15 Black Friday Shopping Hacks You Need to Know!
Are you ready for all the amazing Black Friday Deals! I’ve been getting a lot of questions lately on Facebook Live about some of the different ways to save and I wanted to share with you my Top 15 Black Friday Shopping Hacks that you need to know in order to score awesome deals and save as much as possible!
1.) Use Discounted Gift Cards to Save Even More!
Most retailers don’t let you stack coupons with Black Friday Door-buster Prices so it can be impossible to get the price any lower… UNLESS you buy Discounted Gift Cards for your favorite retailers, You can get a Discounted Target Gift Cards from Raise.com which is a 20% Savings, Use that gift card to buy your doorbuster items on Black Friday and you’ll save 20% off the Black Friday Price! SCORE!
I’ve gotten gift cards for as low as $40 for a $50 Gift Card! Gift Cards can be used to buy Black Friday Deals where as most coupons exclude Black Friday so this is an easy and simple way to save!!!
2.) Earn FREE Amazon Gift Cards & Shop the Lightning Deals
The Best Amazon Black Friday Deals are on Lightning Deals! I use sites like Opinion Outpost to earn FREE Amazon Gift Cards all year long, these really start to add up if you’re consistent. You can earn points for taking surveys and trying products then giving your feedback on them! I recommend saving your points and cashing out just before the Holidays so that you have a little extra to spend, You might even be able to score some FREE STUFF on Black Friday!
You can sign up for Opinion Outpost Here, this is one of my all time favorite Survey Sites and I’ve actually been a member for almost 5 years now and been paid multiple times so it’s totally legit!
Amazon Lightning Deals go live every 10-30 minutes during Black Friday Week! Make sure you Request to Join our Facebook Group Here, that’s where we post alerts when Hot Lightning Deals go live so you can grab them before they sell out!
3.) Be Ready to Shop Early!
Did you know that Most Black Friday Deals go live online BEFORE Black Friday sales start in stores, that means if you start making your list and checking it twice you might be able to score most of your wish list without leaving your house! It’s so important to have your list ready to go with everyone you need to buy for and what you’re looking to grab from the Black Friday Sales so that you can grab what you want fast, the items often sell out fast online just like they do in stores!
Typically Black Friday Sales start online on the Sunday before Black Friday with Kohl’s Black Friday Deals going live late Sunday Night, Wednesday Night is also another popular time for deals to happen online, Make sure you Download the FREE Passion For Savings App here to get alerts when Hot Black Friday Sales are live online!
Sign Up for our FREE Black Friday Deal Alerts and be the first to know about New Black Friday Deals and The Best Ways to Save On All Your Holiday Shopping!
You can also request to join our Black Friday Group on Facebook for updates on the best daily deals and lightning deals + All of our favorite sales each day!
4.) Preview the Ads Before they are Released!
We have all of the Black Friday Ads available for you to preview BEFORE they are released in the newspapers on Thursday that means you can flip through the ads and know exactly what you want! Popular stores like Kohl’s, Target, Walmart and Best Buy often even put their ads on their websites and offer Preview Sales when they first release the ads so be on the lookout for those Preview Sales!
Preview all of the Black Friday Ads Here
5.) Use a Black Friday Database to Find the best deals!
Every year we create a HUGE Database of all the Best Deals on Black Friday, You can actually search this database for all the deals you need and find the lowest price at a store near you. It’s a HUGE help when you’re trying to make your list and create a game plan! This database will be updated as new store ads are released with all the most popular products! It’s completely free to use and you’d be crazy not to use it to find the best prices.
6.) Forget Price Matching, Pick Your Favorite Stores
Price Matching is awesome all year long, but most stores including Walmart, Target and Toys R Us have exclusions for Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday making it almost impossible to price match on those days. It’s better to spend your time wisely and pick the stores that will save you the most. If there’s a higher ticket item on your wish list focus on grabbing those deals first then hit the stores with smaller items that aren’t as important to your bottom line.
Remember, Black Friday is just the Beginning! There will be amazing deals all through the holiday season so you don’t have to stress out if you don’t get everything on your list, prioritize and grab the things that are most important to you first! You can Sign Up for our Daily Email Updates to get hot deals on Clothing, Toys and Electronics every day until Christmas!
7.) Shop Office Stores for Computers & Tablets
Computers are one of the items where it’s important to look at the quality and features of the item when considering a deal. There are a lot of inexpensive computers and electronics out there but the best deals are often on the slightly higher priced items at the office stores, those have the most memory and ram and often the best selection so that you can get a computer that’s a great price but will also last you for a while!
