Millions of people decide to avoid the crowds while shopping, particularly on sales and holidays, and choose to shop online.
Not only can you find great prices, but if you work it right you can actually make money when you shop online.
You can do this by shopping through a cash back and rebate site, known as eBates.
I have been using eBates for a while and I love it. It’s like getting free money for doing something you were going to do anyway.
And last year, thanks to a nifty tool (more on that later) I made $405 by simply shopping through eBates.
I am going to show you a simple trick you can use to make money from your online shopping.
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Table of Contents
What Is eBates?
Stores have what are called affiliate programs, where independent people or entities can send customers to them, and receive a portion of the amount the customers spend.
Stores save money advertising, and get more customers, so it’s worth it to give some of the money back.
As a typical shopping portal, eBates has agreements with a wide range of stores, including big-box stores such as Best Buy and Target, as well as luxury stores such as Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Avenue.
eBates is just one of many cash back websites with affiliate agreements with thousands of stores. That means when they send customers to those stores, and the customers make a purchase, the stores send them money. eBates then sends some of that money back to you, the customer.
So that is how they can afford to pay you to shop through their website, or “shopping portal”.
How It Works
It works like this…
First, you have to join eBates. And if you join now, they will give you $5 for free just for signing up.
You can sign up here & get your free $5
Now, once you join the site the fun begins. Say you want to buy something from Old Navy. Instead of going direct to Old Navy’s online store, you login to eBates and look for the Old Navy symbol. When you click on that, it sends you to the Old Navy store and you can make your purchase as normal.
eBates keeps track of that by using cookies, so it knows how much commission Old Navy should send it.
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Percentages vary, but at the moment eBates is offering 3% back on Old Navy purchases. So in due course, your eBates account will be credited with 3% of your purchase price. eBates keeps the rest of its commission, so you are both happy.
The Trick
What I described above is how things are done normally.
Every time you want to buy something online, you have to remember to login to eBates first, search to see if the store you want to buy from is listed in their shopping portal and continue from there.
The problem with that is…
Well, it takes time.
And that is if you remember to check with eBates in the first place.
As a result, a lot of people miss out on a lot of cash back because they either forget to go through eBates, or they just don’t want to spend few minutes logging in and going through eBates’ portal
But there is a simple thing you can do to overcome this issue and get cashback every single time you shop online.
The trick is installing a handy app called the eBates Cash Back Button app.
This is a browser add on that once you install, will automatically activate Cash Back directly at store sites and applies any available promo codes at checkout.
So whenever you are shopping online, this app will work in the background and alert you whether or not eBates offers cash back fro the site you are shopping from.
And if it does, the add on will automatically activate your cash back. Plus it searches for and applies promo codes specific to that site/store automatically. So not only you get cash back, you also save money by getting discounts from the site/store.
Install it and you will never have to miss a single dime of cash back. I have been using it and that is how I made $405 last year. Otherwise, I would have probably gotten half of that since I would have missed a lot of cash back opportunities.
You can either login (after you join the site) to your account and find the add on link at the bottom of your dashboard, or you can install it directly from your browser’s official app market.
Currently the add on is available for:
How Much Money Can You Make When You Shop Through eBates?
The amount you get back varies from 1% to much more, and it all depends on the agreements that the stores have with the shopping portal website, and how much the website keeps.
However it is worked out, it means you get paid cash back by simply installing a free add on, once!
Your cash back gets paid out quarterly, either via check or into a PayPal account.
Bottom Line
There are other shopping portal websites offering cash back, and some also offer gift vouchers or other rewards. The amount you get back from a particular store can vary from site to site, so it’s worth checking them out, particularly if you’re making a big purchase.
Some, including eBates, also give you money if you refer friends or when you sign up.
This is a great way to earn extra money on the side while you shop online. It doesn’t take but a few minutes to join the site for free and install their browser add on. From then on do your internet shopping as usual with one big difference, now you get a big fat check 4 times a year just for shopping.
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