Earn cash back while shopping online during Cyber Monday

CLEVELAND - Cyber Monday is a busy shopping day online. While there are a lot of sales on this day, there are ways to save even more and even earn cash back. This sounds too good to be true, but it's true.

Before you start your shopping, make sure you reduce your digital footprint by browsing privately. You can find the private browsing options in the tools or safety tab at the top of your browser. This will prevent private information like your credit or debit card from ending up in the public domain.

Click here to learn how to set your browser to private mode in Google , Firefox , Internet Explorer and Safari .

Earn cash while shopping online

I always start my shopping trip at Ebates . It's a site that partners with more than 1,200 businesses and pays you cash back if you shop at the partner businesses. If I want to shop at Macy's, I go to Ebates and link to the Macy's site through Ebates. On the day I checked, Ebates was offering 5 percent cash back for your total purchase price.

Ebates doesn't pay you right away, but those checks arrive. I am a casual online shopper and received more than $50 from Ebates just this year.

If you're a private person this may not be for you, because the company knows what you purchased.

If Ebates is not for you, how about saving money on shipping and the purchase price? Go to a search engine and type in the name of a store and the words promotional code or free shipping to find codes to save money.

Free shipping day

If you can't find a good deal for your favorite retailer, it may pay to wait. On Friday, December 16, more than 1,200 stores will offer free shipping.

There are a lot of ways to save on your holiday shopping. You just have to look.