Tips like these helped us pay off $127K in debt. You can read our story in Slaying the Debt Dragon: How One Family Conquered Their Money Monster and Found an Inspired Happily Ever After.
Last week, Amazon announced July 15, 2015 to be the first ever Amazon Prime Day. Perhaps taking a page from Alibaba, this non-holiday shopping event promises to more deep discounts than even Black Friday. But will the deals on Amazon be worth it and how do you take the best advantage of them? I’m so glad you asked. Here’s my guide to Amazon Prime Day.
1. You Need Amazon Prime for the Deals
So don’t read me wrong. You don’t need Amazon Prime to survive. However, if you want to have access to the deals, you do need a Prime Membership.
2. Is a Prime Membership Worth It?
This is certainly a household by household determination that depends heavily upon your expenses and budget. But, Amazon Prime has yearly increased the services offered to you. With Prime you can now:
- Take advantage of FREE 2 Day Shipping and sometimes even 1 day shipping.
- Access Prime Instant Video – a service similar to Netflix that grants access to thousands of movies and TV shows.
- Listen to thousands of songs and albums for free through Prime Music, a streaming option similar to Pandora and Spotify.
- Store Your Photos for free. You can store an unlimited number of photos as a part of your membership.
- Borrow one of over 800,000 books for FREE per month thanks to the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library. You don’t have to have a Kindle to access one, just any device with the FREE Kindle App. (FYI Slaying the Debt Dragon is is in the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library).
Coming in at $99 per year, it really might be worth the cost for your family. For instance if you cancel cable and or Netflix, the expense works out to be roughly $8.25/month which is much more affordable than cable and around $0.26 more than the cheapest Netflix option at $7.99/month. Adding in the extra benefits, it just makes sense. The same goes for using Prime Music over Spotify ($10 per month) or Pandora ($4.99 per month). The unlimited photo storage is yet another one of those benefits most people don’t take advantage of and might be paying for through Dropbox or another Cloud storage program. There are a few other smaller benefits to Prime, too (read about them here) but these five are the biggest money savers. In the end, I don’t think your household needs a Prime Membership to survive, but if you’re paying for these other services, you might want to see if you can streamline your expenses.
3. Is a FREE Trial Really Free?
I am the Queen of Free; however, I am ALWAYS skeptical of any sort of FREE trial. Oftentimes, you end up paying a pretty penny for something that wasn’t worth it after all. That being said, you may qualify for a 30 Day Free Trial of Amazon Prime. If you’re interested in shopping on Prime Day at all, you need to go ahead and sign up for that right now if you can. In 30 days, you don’t have to continue your membership; but you will need to manage your account so that it doesn’t automatically charge you when the trial period is over. You can even have it set a notification to send you an e-mail right before the membership is about to expire (that includes folks who pay for their membership because I just did that!) so you can alter the settings later.
4. But Where Are the Deals?
Amazon is holding the specific deals close to their vest at this point in the week, but they will be leaking them in their Facebook Event Page. Thus far, they’ve leaked that the majority of deals will be on electronics, toys, video games, movies, clothing, patio, lawn and garden, sports and outdoor items. The Facebook Event Page announced on Friday that you might be able to snag a 32″ Smart HDTV for under $200 or Chromebooks for $199. Both of these deals sound promising to me. You’ll want to watch the Prime Day page on Amazon as well as the Today’s Deal Page. If you’re on Twitter, follow the #HappyPrimeDay hashtag. I’ll also try to share my favorite deals on the Queen of Free Facebook and Twitter accounts throughout the day on July 15th, highlighting what I think are the best deals. You’ll have to be quick on the keys, I’m sure but I think you’ll still be able to score some great bargains.
5. Don’t Miss the Contests
Amazon is also offering a number of high dollar give aways during the day including the #PrimeLiving Photo contest where you can win $10,000 in Amazon Gift Cards just for uploading a picture to Prime’s photo service and the “Listen for a Chance to Win” contest that you enter merely by listening to a song on Prime during the day. It promises a payout of $10,000 in Amazon Gift cards, too.
6. New Prime One Day Delivery
Prime is also rolling out a new Same Day Delivery service in 14 markets. If you live near the geographical Queendom, you’re in luck because Indianapolis is one of those markets. When you select qualifying products that total $35, items can be delivered on the same day. That’s just crazy, friends.
If you’re already a Prime Member, you need to keep your eyes peeled on the deals. If you’re not a Prime Member and you qualify, you need to lock in your 30 Day Trial. If you can’t get the trial, it’s up to you to decide if the $99/year expense is doable in your personal budget. Carefully weigh your needs with the benefits and of course, never borrow money to make any purchase happen!
My book is now available: Slaying the Debt Dragon: How One Family Conquered Their Money Monster and Found an Inspired Happily Ever After. You can also check out Inspiration to Pay Off Debt: 30 Days of Encouragement from the Queen of Free on Kindle.
This post contains an affiliate link. That means when you get a great deal or maybe even something for free, you also help our family pay off our mortgage early. And for that, we royally thank you!
Ktina Mullen says
Okay so confession time- we signed up for the Amazon Prime 30 day free-trial and totally intended to cancel it after we got our free shipping on a few big items (car parts). But I sorta forgot to cancel, so I thought well it’s probably worth it because above reasons. Get this though THEY NEVER CHARGED US FOR A YEAR. That’s right signed up for a 30 day free trial got a 365 day free trial. By the time our one year anniversary rolled around I was so in love with the prime services I could’t cancel. Totally worth the Benjamin. One thing you didn’t really elaborate on was the FREE SHIPPING. I don’t really care about 2-day, but buying at their low prices then shipping for free…WOW! It prompted me to cancel my Sam’s membership too. If anyone wants my 2-cents AMAZON PRIME ROCKS!! I can’t wait to shop the Prime Day Deals.