Saving money at your favorite places.

2009, has been a great year for saving. Be it through emails, Twitter and facebook, or text messages from my favorite places, I’ve been able to take advantage of countless deals. You might be thinking that you don’t want to clutter your inbox with countless junk emails, but there are ways around that and sometimes the discounts and freebies you receive make having to delete the few junk emails worth while.

If a store I frequent offers free coupons and advance notice of sales, I sign up for it. I get coupons 3 or 4 times a week from New York & Co. and Bath & Body Works. By signing up for Victoria’s Secret’s Pink Nation, I got a free travel toiletries bag with all kinds of goodies inside. I also get coupons for undies and other Pink stuff every month or so. I’ve signed up for countless newsletters from companies like Pillsbury, and Betty Crocker. Along with great recipes come some great coupons. This holiday season Best Buy and Leap Frog have sent me notice of special deals and online coupon codes for some great Christmas gifts.

As far as the junk mail goes, I have a couple ways to avoid it. First, when I sign up for emails, I always make sure the box that allows companies to share my info with “partners” is NOT checked. Partners and affiliates are most often people I am not interested in receiving emails from, and by making sure the box to share is not checked, I’ve cut my junk mail why down. When I do receive mail from someone I don’t want to hear from, I scroll down to the bottom and click “unsubscribe”, that 9 times out of 10 stops future emails. The other way I cut down on the junk mail is by creating different email aliases. I have an alias for my survey websites, one for all things Mommy related, one for my blog, and my main email address. When I don’t want to receive email from a certain group, I delete the alias. Unfortunately, that’s not an option for everyone.

A lot of companies out there are now using Twitter. I follow a lot of my favorite places for news and updates. Is there something good going on at Famous Dave’s? I’ll know about it. I have the Twitter app on my phone so I can always be in the know. My phone also comes in handy to get text messages. Although I don’t use this option as much and I would highly recommend having an unlimited text plan before you go signing up to receive texts from anyone, I’ve gotten some good deals this way. All summer long I got texts from Dairy Queen for free Blizzards and Dilly Bars. New York & Co. sent me some coupon codes (in store OR online) for $30 of a $75 purchase, not too shabby. Every so often Arby’s sends me a free sandwich or drink with purchase. The beauty of the text deals is that they’re easy to opt out of if you decide they’re not for you. And remember, do not sign up unless you have unlimited texting.

There are a lot of deals floating around in cyber space just waiting to be snapped up. It seems like companies are really listening to the consumer when we say no more junk mail. I really don’t get that much considering how many times my email address is out there.

Happy Saving!