6 Tips To Avoid Impulse Purchases On Amazon Prime Day

There’s a good chance you’ve already come across marketing around Amazon Prime Day. The popular two-day sales event takes place July 12 and 13 this year, and while some consumers may have already planned out exactly what they want to buy, there’s a whole other customer base that knows they’ll be making impulse purchases the day of.

While making one or two impulse buys where you can score a good deal may certainly feel “worth it,” this type of shopping behavior can easily lead to overspending and buying things you don’t really need — especially when it’s so easy to just click and purchase.

To best prepare you and your wallet for Prime Day madness, Select spoke with financial and behavioral experts to learn a few tips and mental tricks that’ll keep you from making too many impulse purchases.

“Prime Day is such a risk because it creates a sense of urgency,” Lauren Anastasio, certified financial planner and director of financial advice at Stash, a popular investing app, tells Select. “In reality, you should be taking your time.”

Anastasio suggests considering how you would feel about the purchase in a month. If you can look ahead and imagine the expense meaningfully impacting your life, it’s probably worth it. However, if you anticipate any buyer’s remorse because you wish you had saved the money or spent it more wisely, it’s best to refrain. If you were to check your bank statement and see that charge, contemplate how you’d feel about it.

Perry Wright, a senior behavioral researcher at Duke University’s Common Cents Lab, wants consumers to also take a pause and think about why certain products are on sale.

According to Perry, illusions of forced choice and scarcity normalize us feeling as if we’re being savvy consumers by taking advantage of Prime Day deals, but the heavily discounted items we see may in fact just be the result of supply forces. For example, a tech gadget we’re currently lacking can seem enticing, yet it might only be discounted because of an upcoming hardware update.

Target Deal Days, for example, is an online-only sales event that happens to be running July 11–13 this year, and customers can score deep discounts on everything from electronics, toys and beauty to home goods, apparel and groceries.

Dan Egan, managing director of behavioral finance and investing at Betterment, a popular robo-advisor app, recommends setting limits beforehand, including both a dollar amount and a quantifiable item amount, come Prime Day. Even if this limit is self-imposed, it can successfully trick you into staying within your budget.

According to Wright, Amazon Prime Day is best described as a “sushi conveyor belt of items” that is sometimes distracting and difficult to sift through.

Since the abundance of discounted items can be overwhelming to those who visit Amazon.com on Prime Day, make sure you’re logging on with a purpose.

Know exactly what you want to type into the search bar rather than browsing through random departments you never intended to shop in — this can look like searching a general category such as “snacks” vs. searching for more specifically, as in “savory snacks in bulk.”

To try to stay on track with what you plan to purchase, Egan recommends turning off Amazon notifications from appearing on your phone so you aren’t tempted to buy anything else.

Anastasio also warns of purchases that catch your eye just because of creative marketing. “If people avoid the marketing, unsubscribe from the emails and avoid social media, chances are the actual purchase traffic on Prime Day would plummet,” Anastasio says.

When you’re ready to make a Prime Day purchase you’ve prepared for, consider using a top credit card for all your Amazon Prime Day shopping. Also, remember that you have to be an Amazon Prime member to be eligible for Prime Day sales. If you aren’t currently a Prime member, there are ways to get a membership at a discount, or even for free.

For avid Amazon shoppers and Prime members, the Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature Card is currently offering a limited-time welcome bonus now through July 29. New cardholders can earn a $200 Amazon gift card immediately after approval and can earn up to a whopping 10% cash back on specially-marked Amazon products, with rotating items and categories, among other cash-back perks.

For flat-rate cash back rewards on all other spending, the Citi® Double Cash Card makes a good addition to anyone’s wallet, with 2% cash back — that’s 1% cash back on all eligible purchases plus an additional 1% cash back once your credit card bill is paid.

Information about the Amazon Prime Rewards Visa Signature Card has been collected independently by Select and has not been reviewed or provided by the issuer prior to publication; if you purchase something through Select links, we may earn a commission.