Tumbling Towards Something

Using Amazon.com to Reduce Your Spending

About a month ago I was on Amazon.com, looking for Christmas presents to add to the Amazon wishlist to help my Dad out with his Christmas shopping. I don’t shop online very often, and when I logged onto the actual wishlist, I saw about 5 things on it that I had added several months ago. I hadn’t purchased them yet. In fact, I had forgotten about them. I looked them over and realized that I didn’t really need any of them, and I was very happy that I hadn’t purchased them.

This article is based on that experience. I recommend doing it about once every few months, and not just during the holidays. It can help you to gain a better perspective on material objects and your life. You’ll also be amazed at how well marketing works and be better prepared to resist it.

Exercise

First, go to any online shopping website that has a “wishlist” feature. I used Amazon.com because it has a wide variety of categories, but if you are only interested in books, music, and videos you could use Borders.com, or use a site such as Newegg.com if you are interested in consumer electronics. The key is to choose a website with many items you’d be interested in and that has a wishlist function. You may have to register or log-in to use the wishlist function.

Then start browsing. Search whatever categories you are interested in. If you see something that you want, add it to your wishlist. Read the marketing descriptions of products. Check out review for it. Ignore the prices.  See a $600 digital camcorder that looks cool, just add it. Look, an automatic bread machine—add that too.  Do this for as long as you want, for as many items as you want. I recommend at least half an hour. 

Add anything you find that you think you’d like.

 
Follow Up

Then log out and wait a day or two.

Before logging in to your wishlist again, take a sheet of paper and try to remember and list all of the items that you previously added. Once you’ve written down as many as you can remember, go to your wishlist and compare. Ask yourself these questions:

• How many things could you even remember from a few days before?
• Do you really need these products if you can’t even remember them?
• Do you still want any of this stuff?
• Or did you only want it based on the advertising that you saw for it?
• How would purchasing these items improve your life?

Take a sheet of paper or a computer file and write down one of the items on your wishlist at the top of a page. Make two columns: one for pros/improvements and the other for cons/negative impacts. List how each product could positively improve your life and negatively impact it.

Once again, do you really need all this stuff?

Many of us probably run through a similar process in our heads when we are at a store or shopping online. However, writing it down really makes you aware of the pros and cons of a purchase and can save you lots of money. The wishlist function makes it easy to do this exercise in order to make yourself more aware of all the marketing that surrounds us. Give it a try! If you do still feel the urge to purchase the item, check out Trent’s recent article on Talking Myself Out of Frivolous Purchases at The Simple Dollar.