For those in the know, Plastic Jungle is a prime deal machine for holiday savings.

On this morning’s Today Show, Yahoo!’s Web Life Editor, Heather Cabot, spoke with Today Show personality Natalie Morales for Today’s Tech on Digital Deal Hunting, and of course, Plastic Jungle made news.

“Gift cards: don’t pay full price!” said Heather. When Natalie was in disbelief, Heather Cabot went on: “It’s a new trend. Sites buy gift cards, validate their authenticity, then re-sell the cards at a discount. Plastic Jungle is one.”

She went on to make the point that desirable gift cards sell out on sites like Plastic Jungle fairly quickly, and that there’s a huge advantage to signing up for email alerts for your favorite retailer’s gift card offers. “You can buy a $50 gift card from Macy’s for $44. The one thing about this is that the gift cards run out really quickly. So what you want to do is go to one of these sites and actually sign up for email alerts and put in your wish list. They’ll send you an e-mail when they get those new gift cards in.”

Additional Dealmaking

Heather spoke about making lists, comparison shopping and using coupon aggregators, such as Shopping.Yahoo.com, FatWallet.com, PriceGrabber.com, and RetailMeNot.com.

Another hot savings tip: If you’re looking for a free shipping coupon, go to FreeShippingDay.com to see if your preferred retailer has a free shipping offer on the web. Free Shipping Day 2010 is Friday, December 17, when more than 1,000 participating merchants will offer free shipping with delivery by Christmas Eve in the continental United States, including those with current gift cards on offer from Plastic Jungle, such as Macy’s, Brookstone, Lands’ End, Bath & Body Works, and more.

“Really, the last day you’ll be able to take advantage of free shipping is midnight on December 18^th,” Heather said.

Good to know, and even better to save! Thanks Heather Cabot!