Exposing the marketing gimmicks of sales promotion

How many times have we come across that sweet deal of a lifetime on an online shop or on your friendly neighborhood retail shop and we just cannot wait to take advantage of the opportunity? I bet more times than we can possibly remember. But do these "deals" worth the money spent on them every time? I can safely answer this with a NO.

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Some of these promotions claiming discounts of 80% or more are just gimmicks to fool the unsuspecting customers into parting with hard earned cash thinking they just bought an item at a price lower than it is usually sold. It goes without saying that there are real discounts of some products done for a promotional purpose.

Here are four ways to spot and/or verify that you are not buying into a hype but getting a good deal:

• 1 Make a research to find the producer of the product and check how much they offer the same product for sale. If they are selling significantly higher than the purported promotion, there is a likelihood that the promo sales shop is selling cloned items.

• 2 For shopping days like Black Friday or its Chinese equivalence of 11-11 ( 11th November) made popular by e-commerce giant Alibaba (China's Amazon equivalent), you just have to plan ahead and pick products you want to buy like a month before the date and note its price. Chances are on that date you will meet the same price with a 50% discount sticker beside it.

• 3 Buy your product in the off season of the market rush. I found out I get better deals on products on off peak shopping periods than during the hyped discount days.

• 4 Check whether the discounted product is real.
  
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Do not get duped, go for the best do not judge by the quality of cheap fakes that are out there with ridiculous price tags, visit the genuine shops or internet shops that are authorized to sell the branded items to compare them to the ones you want.

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Thanks for reading :)