Tricks to Get the Most Out of Amazon Prime
Here are some secrets from Tech Talker that will help you take advantage of your Amazon Prime account.
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Tricks to Get the Most Out of Amazon Prime
I’m going to go out on a limb and say that chances are you or someone you know has an Amazon Prime account. Whether you have one, or have considered getting an account, there are some unknown perks that almost no Amazon Prime users take advantage of. Even at a price of $99, Amazon is made more worthwhile if you know the hidden secrets of the services.
The most well-known and useful feature of having an Amazon Prime account is most definitely its free 2-day shipping. Almost everything on Amazon is just two days away from your house—Amazon even delivers on Sundays.
OK, so that’s the most well-known feature of Amazon Prime. Let’s talk about the lesser known perks that are available.
Sharing Your Amazon Prime
Back in the good ole days (before Summer 2015), you used to be able to share your Amazon Prime perks with up to four other people. All you had to do was type another user’s email and birthday, and once they accepted the invitation, they had a full Amazon Prime account, separate from yours at no additional charge. This was intended for use with families with different accounts, but was abused pretty heavily according to anecdotal evidence.
Because That feature has been cut back significantly. Now you are only allowed one other free Prime account in your household. This is still helpful because you can have multiple accounts in order to keep gifts secret, and preferences unique for each person. The rules appear to still be evolving.
But there’s a catch: if you took advantage of adding four users before Amazon restricted that function, they have left all remaining users on the account. However if you make a change to those users you will not be able to re-add a previous user, or add a new user.
Prime Pantry
If going to the store is difficult for you, you shop for an office snack bar, or you just want to save time Amazon has “Prime Pantry.” The way that it works is that you can shop for normal household goods, such as bathroom supplies, food, cleaning supplies, and more.
For $6, you can have an entire box sent of things you pick out. Each box can weigh up to 45 lbs before it is considered full, and you’ll get it super quick. The idea here is that you can get normal household items you would normally not be able to get on prime delivered directly to your door.
My office uses this feature so that our snack and drink fridge is never empty, and it’s great for people who find it difficult to get to the store.
Unlimited Photo Storage
Nowadays, who doesn’t take tons of photos? With a smartphone, it’s easy to take hundreds, if not thousands, of pictures a month. With an Amazon Prime account, you can download their photo app, and then back up all of your pictures from your device for free. They have a desktop program as well that allows for a pretty seamless syncing experience, with unlimited storage.
They will let you upload an unlimited amount of pictures. That could be your entire photo collection, and all of your baby pictures, for nothing more than you already paid for your Prime account!
That’s a pretty great deal if you’re looking for a good free place to keep an offline copy of your pictures!
Prime Video and Music
Now if you have Netflix, Hulu, Spotify, or Apple Music, there’s a chance that you can cut those subscriptions and just stick with Amazon Music and Amazon Instant Video. Again, both of these are free with Amazon Prime, and they allow you to have unlimited free streaming music of which they boast over 1 million songs.
On Amazon Instant Video, you can watch a ton of movies and videos streamed to any number of devices. I’ve used both of these services with my Prime account and found a few things from my experiences. One downside, however, is that they don’t seem to have near the selection that I’ve seen from Google Music or Spotify.
However, if you already have an Amazon Prime account, this is definitely something you worth a look, so you can see how much of the streaming video and music that you consume is available without purchasing Netflix, Hulu, Spotify, or any other similar providers..
The reason I bring this up is because if you cut a single online account for $10/month and substitute it with Amazon Prime, then you have essentially paid for your Amazon Prime account with the savings alone.
Amazon Lightning Deals
If you haven’t heard of Amazon Lightning Deals, I wouldn’t be surprised. This is an awesome, but little known part of Amazon that could save you a ton of money. These are deals that come up very quickly, and disappear once stock is gone. They could be anything, and the amount of savings can vary greatly.
If you’re an Amazon Prime member, you get a 30-minute head start on the deals, which could easily be the difference between a product you want being sold out or in stock.
Bonus: Amazon Smile
Now last but not least is something that doesn’t require you to have Amazon Prime at all. I’ve decided since we are in the spirit of Amazon that I would throw this bonus tip in the mix. Amazon has a special portion of its site called Amazon Smile, which donates .5% of whatever you buy to a charity of your choice.
This doesn’t add anything to the cost of the item that you’re buying and it’s a great and easy way to support a charitable foundation. All you have to do is visit www.smile.amazon.com , select the charity you would like to support and then go shopping!
Well, that’s it for today! Be sure to check out all my earlier episodes at techtalker.quickanddirtytips.com. And if you have further questions about this podcast or want to make a suggestion for a future episode, post them on Facebook QDTtechtalker.
Until next time, I’m the Tech Talker, keeping technology simple!
Image courtesy of Shutterstock.
