I wish that I practiced what I preach and used shopping portals with more frequency. It is always so easy for me to just go on to Amazon and get with a mere click or two exactly what I need.
However, I recently learned about a program which may make shopping in shopping portals more enticing. Cashback Monitor is a site that compares the deals from online shopping portals for extra points, miles and cash back. They feature shopping portals from the airline and hotel loyalty programs as well as flexible rewards programs like Chase Ultimate Rewards and Barclays Arrival Miles. So for example, if you purchase your contacts at 1-800-Contacts, you can easily look to see which shopping portal is giving you the most bang for your buck. The site is brilliant IMO.
I actually am going to move it to be an icon on my desktop. Maybe the next time I need to buy something online, I will have easy access to the site and use it!