Meet your personal shopping assistants
These six apps will make the best deals available on your smartphone
The hottest tech product on the planet? It’s in your pocket.
More than 75 per cent of Canadians now own a smartphone — up from 62 per cent just three years ago — and chances are you bring this digital device with you everywhere.
And so it may come as no surprise many are using it to shop, whether it’s online shopping through apps or the mobile web, or as a companion to help sniff out great deals at retail.
“Your phone can be an invaluable shopping tool,” says Rubina AhmedHaq, a Toronto-based personal finance expert who runs the blog AlwaysSaveMoney.ca. “Our phones are a lot more accessible than computers, and there are many good and free shopping apps to install and use,” Ahmed-Haq adds.
If you’re looking for some suggestions on what to load up your phone with, the following free apps are worth considering.
Flipp Consider Flipp, the ultimate flyer aggregator. After you type in your postal code, browse the best deals at local stores or select what retailers matter to you — such as an electronics store, clothing chain, home improvement centre, department store, or supermarket — and you’ll be able to see the latest flyers that showcase new products and sales around you. Available for smartphones, tablets and computers, clip favourites, print coupons, press and hold on a product to read reviews, add items to your shopping list, and see dis- counted items by percentage off. Flipp also lets you store digital versions of your loyalty cards to use at retail, when needed.
Ebates.ca It’s one thing to save money while shopping smartly, but what if you could earn money back while shopping online? That’s the premise behind the Ebates app as it pays members cash back every time you shop through participating online retailers and marketplaces — and there are many. Here’s how it works: sign up for a free account, and then every time you shop at one of the supported stores you’ll start earning cash that can be sent to you via cheque, deposited into a PayPal account, or donated to a charity of your choice. Each store offers a different cash back percentage. Save.ca
Owned by the same parent company as this publication, this Canadian app borrows elements from both Flipp and Ebates.ca: you can view f l yers, price-match between your favourite local retailers, and take advantage of cashback offers and mail-to-home coupons. Save.ca also lets you create shopping lists to keep track of products you want, plus you can scan loyalty cards and present them at the register of retailers you frequent the most. The interface is clean and intuitive.
ShopSavvy If you’re hoping to find a bargain while shopping at retail, ShopSavvy takes advantage of your smartphone’s camera by letting you scan barcodes of products in front of you. Within a second or two, you’ll see how much the same product costs online — or nearby at a nearby competing store — including the option to get directions to the stores that have the product cheaper (represented by coloured pushpins on a map). Needless the say, retailers don’t like this app very much. You can also do a search by keyword, such as “Xbox” or “Sonos,” to find the best deals. Amazon.ca Browse and buy from anywhere life takes you. Amazon.ca — the app — is a conduit to Amazon.ca the web store, with many millions of products to order from the convenience of your phone — including “1-Click” ordering, if you like, which remembers your shipping and payment details. Read reviews, view photos and videos, create wish lists, and track your orders. The Amazon.ca app now lets you compare prices and check availability by scanning a barcode, snapping a photo, or typing in the search window. With Apple Watch support, you can use your voice to search for products, buy, and more, right from your wrist.
Kijiji Don’t forget about online classifieds apps, too, like Kijiji, which is No. 1 in Canada. While you need to wait for products to ship to your door with apps such as Amazon.ca, Kijiji lets you buy local and with cash — and avoid shipping charges altogether.
Contrary to popular belief, many all-new products are listed on Kijiji, and not just previously owned ones. Of course, if you have something to sell, Kijiji is also a great place to offload old or unwanted items in your home, and the app notifies you immediately if there’s any activity on your account.
The other real benefits of mobile shopping? “You can be immediately notified of location-based deals and you can keep all your loyalty and rewards cards on your phone, too,” Ahmed-Haq says.