5 free pieces of advice to Amazon, from a very unhappy customer
I consider myself a “power buyer” on Amazon – having ordered and read for the last decade or so between 20 and 30 books every year, for sums of money far from negligible, at least to me.
This being said, I’ve never been more unhappy about my experience as a customer. Here are 5 free pieces of advice from too faithful a customer:
- The company pretends to invest millions in its customer relationship management systems, but why on Earth Amazon never implemented any Fidelity / membership program? Even the worse companies in the world, customer service-wise (yes you’ve recognized them, I’m talking of airlines), have membership /faithfulness programs. I would be delighted to gain some travel miles or free mp3 as a reward for being a long time customer.
- Books purchased via the one-click purchase button should be automatically removed from one’s automatic recommendations, wish list & shopping cart. Why would you want to recommend a book already acquired and shipped to the actual same customer in the past? Today, you face a high risk of ordering a book twice because of that.
- Amazon seems to consider that none can purchase a book anywhere else than on their store. I think users should be granted with the possibility to mark a book as already acquired (somewhere else), either on Amazon (they should make this automatic though, but I’m so desperate…) or elsewhere.
- Even worse, when these books are already in the shopping cart (or mention “In your shopping cart” already), that is to say between my wallet and Amazon’s and their warehouse and my shelves, Amazon still finds ways to recommend them. Don’t they think I already know the book if it’s included in either my shopping cart or my wishlist?
- This one is more a back office thing. But aren’t you guys all about dematerializing the bookshopping experience? So why can’t I find ‘.pdf’ed invoices in my “account info” space? I still need to keep these blue bills for ages: I know you legally have to send these, but why don’t you help us get rid of the tons of paper we receive.
And I’m not even mentioning transnational use of Amazon (if you acquire a book on Amazon.com rather than on Amazon.yourcountry login in with the same email address, it’s not removed from your country’s wishlist) or the interface here. Or… let’s mention it before we leave the floor: Amazon’s interface wasn’t so much more convenient back in 1997 or so than it is today. I’m surprised because every engineer from Amazon I’ve met was super bright, but if I were an e-Commerce entrepreneur today I would definitely embrace rich media and video category marketing as a paradigm to set a new user experience standard.
To everyone: as you will have understood, I’m not so happy with my experience as a customer on Amazon. Any alternative?
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You are so right in many ways! It’s a huge pity for me that I can’t buy french books with my german amazon account. I would have to create a new one with Amazon France! Isn’t that stupid?
Although my german account allows me to buy american books on Amazon and to get them shipped from the United States to good old Germany – there is no chance with french books. Did Jeff Bezos ever hear something about the European Union? And our single currency?
Well, at least you two have Amazon.yourcountry.
Jeremy, I totally agree with on you with 2 – 4. Those make it hard for some one like me who collects a huge list on wish list and then one day might buy some from that “backlist”. 1 and 5 are more like nice-to-haves for me.
I don’t mind that Amazon tries to always offer the hardcover edition, but trying to offer another edition when I’ve already bought it one? Seriously?
Matthias, it looks like Amazon has heard of EU and its advantages. If I remember correclty, some of my shipments have originated from Germany even though I shopped at .co.uk. So, there’s definetly a possibility in theory of Single European Amazon (like SEiTunes). There seems to be some reasons these big US companies don’t like that idea, though.
Just move to http://www.u-lik.com
Amazon is a delivery company… less and less a website.
I agree with you jeremy on many points and if it was a bad day i would have probably added at least 5 more bullet point.
la dernière blague c’est bezos qui me demande de signer une petition http://tinyurl.com/22ecv6
Hi Jérémy,
Some of the things you are describing are already implemented on Amazon.com (owning a book, fidelity program with Amazon Prime).
I think you are too much used to Amazon… the competitors still have a lot to do to reach Amazon’s level
Concerning Video & rich media, the problem is cost. How do you pay the video or the 3D visualization of a product ? Margins are still very low and it’s not easy to have a large catalog and lots of content & rich media.
Hello,
(Great subject )
Jeremy maybe you have just mentioned a paradox even though you are not exactly emphasizing on the antithesis: even without a commercially overwhelming fidelity program, Amazon’s success was largely based on somehow loyal customers : its community of buyers (transforming its value and function in e-commerce).
So maybe there is a fidelity mechanism, thus more discrete, that not only fidelized but even employed clients as advertisers.
Nobody’s perfect everywhere:maybe Amazon focused Innovation (CRM+techno: search inside), Logistics and Legal processes with competitors and artists (http://www.amazon-noir.com/index0000.html) leaving clear-minded customers a sense of disappointment to be covered through other forms of book exchange (http://bookmooch.com/)
Greetings!
Hey Thomas!
- Amazon Prime as you say only runs on Amazon.com, which is a shame because I happen to be a global customer of, supposedly, a global company.
- As far as video is concerned, I don’t see cost as an entry barrier: authors would just be delighted to present their products themselves, so would be readers when reviewing books.
Margins are low so enrich the user experience, make it a truly compelling experience and increase the ARPU rather than facing the risk of losing customers like me.
Amazon’s ONLY competitive advantage is price: Amazon makes sure it offers the lowest prices on the market, which ensures customer lock-in. Until when?
Hey Georgia,
Nice to see you here. I tend to agree with you, Amazon’s operational (logistics, PO management, procurement, shipping, etc.) capabilities are just stunning.
On the ‘community effect’ lock-in though, I don’t think Amazon’s community is quite as close to matching the power of the eBay community, for instance.
Jérémy > About the 1), you can’t have this in France if it applies to books because of the Lang law. Free shipping is already in trouble, so giving anything would definitely be an important legal issue.
Actually I could explain this for the other readers: in order to protect the small libraries, it is forbidden in France to sell a (new) book less than 95% of the official price. Of course, you can’t either sell it 95% of the price and give any kind of payback. Amazon and others have just been found guilty of disrespect of this legislation with their free shipping. Since they are already selling books with a 5% discount rate, they can’t to anything for the good customers (except apply this discount only to them, as the Fnac is doing).
Hello Chris,
Thanks very much for your very clear explanation: I didn’t know about Lang’s law – actually, I heard about it recently when I signed Bezos’s petition leafar is pointing to above in the comments. But that’s it.
Thanks again for the fish.