So I know we’re all eagerly glued to the Amazon Lightning Deals this week, so I thought I’d give you a couple of quick tips about ’em.
First of all, many of the deals are visible in advance of their “live” times (not the price, but the item itself), and even the “mystery” items can often be decoded based upon the descriptions, ahead of time. I know that scrolling through a hundred pages of deals first thing in the morning isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but if you’re wanting a particular item, it may be worth it to check ahead to see if something you want is coming up. And if you see an item you want, decide well before deal-time what you’re willing to pay for it. As with everything else, some of the deals are better than others.
When you want a deal: Make sure you’re signed in to your Amazon account and sitting at your computer, ready to click, as soon as it goes live. I have a friend who was trying to snag a deal on a Touch yesterday and both of us clicked for it the minute it went live and neither of us got it. Some deals (particularly the good ones) are available in extremely limited quantities and sell out in a flash. That’s the bad news. The good news is that when you miss out—don’t panic! Many of these deals are showing up more than once. The deal you miss today may be back on Friday. Be patient. Stalk your prey like a lioness, my pretties. Persistance pays off.
Remember, once you add a Lightning Deal to your cart, you only have 15 minutes to check out before you lose the deal price. If you’re on the fence about an item for some reason, you are better off clicking to add it to your cart immediately and then taking those 15 minutes to decide after you’ve secured your shot at it. And if you decide not to buy it? Take it out of your cart—there are people on the waiting list, most likely, and it’s the courteous thing to do.
Happy Lightning-ing!
Mir-
You just made me fell better!! I was ready and waiting to try to snag the Touch yesterday and I was not successful either. I will keep looking……
Almost got tricked by Brave this morning – I thought it was the DVD for $4.99, but it was the music CD. Figured it out before I placed my order, though.
Janie, when they offer a deal as good as what they had on those 16GB Touches, I honestly believe they only have a few. Not only were we unable to get them into our carts, the wait list was full, like, instantly. I added myself to the wait list for another item to try to gauge how many folks they let on the list, and for that they said my position on the list was 500+. So my guess is that they had 10 units or something and thousands of people trying to get them.
There’s always more deals to come, though. We’ll find another one.
What’s the fastest way to refresh the deal so you can click it? If I watch the countdown, it doesn’t automatically turn into an “Add to Cart” button, which means refreshing my screen, which then means scrolling back through the items.
Is there a faster way? There’s a lightning deal coming up on Thursday that I’m *very* interested in and will be *very* popular (Skylanders Giants).
Amanda, I’ve been experimenting and I’m not sure I have an answer for you. Clicking one screen forward/back doesn’t always work for me, and the delay is longer sometimes than others if I just wait for it to refresh on its own. I’m not sure there’s a good way to “game” it; it may be random. (Also, sometimes the product page itself will give you a “add to cart at Lightning Deal price” button and other times it just says “see Lightning Deal” and takes you back to the deal window, so just reloading the product page is not necessarily the fastest route, either.)
I find some of the deals to be sketchy though. They have a cuisinart ice cream maker for $45. I bought one for $50 ten years ago. That doesn’t seem like a smoking deal to me when I know they still sell for about $50 most of the year. You really have to be careful.
Absolutely, Lucinda, that’s what I recommend pricing out items before the deal goes live—of course there are “meh” deals mixed in with the real bargains. Knowledge is power! Do your price research ahead of time, for sure.
Whew, I was kicking myself for missing the iTouch deal yesterday. Now I will stop beating myself up.