While I, myself, am not always the most frugal shopper (coupons aren’t really my thing and I tend to buy what I want instead of waiting for it to go on sale), my wife is an incredibly frugal person who knows how to work every angle and snag every discount possible.

So when I found out the power that having Ebates loaded into my Google Chrome browser created, I kicked myself for the hundreds (and possibly thousands) that I could’ve been getting a nice little Ebate on.

Here’s how it works:

You simply sign up for an Ebates account, easily logging in with either your google account or your Facebook account. Then, in your Google Chrome browser, search the plugins available for the Ebates plugin. Once you install and activate the plugin, every website you visit where there is a possibility for you to earn cash back on a purchase, the plugin opens a small popunder window and asks if you’d like to activate the earning on that site.

Boom. That’s it.

When you spend money on that site, you’ll automatically have funds deposited into your Ebates account. You can transfer that into a paypal account within a day and ideally plow those newfound funds into an investment account like Stockpile.com.

What makes me an Ebates fan

There’s no coupons to carry. No codes to plug-in at checkout. No surveys to take. You simply transact the purchase just like you were going to anyway.

More and more of my transactions happen online these days and it is a constant frustration of mine to search “coupon codes” “checkout codes” or “offer codes” for the site I’m on. Candidly, it’s the one area that I could always get better at, it’s just a matter of time spent looking for those things versus time spent building my business.

How much can you make with Ebates?

Most of the ebate cash back offers are around the 4-8% range, though if you’re shopping for luxury fashion, flowers or particular vertical products (like home furnishings) through sites like Walmart.com, the payout can be significantly higher (ranging from 10%-40% in some cases).

When we installed the Ebates chrome plugin, I noticed two things.

  1. My wife was spending money online anyway, and often buying more than she intended to keep to eliminate shipping costs. (The stores she orders from have local outlets that she takes the excess to… like I said, extremely frugal.) By doing this she often saves upwards of $20-35. To my surprise, the Ebates were racking up because of her heightened spending.
  2. With the Ebates plugin, whenever I spend money online, I’m way more conscious of using sites that have an Ebates cash back option. Whereas before I was completely site agnostic (sometimes paying no attention to the price being cheaper on a different site), now I’m far more aware of whether or not I’ll get money back on this next purchase.

Sign-up, download the plugin, and get earning!

If you find the plugin helpful, send me an email and let me know your savings story. I’d love to feature readers of Mastery of Money who are taking advantage of the advice given on the site!

To the pursuit of mastery!

Adam