in one spot and to keep your email account clean. Whenever you are going shopping you can just log into your “special deals” email account and see what is available. Now you have control over when you see their emails, all the while still receiving the many great deals they are offering.
2. Sign up for your favorite retailers email lists
To marketers, having your contact information is the equivalent to gold. Having your email address means they can reach out to you with special deals that help them reach their sales goals. Many companies will even give you an immediate discount just for signing up, or they will include a special bonus with your next purchase.
The downside to their having your email address is that they absolutely intend to fill your inbox with marketing messages, and they rarely disclose upfront the volume of emails they are going to send you.
When consulting with a large online meditation company with a robust email marketing program, I asked the CEO, “How do you ensure that someone who joins multiple lists doesn’t get 30 emails a day?” His response was that if they signed up for multiple lists they want all of the emails, even if that means they get 30 emails a day. This attitude is not uncommon in the industry. Marketers have yet to truly learn how to respect our inboxes. This means we have to go covert to get the special offer while protecting our personal space. That’s why you’ve already set up a burner email address exclusively for this covert discount shopping operation.
3. Use the power of the click to get the discounts you want
Check this email account once a week versus every day. When you see a deal you like make sure you open the email and click on the deal. Marketers track what you click on and use it to design your next deal. If you are clicking on the coupons, expect to get more coupons. If you are clicking on last-minute deals, expect to get more last-minute deals. You can step this up a notch by being even more specific with your clicks.
See, they also track what products you click on, so if you click on the products you want to receive special deals on, you are more likely to get just that. For example, if you are in the market for a new pair of boots, start clicking on the boots you like and take the time to enjoy them on the screen. Show the marketers tracking and analyzing how much prefer one item over another and your level of interest by spending a little more time on that page. What you are really doing is laying the ground work to get a special deal on those boots. You’re leaving digital bread crumbs for the marketers to take things to the next level with an even better offer for you.
Take things a step further and add the item you want to your cart and then leave the website.
4. Always abandon your shopping cart before purchasing
Abandoning your cart is the biggest secret marketers will never tell you. Marketers know what you’ve added to your cart and they know whether you check out and purchase an item. When you add something to your cart and then leave the website marketers call it “abandoning your shopping cart.” Conscious consumers understand this tactic and use it to their advantage. Always abandon your cart unless you are concerned about product availability or if there is a legitimate discount that is ending at a specific time before you’d be able to go back to your order.
When you abandon your shopping cart, marketers assume something happened, such as your browser crashed, or you thought you completed the purchase but never clicked on the final “purchase” button. Using this trick will put you into a special email list some call the Email Recovery Campaign. You will receive an email reminding you about your cart and asking if you would like to complete your purchase. The first email is usually a simple reminder with a link back to the shopping cart. Click on it. But don’t buy just yet.
5. Wait for it…
It can be tough to wait when you know you want to buy something, but in this case, it’s likely to be worth it. You just told the company’s marketing team that you want what they have, twice. And for some reason you haven’t purchased the item, which leaves them questioning why. The reason they will assume is that you don’t like the price. Guess what that means? You’re about to get another discount to complete your order. You just have to be patient enough to wait for it.
Sometimes you’ll get the email immediately. Sometimes it’s within 24 hours. It’s almost always within 48 hours. When price becomes a factor, marketers know that discounting is the only way to get you to buy. If you receive emails in the interim asking you to finish your purchase without a discount, ignore them. Wait until the email comes that offers a discount and then complete your order. This is where you can also decide if you want to hedge your bets.
6. Hedge your bets for deeper discounts
Many of the discounts you will receive may say it’s only available for a short window of time. However, it’s rare for discounts to truly be time-based. Marketers create a sense of urgency by telling you a deal is only for the next hour or the next day. This is a standard marketing practice. At the end of the sale, you’ll likely get the “due to popular demand we’ve decided to extend the discount for another 24 hours” email. The rare exception is around Christmas when product availability can be limited and time-based offers such as Black Friday deals are usually adhered to. However, in most cases you can expect an extension at the end of the sale and in some cases, you’ll get an even deeper discount to complete your purchase. Marketers simply can’t resist the opportunity for more sales when the product you want is available.
This tactic is only for the brave. There is certainly a chance you’ll miss out on the deal. And there is also a possibility that the product sells out. However, for all the times when you turn that 20% discount into 30% by waiting an extra day you’ll thank yourself for your bravery. And for the times when it didn’t work out, you can chalk it up to the Universe telling you the product wasn’t for you.
These 6 tips will completely change the way you shop online. Understanding how marketers work to get you to buy empowers you to be a more conscious consumer. We all want the best quality products at affordable prices. And we want to buy from conscious companies. By working together, we can create demand for deeper discounts and more conscious mission-driven companies to buy from. The beautiful part is that even if marketers know you are working their system, it still works to their advantage. Conscious consumers want win-wins. Conscious marketers help to create them. Now let’s go get some deals.