Whenever I talk about Bitcoin, one of the most common questions I get asked is:
- How do I use Bitcoins?
In 2017, there are plenty of ways you can use Bitcoin.
You can use it to buy things (like you would with “traditional” money), and you can use it to make money (i.e. investing).
Today, I’m sharing a detailed tutorial that will help you to purchase products from Amazon using bitcoins & also help you save up to 25%.
You can do this with Purse.io.
Purse is a popular tool used for many things:
- Exchange Amazon gift cards for bitcoins.
- Purchase products from Amazon using bitcoins.
- Get discounts on purchases from Amazon.
In the past, I have used Purse.io to earn bitcoins in exchange for Amazon gift cards.
In this tutorial, I will show you how to use Purse to order any product from Amazon & save money. The only thing that you need to have with you are your bitcoins. If you don’t own bitcoins yet, you can purchase them from one of these places:
- India: Unocoin, Coinsecure, Zebpay
- USA: CoinBase, GoCelery
- Europ: Cex.io, Bitstamp, Bitbay
- Nigeria: Naireax
- China: BTCC
You can also buy bitcoins anonymously using Localbitcoins. (Here is a tutorial on how to do that.)
Backstory
Before we move to the serious part (the tutorial), let me quickly share a story about my phone.
I was using a OnePlus 3 phone for the past few months, and I was pretty happy with the overall performance & value for the money.
During the 2nd week of January 2017, I visited the USA to give a talk at Affiliate Summit West. Well, at LAX (the Los Angeles airport) I got pick-pocketed! Luckily, the only thing that I lost was my phone. I used Android Remote Manager and deleted all the sensitive data.
However, I still needed another phone. So, instead of directly buying one, I decided to order a new phone using Purse.io (and save myself a significant amount of money). I’m creating this tutorial as I purchase this new phone. I’m making this guide so that in the future, you can also save money with this method.
For this tutorial, I’ll be putting in an order for a new OnePlus 3T mobile phone which retails for INR 29,999 ($440).
How To Save Money On ALL Amazon Purchases Using Bitcoins:
If you haven’t yet created an account on Purse, go ahead and create one right now.
What I like about them is they are user-friendly for first-timers, and they’re very active on social media.
Make sure you verify your account using Google Plus or Facebook for an additional 10% to 15% discount.
- Note: After your first successful transaction, you can get a discount of up to 33%.
A little more about Purse: Purse is an escrow service that connects Amazon gift card holders with users who want to purchase stuff on Amazon. In a majority of cases, users with unused Amazon gift vouchers want to get rid of their cards & Purse offers them a great opportunity to exchange them for bitcoins. To offer this service, Purse uses the “Wish List” feature of Amazon.
In their own words:
“Amazon gift cards are uniquely abundant and illiquid, which has led to insane demand to liquidate these cards even at premiums of 15-25%, and Purse is the only path to liquidity. Shoppers spend bitcoins for products and Earners trade Amazon gift cards for bitcoins. Purse acts as the escrow agent (or trusted third party) and verifies purchases, shipments and deliveries. Bitcoin is required for these transactions, because credit cards and PayPal are incompatible with Purse’s blockchain escrows. All payments on Purse are escrowed (or held with a trusted third party) providing protection for consumers as the merchants are not paid until the products arrive.”
This solves two purposes:
- Amazon gift card holders get something of value for their unwanted gift cards.
- Buyers get to purchase stuff at discounted prices from Amazon.
I know it may not be clear right now, but trust me, follow this tutorial and I will help you save a lot of money. You regular Amazon buyers will thank me for this tutorial!
- Head over to Purse.io & create an account.
- Once you are logged in, click on “Name Your Discount”.
You can use it to order stuff from any Amazon site. The majority of their audience comes from Amazon.com, but in my case, I will be ordering from Amazon.in.
- The next thing we need to do is go to the Amazon product page & click on “Add to Wish List”.
- Create a public wish list & add whatever you want to purchase through Purse onto that list.
- You can access your wish list anytime by clicking on your name (top right) > “Your Wish List”.
- Now, click on “List settings”.
- Find the correct wish list and click on “View details”.
- (Official Purse guide here)
On this page:
- Fill out the “Delivery/Shipping Address” section with your address.
- Make sure that “Third party shipping agreement” is checked.
- Make sure that “Don’t spoil my surprises” is unchecked.
- Click on “Save Changes”.
- Now, go back to your name (top right), and click on “Your Wishlist”.
- Click on “Share” to get the shareable link. (See screenshot below.)
That’s it. All we needed from Amazon was the wish list share link, and we can now proceed to the final step on Purse.
Placing An Order & Adding Bitcoin On Purse
Once you have the shareable link for your wish list, simply go back to Purse.io & paste the shareable link into the search bar. Hit the Enter button.
- Now, use the slider to set how much of a discount you are looking for. (Purse will automatically recommend the best price based on market conditions.)
- Once you are satisfied with your price, simply click on “Place Order”.
After you place your order, you need to deposit the funds into your Purse Bitcoin wallet.
The next page will show a QR code, or you can copy down the Bitcoin address and transfer the funds there.
Once you fund your deposit, you will have successfully placed your order!
Upon confirming your deposit, your listing will be available for the public to accept.
Depending on the country you are in, it can take up to a few hours (or even a few days) for your order to complete. This is one reason why I usually recommend not to place time sensitive orders. If you really need to get your order completed fast, lower down the discount amount.
Here’s what a successfully completed order looks like:
I will update you as soon as my order gets fulfilled. Meanwhile, here are a few interesting & important things you should know about Purse:
- Using Purse, you can also place instant orders using Bitcoin. You will save around 5% with this method (currently only works for US addresses).
- Purse has mobile apps for iOS (download now) & Android (download now).
I will do another guide on how to exchange Amazon gift cards for bitcoins in the coming days. For now, the above tutorial will help you to save a ton of money on Amazon purchases.
Conclusion: Is Purse useful for an Amazon shopper?
Apps like Purse.io are putting Bitcoin to good use & paving the way for end users like you & me who want to save money while using our bitcoins.
In many countries, this app is already very popular among Amazon shoppers who want to save money on shopping while helping other users sell their unwanted gift cards for bitcoins.
But it’s going to take time to become mainstream because Bitcoin is still very new. Only a handful of smart, techy users are using Bitcoin.
If you haven’t yet started using Bitcoin yet, I would suggest you start. You can follow my CoinSutra blog to learn more about Bitcoin.
Personally, I find this tool to be highly useful. Whenever you are shopping for anything which is not time sensitive, Purse should be your go-to website for Amazon shopping.
