This post contains affiliate links. You don’t pay any extra, and I earn a small commission.

Prime Day is a two day online shopping extravaganza for ONLY Amazon Prime Members. This year it is being held on Tuesday October 12 and Wed Oct 13th. In years past, it’s been in July. If you’re not a Prime Member, click here for a free trial. It’ll show you the benefits you receive with your paid membership and where you can sign up if you’re interested. Amazon provided some tips for customers how to navigate prime day (click here to see those), but I have 4 tips of my own to get ready for the big days.

Since I know we’re all busy folks, I’ve outlined the tips first. Please read the expanded version below for more specifics.

Laura Tip #1: Have a Pondering Purchase list ready to go. Try to stay grounded in your purchases!

Laura Tip #2: Make sure your 1-click settings are enabled and set to the correct delivery address and payment method.

Laura Tip #3: Take advantage of Amazon’s “Spend $10 on small business and get $10 to spend on Prime Day” promotion. Act FAST….this is only available through October 12 (which is Today for this post)

Laura Tip #4: Look at competitors, like Walmart and Target. They’ll be having sales too!

Now for the detailed version 🙂

Laura Tip #1

YOU NEED A PLAN!!! Make a list of items that you’re ideally looking for like household items, Christmas gifts, etc. I refer to those as “Pondering Purchases”. If I’m not careful, Prime Day can suck me in just like any Black Friday sale or random everyday sale for that matter. I have to at least try to somewhat have a purchasing strategy or else I’ll be buying all sorts of crap. If you’re able to filter for items with free returns that’s always a great assurance of knowing if you bought the product on a whim, you’re just out the time it takes to return. If you’re interested in hearing what my current “pondering purchase” list is looking like, stay tuned to the bottom of this post.  You might not want those particular items for yourself, but it might trigger some ideas.

Laura Tip #2

The second thing I do before Prime Day officially starts is make sure 1 click settings are enabled and it’s linked to the method of payment AND shipping address you want it to be. You do not want to be pushing that Buy in one click button and forget that you actually delivered your last package to your friend’s house for her birthday and now she’s going to receive all of your purchases. Most of us will have the 1 click setting already prepopulated to the correct address and payment method, but it doesn’t hurt to double check. When you’re able to click “buy now” with one click, you’re able to secure the deals you want without risking them timing out in your cart. Remember, most of the time sensitive deals have limited quantity and limited time. Just because you have it in your cart, doesn’t guarantee you’ll get it at that price. And if you’re adding multiple separate items, it can be hard to keep track. So, it’s best to just commit to the purchase right away with the one click feature (as long as you know for sure you want it…obviously).

To check if you have this enabled, you just go to the top of the amazon website, where you see “Hello, [Insert Name (Laura)] Account & Lists”, hover over that and select “Your Account”,  then under “Ordering and Shopping Preferences” click “1-Click Settings”,  Then it’ll show you what is listed as Your default. In my case, it’s listed to my home address and my Amazon.com Visa Card, which is what I want in this case. As I’ll also get an additional 5% cash back for my purchases.  If you see that your default setting is not ideal, then you just simply click “change” for either the shipping address and/or payment method and make sure it lists as your default. Done. You’re ready for 1 click purchases. If you ever wanted to disable this feature, you’d simply go to this same page and click the little slider on the right hand side of the screen to disable.

Laura Tip #3

My 3rd tip is take advantage of Amazon’s Prime Day promotions: Spend $10 on small business and get $10 credit to spend on Prime Day…act fast..this promo is only open until 10/12…which is TODAY! This means you must make a qualifying purchase through the small business link and then you’ll receive an email from Amazon where you can claim a $10 credit to use only on Prime Days October 13 and October 14. Click Here to take you directly to the Small Business promotion page. If you scroll a little down you’ll see some support small business categories…click on one category….for example, I clicked on “pet supplies” to see if my dog’s Movoflex joint supplement was listed anywhere. If you look at the search bar, this should populate to where you’ll be only searching within that category (that way you know it’ll be a qualifying purchase). Here is a screen shot of what that looks like. 

Unfortunately, my Movoflex search didn’t work out for me. It would not be a qualifying purchase. I decided to search in the toy category and found a great STEM toy that I plan on give my girls for Christmas. It’s 100 pieces of connectors for spaghetti….they can use the connectors to build designs out of normal dry spaghetti. Looks awesome. Probably not recommended for anyone with small toddlers in the house though.  My goal in this was to spend as close to the $10 as possible. I purchased the product for $11.99 because of a $2 digital coupon it had and then received an email with my $10 credit to use toward prime day.  I feel really good about this purchase!

I also am confident that this qualifies for the promotion because it had a banner showing “Support small businesses like this one” on the listing. See screen shot below.

Laura Tip #4

Look at competitors, like Walmart and Target. They’ll be having sales too! In fact, I’d look at all the stores that you typically purchase at. For instance, I’ll be checking Costco as well🙂

Well, that’s all my Laura Tips for now. Check out Amazon’s Prime Day Tips to get familiar with their offerings.

As promised, this is my Pondering Purchase list of items that I’ll be checking out tomorrow. I’m not tied to these specific brand/products per se, but this will give me a good starting point. Hope it triggers some ideas for you! Happy Shopping!

Laura’s Pondering Purchases: (Reminder: This post contains affiliate links. You don’t pay any extra, and I earn a small commission.)

Ice Chest (either Yeti or RTIC)
Amazon Echo Kids Edition
Golf Shoes
Aetrex Insoles
Heating Pad
Amazon Kindle Paper White
Audible
Ring Video Doorbell
Girl Pajamas
Portable Powerbank Charger
Tablet Charger
Christmas Presents- See Amazon’s Gift Guide (soooo general I know, I’m not prepared for this, but maybe I’ll find something 🙂

**Thanks for reading this far** 🙂