9.) Get FREE Stuff at the Drugstores
Did you know that already we often see tons of Freebies at the Drugstores on Black Friday? Last year we had 19 FREEBIES in the CVS Black Friday Ad and 7 FREEBIES in the Rite Aid Black Friday Ad. Drugstores are a great place to pick up items without busting your budget, a lot of these items make great stocking stuffers. Make sure you plan to shop the drugstores early, most sales start on Thanksgiving morning so you could hit these stores up early before Thanksgiving dinner, then spend the afternoon with Family and Friends.
10.) Shop on Thanksgiving Day
Did you know that every year we see prices LOWER Than Black Friday on Thanksgiving day, there’s a really great reason for this. Stores know that you are about to start your Christmas Shopping and they are fighting to get a piece of your Holiday Budget before you hit the stores. Almost all the stores are closed on Thanksgiving morning which means they know you are at home with nothing else to do so they offer amazing deals and discounts to motivate you to get online and shop.
You can get up early and shop with me in the Facebook Group. I won’t be posting all day because I will be spending time with my family, but I do try to get the best deals up in the Group and sometimes I just throw up quick links without doing an entire post so the Facebook Group is a great place to check early on Thanksgiving morning!
11.) Join the Waitlist
There’s a little secret you might not know about when shopping on Amazon. Amazon runs all of their best deals as “Lightning Deals” These are deals that are available for a limited amount of time and in limited quantities. During the Holidays Lightning Deals often are “Claimed” within minutes which means you’ll often pass up on the deal not realizing that it isn’t actually sold out.
When Amazon marks a Lightning Deal as “100% Claimed” They mean that all the items have been added to users carts, but not all have been paid for. If a user doesn’t complete the purchase within 15 minutes then the item goes to the next person on the waitlist which means that as soon as you see an item 100% claimed go ahead and add yourself to the waitlist because it’s not really sold out and you may get a chance to purchase the deal if someone else passes on it. I have gotten SO. MANY. DEALS. using this method, It’s not really understood very well so I did an entire post on How to Get Amazon Lightning Deals that you might want to check out.
12.) Look for In Stock Guarantees
Some of my favorite Black Friday Deals are the ones that you are Guaranteed to get. If you’re going to brave the stores on Black Friday then it’s a good idea to remember that most stores have a limited number of their Door-buster Items so unless you are one of the first 50 or 50 people in the store your chances of getting these amazing deals are really low, skip those stores and opt for stores like Walmart where they guarantee everyone will get that item at the Black Friday Price for at least an hour!
Walmart stopped this is 2017 but I’m hoping it makes a comeback because it was a great way to get High Value Items!
13.) Look for Gift Cards & Kohls Cash
Popular Brands often require retailers to hold the Prices High on higher priced brands and items like North Face Jackets, Apple iPads, Xbox and Playstation Systems, KitchenAid Mixers, Dyson Vacuums, Samsung TVs and more! Because retailers don’t have much flexibility with the price they often offer Gift Cards or Rewards on your purchase. Look for Gift Card Deals at Target, Best Buy, Toys R Us, and Walmart.
Also, don’t forget about Kohl’s Cash, during Black Friday you’ll earn $15 for every $50 you spend, on Big Ticket Items that’s often an extra $75-$120 back in Kohl’s Cash to spend on a future purchase, that’s a Huge Savings if you’re already planning on buying one of these more expensive items. Often the prices after Kohl’s Cash are the lowest we see. Check out all of the Kohl’s Black Friday Deals Here.
14.) Be First in Line & Save More
JCPenney, Cabelas, Belk, and Goody’s are just a few of the stores that offer incentives for being some of the first in the store. JCPenney is offering it’s first shoppers a coupon for $10/$10 Purchase, up to a $100/$100 and even a few $500/$500 coupons! Be there when the doors open to get these extra savings and sang some extra savings for shopping early!
15.) Don’t Forget the Rewards Programs
Sign up for all the rewards programs you can to take advantage of special coupons and discounts + Those rewards can really add up fast. Kohl’s Rewards Program can earn you an additional $5 on every $100 you spend which is on top of any coupons you use and Kohl’s Cash you earn! That means you could earn $30 in Kohl’s Cash + $5 in Rewards on every $100 you spend at Kohl’s during Black Friday!