Ebates’ Cash-Back Button Lands On Browsers

Online cash-back shopping provider Ebates has a new way to help consumers earn free money.

The company’s cash-back button, a browser plug-in available for Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari, now tells a consumer if an online store has a cash-back option the moment they visit, CNET reported.

It provides an instant, less intrusive way of notifying online shoppers of cash-back availability.

Once installed, users link the button to an Ebates account and then proceed with browsing online as they normally would. If they land at a store or product page with a rebate available, the plug-in displays a button with the cash-back percentage.

The cash-back deal is activated upon clicking the button, which then refreshes the page and enables a customer to complete their shopping.

Earlier this year, the online cash-back service invested $8 million in Influenster, a product discovery and review platform, in a Series A round of funding.

The funds, TechCrunch reported at the time, went toward scaling Influenster’s service in order for it keep pace with its rapidly expanding user base as well as improving the platform’s ability to track the variety of products that are made available for customer review on its site and mobile app.

According to the agreement surrounding the Series A investment, Ebates VP of Strategic Alliances Ken Hirschman will join Influenster’s board of directors. The TechCrunch story posits that Ebates’ role in the further development of the product discovery platform could increase its own reach in the realm of online shopping twofold — in online reviews, as well as purchasing.

Ebates, adds the outlet, is a subsidiary of the Japanese holding corporation Rakuten, which was a lead investor in Pinterest and also has partial ownership of Viki (an entertainment service) and Viber (a messaging service).