When Lisa Koivu, founder of ShopGirlDaily.com and contributor to the U.S. News Frugal Shopper blog, wants new clothes, she browses through the Poshmark app. There, sellers of gently used clothing upload items they no longer want. Users can chat with each other through the app, buy and sell items and even trade items.
Koivu recognizes that the app encourages her to spend more money than she would otherwise, since there’s always something new that catches her eye, but she also knows she can get great deals by using the app. “If the products are right there in front of you, it can be hard to resist spending money,” she says.
Koivu is not the only shopper using new online tools and apps to shop with others through virtual communities. The Mashalot app lets users share items they like with friends and leave comments. Wish makes it easy to keep tabs on and share “wish lists” of products with friends. Blinq, which sells clearance items at a steep discount, encourages shoppers to tweet about purchases and share Pinterest images. Even standard retailer sites, like Amazon, often make it easy — some say too easy — to share the purchase you just made with friends on Facebook or Twitter with one click.
Does all this social shopping add up to more unnecessary spending, or can our friends help us home in on the best deals and make smarter buying choices? The answer, according to shopping and consumer experts, is a little bit of both.
Lauren Greutman, founder of the frugal living site IamThatLady.com, likes sharing her shopping habits only when it directly benefits her own wallet. Some apps offer credits in exchange for using referral links to sign up new customers, for example. “If there’s some sort of benefit to me, like a referral credit, then I’m a lot more willing to share what I buy,” she says. She also uses the Shop Your Way app to share purchases with friends when she really likes certain products, and she uses restaurant apps when they come with free appetizers.
She’s noticed, though, that it’s easier to overspend when you’re shopping through apps. “You can buy something in two clicks from your bed. It literally feels like you’re getting something for free, even though you’re paying for it,” Greutman says. She’s also sometimes accidentally shared purchases over Facebook without intending to, because apps make it so easy to do so. “Thank goodness I wasn’t buying lingerie,” she jokes.
To protect her online security, Greutman likes using her PayPal account or a prepaid debit card to avoid giving apps access to her credit card or bank information. (The Starbucks app recently made headlines when hackers accessed users’ bank accounts through the app.)
Lynnette Rice, creator of the CleverlySimple.com savings blog, says she doesn’t use any social sharing apps because they don’t offer enough of a return. Considering the time it takes to download and use an app, she says, she wants to make sure it leads to significant savings, which she doesn’t see with social shopping apps. She’s also concerned about protecting her privacy. “Sharing with the entire world where I’m shopping with my kids is a huge concern to me,” she says.
When it comes to restaurant loyalty reward apps, another growing category, Rice is also careful to avoid spending just to rack up the points. “Most of the time I was going to visit that restaurant anyways, and so it’s a great way to save some money,” she says.
Michelle Madhok, shopping expert and founder of shefinds.com, says she sees value in shopping apps that let you easily explore and save products you like, as the Keep Shopping app does. “You can follow friends and fashion icons you admire, explore styles and then decide if you want to purchase an item or keep it for later,” she says. The Net Set app similarly makes it easy to “like” and comment on styles and receive recommendations from friends. “You can even upload your own images of a piece of clothing or inspiration item and the app will try to find something similar,” she says.
Another plus is that these social shopping apps make it easy for busy consumers to browse items during short breaks or wait to make a decision by saving it for later, she says. “It’s also nice to get feedback from friends,” she says, adding that price comparisons are also easier than ever with the search functionality.
Madhok urges shoppers using social apps to check out where items are coming from along with their price. “Many items are shipping from overseas where work conditions are poor, or the items are knockoffs,” she says. The apps might also be collecting your personal information, and you might notice an uptick in promotional emails after you download them, she warns.
The tool Blinq, which lets users purchase customer returns and excess inventory from major retailers at significant discounts, also makes it easy to share purchases through social media. On the Blinq Pinterest page, pinterest.com/blinq, the company also recently hosted an Earth Day campaign around different ways to help the Earth. (Sustainability is a large part of the tool’s goals, since it makes it easier to buy used goods instead of new ones.)
“A lot of people were sharing images around that,” says Caroline Ernst, vice president of e-commerce for Blinq and its parent company, Optoro. The company also plants a tree for each purchase made on Blinq.com, and if you tweet about that tree, it plants another one. The Pinterest page is also filled with images of positive feedback from customers about their purchases.
Koivu has discovered that friends often share more than they intend to through shopping apps. She’s been browsing products on Amazon or Target, when she suddenly receives a pop-up message that a friend also has their eye on the item, or recently purchased the item. “I think this can be an invasion of privacy, depending on what you’re purchasing,” she says. She usually lets her friends know that they can turn off the sharing feature to avoid broadcasting their purchases to others. Even social shoppers have their limits.
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The Pros and Cons of Social Shopping originally appeared on usnews.com
