I’m starting a new post series called “Things Twitter helped me discover” to highlight all of the great sites and other things that I find out about on twitter.

The first is Smarty Pig. Smarty Pig is a savings account with social aspects. This all started when I asked twitter if there was a way for me to save for specific goals and let other people also donate money towards those goals. Sure there were things like ChipIn, but that was only to show progress in collecting money, I wanted to also show my own savings progress. So someone suggested I check out Smarty Pig.

When you create a Smarty Pig account, you are actually opening a real FDIC insured savings account that has a 2.01% APY. Then within that account, you set up specific savings goals. That can be a family vacation, college savings for your children, or maybe just something you want to splurge on.

You set up these savings goals and choose how often you want to contribute to that goal, and how much. This was perfect for me because it allowed me to take out an amount from my check each week to save for rent, and then at the end of the month, I had my rent money without even thinking about it.

Next you can choose if you want to make the goal public or private. Certain goals like my rent, I kept private. But for other things, like my trip to SXSW, I can keep it public so that my friends and family can help me save too.

Once you reach your savings goal you have a few options. You can have the money deposited back into your checking account, Smarty Pig can send you a debt card with your savings, or you can choose to receive up to a 12% cash boost on your savings by placing it on a retail card like Amazon.com, Best Buy, Travelocity or Macy’s. You can even spilt your savings among the three, to find the best option for you.

You can add widgets for your facebook or blog so that all of your friends can help you save. I put one in my blog footer.