Online Shopping Tips
Online Shopping Tips: Secure Shopping Year-Round
Online shopping offers convenience, speed, and cost-effectiveness, but it's not without its risks. From scams to subpar products and deceitful sales tactics, the digital marketplace is a cautionary tale. But whether you're shopping for the holidays or your everyday needs, you can achieve hassle-free online shopping by following these few tips.
Read Reviews
As a small business owner, I can attest that not every purchaser will write a review. But if there are reviews on the product you’re interested in purchasing, you should read them starting with the most recent. However, reviews shouldn’t be the first and last step in your investigation.
Verify the Brand’s Website
Have you ever seen a product severely marked down, purchased it, and then realized the brand doesn’t actually exist anywhere but on discounted sites like Groupon and Walmart Marketplace by a random third party? You took the bait, and you’re not alone. Budget shoppers are always looking for a deal and don’t want to miss out when they think they’ve found one.
Before you start purchasing every item marked down 70%, see if the company has a web presence. All reputable brands should have their own website.
Since it’s easier than ever to create a legitimate-looking website, click through and read important pages like Contact, FAQ, About, Return Policy, etc. If anything looks remotely suspicious, I wouldn’t trust the products or the value they’ve assigned to them that they’ve so “graciously” marked down.
3. Social Media Matters
Check to see if they have social media accounts, primarily Instagram. E-commerce sites utilize social media to build their brand and market their merchandise. Please note a social media account with a small number of followers could just mean it’s a small business. Unless you purchase followers, growing an online presence takes a lot of time and strategy. Companies who purchase followers will most likely have questionable engagement with their content, e.g. 56k followers and 3 likes on a photo.
4. Pay Attention to Estimated Shipping
Products made in the US don’t take weeks to be delivered to another American address. Companies like Boohoo, TEMU, and Shein, which are growing more and more popular by the day, are often shipping products from overseas. This is important to pay attention to if you have to return something. Donating an item or regifting it is a lot cheaper than mailing it back to London.
5. Check for Warranties and Guarantees
Reputable companies usually come with some sort of warranty on their products. Before you make the purchase, double check that a reasonable warranty or guarantee is in place.
6. Price Match
The best thing about online shopping is being able to search for the best price with a simple click. It’s as easy as copying and pasting the product name into the search bar. When determining which company to purchase your beloved item from, you should consider
Cost of shipping
Arrival time
Discounts for joining the marketing list
In addition to checking the prices, consider if the particular company is always having a sale. That’s a red flag since quality items are not frequently discounted.
7. Know the Materials
When purchasing clothes, materials such as polyester, rayon, and spandex are considerably cheaper than cotton. A polyester shirt could last one year or a week depending on how it’s manufactured. Fast fashion is mass produced, cheap, and trendy but it won’t take long before it rips, shrinks, or pills.
8. Shop Securely
Websites that take payments should be secure, meaning their web address should start with https. Https means the site is encrypted and has a higher level of security than http.
Online shopping should be fun, but unfortunately there are some risks that can make it a bit stressful. Let Knomi Kado take the stress off your plate. If you want to receive (or send) an amazing gift but don’t know where to begin, know you can trust our small business. We are a surprise gift concierge specializing in curating one-of-a-kind gift sets based on your preferences and budget.