Five Steps For Selecting the Best Gift for Your Wife

If you are looking for another article with page after page of generic gift ideas for your wife, you are in the wrong place. There are thousands of those available on the web. Most contain dozens or even hundreds of items with affiliate links to Amazon or another retailer. If you are shopping for a random gift for someone you don’t know well, they might be a good place to start. However, if you are looking for the perfect gift for your wife they are of little value.

There are few things in life as rewarding as surprising your wife with the perfect gift. If you have been married for any length of time you are aware of the subtle but noticeable difference on her face and in her voice when you give her a great gift versus an “okay” gift. Giving her a thoughtful gift that she really loves is about much more than just the gift itself. She sees it as an indication of your love for her. When you give a thoughtful, personalized gift you are showing her that you know what she likes and dislikes. It is an indication that you understand her and are listening and paying attention to her wants, needs & desires. You are showing her that she is worth the time and effort it takes to find that perfect gift.

All that being said, you are also aware of how difficult it can be to find a perfect gift every time. Between her birthday, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, your anniversary, Christmas and other ad hoc gifting occasions you are trying to find five or more great gifts for her each year. That is no easy feat. Even if you pay close attention to the hints she may give along the way you are still going to need to do a lot of ground work to find the best gift.

Knowing which gifts are at the top of her wish list is going to take a little detective work. You need to know where to look for clues. Just like a detective or private investigator you will need to use all the resources available to you. No stone should be left unturned. You may need to cultivate sources, recruit confidential informants and even execute a secret search warrant.

Not sure where to start? Don’t worry, we have you covered with the five steps to take which are guaranteed to help you find the perfect gift. With detailed instructions, including screenshots, on each step you can’t fail.

1. “Operation Pinterest”
2. “Operation Instagram”
3. “Operation Cell Phone”
4. “Operation Friends”
5. “Operation Last Resort”

Step #1 “Operation Pinterest”

You might be surprised how easy it is to find some great gift ideas from the images she has pinned in her Pinterest account. If you don’t have a Pinterest account don’t worry, it is easy and free to create one. After you have created your account you will need to find her board. Search for her name in the search bar at the top of the page. Don’t be surprised if you find a several accounts with her same name, especially if she has a popular name. You may need to click through a few accounts to find the right one. If you are still unable to find her account it is time to reach out to a source (aka. her friends) to find her account name. Be sure to tell them to keep it on the down low so she is not aware of what you are doing.

Once you have found her board start looking at her pins but don't follow her since she will get a notice which may lead to some uncomfortable questions.

The nice thing about Pinterest is you can just click on any of the images she has pinned and it will take you directly to that item on the company's website. Not all images may be gift ideas. She may have images pinned for home décor, recipes or other things. However, even those images may give you some new ideas for personalized gift she would love.

Step #2 “Operation Instagram”

If your wife is not active on Pinterest or if you didn’t find what you were looking for there, it is time to move on to the next step. There is a good chance your wife uses Instagram on a regular basis. Instagram is one of the fastest growing social networks in the world with over 1 billion monthly active users according to Statista.

Hopefully you are already on Instagram and following her account. If not you will need to create an account. It too is free and easy to do. After your account is created you will need to find her account just like you did on Pinterest. Again, don’t be afraid to reach out to her friends, your kids or other family members if you can’t find it. Hopefully when you find her account it is a public account. If so you will be able to look at her posts without following her account. Don't request to follow her account since sending a request to follow her a month before Christmas might tip your hand.

If her account is private you will not be able to see her posts. In that case you will need to ask someone who is already following her to help you out. If you have a teenager in the house you are almost guaranteed that they are already on Instagram and probably already following your wife.

Once you have access to her account you will notice that it looks a lot like Pinterest. You will see the pictures she has posted just like the image below:

Unlike Pinterest, you can’t simply click on the image to get to the product. In fact, if you double click on the image you will “Like” the photo and she will receive a notification. Don't do that. If you can’t easily tell from the image where to find the item you are going to need to do some more advanced detective work.

Google Image Search is a great tool and will be very useful here. If something catches your eye on her account grab a screen shot of the image and download it to your phone. Then go to https://images.google.com/ and click the camera to search by image instead of text.

Google will then ask you if you want to “Paste an Image URL” or “Upload an Image.” Choose the “Upload Image Option” and then select the saved screenshot from your phone. Upload your image and let Google do its thing. Within a matter of seconds you should have a list of websites with that image.

For example, when I look at this image on my wife’s Instagram page:

And then upload it in Google Image Search.

From there I just need to click one of the links to find that item on the retailer’s website. Once you do it once or twice you will be an expert. Using this tool you can quickly find the source of any of the images on her account.

Step # 3 “Operation Cell Phone”

If your wife does not use social media or you could not figure out how to get access to her accounts without her knowing, you will need to try a different tactic. Before you proceed with what we call “Operation Cell Phone” you need to make sure you are respectful of her privacy. If you think she would be offended that you were snooping on her cell phone or if you are worried what you might find when you do, you should skip this step and jump to step #4. However, if you know your wife would be okay with you doing a little snooping to find her the perfect gift then you should proceed.

