Top 4 Time- and Money-Saving Tips for Geeky Moms

Image credits: hill.josh

Planning and doing shopping takes about 20% of my (mom’s) time. That’s quite a lot considering I have a new-born daughter that keeps me busy throughout the day and what’s more, I am one of those work-from-home mommies who have to be everywhere at the same time (I am heavily into Internet marketing, blogging, business intelligence, many more).

That said, shopping is one of those daily obligations that need to be optimized (since I don’t want to spend less time with my baby but still need to keep working). And here are my own tips that prove to be effective:

Shop Online

The best thing about shopping online is that you don’t have to waste time on driving to the mall to make a purchase – everything you buy will be delivered right to your front door. This becomes even more valuable if you are (like me) breastfeeding and thus can’t leave your baby for a long time.

No wonder, online shopping has become so popular: last year’s research identified the following main reasons behind shopping online:

1. saving time,
2. locating hard-to-find products,
3. greater selection,
4. no queues;
5. easier shipping;
6. saving money;
7. saving gas…

Get Organized

Things get much easier when you spend just a few minutes a day to organize everything. One simple notebook listing your planned purchases and a calculator to estimate how much you are going to spend – these are the best tools to save money by avoiding impulse shopping and not to forget anything.

Of course, being a geeky mom you can also use web tools for that. Online wish lists storing all the information on what you want and plan to buy can be a great help: as you can access them from anywhere: be it a laptop or even a mobile phone. Besides, adding products there can be a real fun: just browse your favorite online stores and save the items you’d like to buy one day:

Track Deals and Coupons

Coupons will only save you very little money: but little by little this will accumulate in huge savings if you create an effective couponing strategy. The main thing is to know what and how to track.

Coupon codes directories are plenty; my advice is to choose a couple of them and stay focused. I usually pick the one that provides a good selection of product and brand range. However I believe this is too subjective, so I won’t recommend anything here.

What I can still suggest is choosing the ones that offer best tracking tools. For example, there are sites that deliver shopping deals right to your email box (and you can even set how often you want them to do that) or to watch the product price until it drops (e.g. PriceGrabber):

See What Other Buyers Say

Shopping online (as well as coupon hunting) has one huge disadvantage: huge risks. You can be scammed, you can be fooled into buying something which will never be delivered to you or you may be cheated into giving your credit card details to someone who will then steal all your money.

So whenever you see an enticing bargain, stay calm and do some research. Online shopping communities will help you to investigate if the deal should be trusted. One of my favorite bargain hunting communities is Buxr.com. The site encourages its members to share and discuss bargains and I found it to be the best source of coupon codes and trusted deals.

Each deal there has comments and rankings. Besides, you can post your own comment and ask questions about each one to make sure the offer is valid and legit:

And how do you save time and money? Please share!

The guest post is by Ann Smarty, a new mommy and Internet entrepreneur.

Last 5 posts by asmarty

• The Three S's of Safe Freebie Hunting