What you want to do is get your hands on her cell phone or laptop when she is not using it. Maybe when she is sleeping in on the weekend or when she is in the shower. You will want to move quickly so she doesn’t catch you and ruin your surprise. Once you have access you will want to check her search history on her browser. To do that on the iPhone open up the Safari app and click on the book icon at the bottom.

Then click on the clock icon on the top of the next page:

You can then scroll through her recent search history to check for any potential gift items she has been looking at.

If she stores her Amazon password in her browser, Amazon can be another great resource for gift ideas. Simply sign into her Amazon account and click the "Browsing History" tab in the upper left corner.

You will then have access to the items she has been viewing on Amazon. Again, you need to keep in mind that she might be looking for a lot of items on Amazon or Safari that she would not want as a gift. Don’t assume that just because she has looked at paper towels on Amazon recently that she would want a giant pack of them for her birthday. Use good judgement and try to identify items that would make a great gift.

Step #4 “Operation Friends”

In the first two steps we mentioned that you may need to recruit some of her friends or your family members to help with your search. In this step friends are required. First you need to identify one or two close friends that you know well enough to ask for help. This may be couple friends you both know or her girlfriends that you don’t know quite as well. Start by reaching out to them and asking them if they know of gifts or items that your wife has mentioned that she might like. You should also ask them which gifts are on their wish list since those items may be popular with your wife as well. You might get lucky with this approach but more than likely you will need to take it a step further. You might need to ask them if they are willing to participate in a ruse to get some ideas.

Give one of her friends your budget and ask her to reach out to your wife under the pretense of needing help selecting a gift for a relative. This friend could explain to your wife that her sister-in-law is about the same age and has similar interests. Your wife might give her some great ideas for her “relative” that she would really like for herself.

Step #5 “Operation Last Resort”

If you are still reading this article I assume the first four steps did not work for you and you are still looking for a gift. At this point you are going to have to dig deep and do some real leg work. Start by making a list of all of your wife’s interests and hobbies. Think about where she spends her free time. Does she practice yoga, love reading or enjoy streaming shows on Netflix? After you have refined your list to two three interests try very targeted searches on Google. Don’t waste time with search terms like “Gifts for Women” or “The Best Gifts for Women.” Those search terms are too generic and you will spend hour after hour looking at irrelevant gifts. Use targeted, long tail search terms. For example, if your wife loves to host book club at your house and the preferred drink for her and her friends is a Pina Colada, you could do a very targeted search such as “Pina Colada Gift Box for Women.” See that search below:

You will notice with that specific term you see local results, where you can pick up the gift in person today if you have waited until the last minute, as well as national results where you can find a company that will ship the item right to your home or office. With this approach there is no need to scroll through page after page of worthless search results. You can use this same approach to any hobby or interest if you can narrow it down to a very specific search term.

If you feel that your wife would prefer jewelry or a romantic gift instead of a gift based on her hobbies or interests, you can take a similar approach. First, start paying closer attention to the jewelry she is wearing. Try to stay away from rings since finding the right size can be difficult. Instead look for a necklace or bracelet which don’t require a specific size in most occasions. Does she prefer gold or silver jewelry? Does she like a lot of bling or something more subtle? You may want to take a few minutes to dig through her jewelry box to see what she likes and what she already has. Once you have an idea on what she might like use a specific search term for that item. For example, instead of searching for “Gold Necklace” you can search for “14 kt. Gold Two Circle Necklace” and then click on “Images” in the search results to find just the items you are looking for:

The main take away from this 5^th step is to first spend some time to narrow down your gift ideas to items that would be meaningful to her and then to do very specific, targeted searches to get right to the item you want. Even if the item you select isn’t exactly what she would have purchased for herself she will appreciate that you put in the time and effort to try to find a personalized gift just for her.

The Perfect Gift Packaging

With the right tools and knowledge as well as a little time and effort you can give your wife a thoughtful, personalized gift that she will love. However, you are not done yet. You probably already know that the way the gift is presented can be as important as the gift itself. Your gift packaging should not distract from your gift. If you are going to wrap the gift yourself, take your time and make it look nice. If gift wrapping is not one of your strengths, you could ask for help from a friend or family member. Another option is to give her a gift in a decorative gift box or even better a wooden gift crate for women. These keepsake crates become an important part of the gift and something she will keep and use as home décor or storage. Imagine how surprised she will be when she sees her name or favorite saying engraved in the beautiful pine crate holding the perfect gift you selected for her. You will definitely be her gifting hero.

Gifts You Wife Will Love

You now have everything you need to find the perfect gift for your wife. These five steps work for any gifting occasion including birthdays, anniversaries, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day and her birthday. You no longer need to spend countless hours searching the web or running from store to store. If you follow these five steps, you are guaranteed to give a personalized gift she will love. If you have any other ideas or suggestions on how to find the perfect gift, please let us know in the comments below.

Not married?  Check out our Do I Need to Give My Girlfriend a Valentine's Day Gift article.