Quote:
Originally Posted by rhadin
Great idea but it lacks the most important element -- the wrapper won't say Amazon. 
I've noted that with many people it matters not whether Amazon is the best option, just that Amazon is the only option they will consider -- if Amazon doesn't sell it, they won't buy it. |
Hey, its brand loyalty.
Amazon is not unique in inspiring it. Most successful companies develop it with care because it is vital to staying in business. Sony, for one, has been living almost exclusively off brand loyalty for the last decade. Apple, for another, has long depended on it to "justify" its margins. Some people only buy FORDs and others only Hondas. It's common.What else are fanboy wars about but brand loyalty?
Without brand loyalty, B&N would probably be in chapter 11 reorganization already. So don't knock it.
As for Amazon, of course some people don't even go anywhere else. That is what Prime exists for; it's a loyalty program. They get people to sign up for the shipping and offer up freebies to keep them shopping there. And, having committed to the membership fee, people will then want to maximize their return on it by using it as much as possible. It's no different than SAM'S OR COSTCO: people don't signup with either and pay the annual fee to drop in once in a while, they do it because they intend to shop there often enough to recoup the fees.
Sorry, but folks seem obsessed with Amazon as some kind of lowball discounting monster and forget there is much more to their business, to any business, that just racking up products, pricing them, and waiting for consumers to come and buy. To hear the talk, many bookstores seem to operate on a magical "stock it and they will come" model. And when consumers flock to amazon instead, they kneejerk into thinking "it's only about the prices, those dirty lowballing so's and so's" and when they clearly see it's *not* all about the prices blame the shopper for "getting hooked". Well, it's not all just about prices. It is also about convenience, ease of use, speed of fulfillment. About constantly looking for ways to get customers hooked because that is a good retailers job; to build up goodwill and loyalty to ensure repeat business. It is about service, service, service...
So Amazon does Prime, they do product subscriptions, they build a crowd-sourced review system, they do simple ebook returns, they streamline their fulfillment system by pre-positioning product at regional distribution centers.
Amazon didn't spring full-blown out of some monstruous retailing god's head, it grew out of a small garage-type operation twenty years ago. They have spent those twenty years building customer relationships for fast, reliable, and yes cheap shopping experiences.
And after twenty years some folks...a lot of folks...trust them to deliver the goods and the experience.
They own massive brand loyalty and consumer goodwill because they worked hard to get it over two decades and many of their would-be competitors don't give customer loyalty (and how to earn it) a second thought. And if you don't even try for it, you won't get it, no matter how entitled to it you may feel.
Over the years I've seen some pretty extreme cases of brand loyalty but one of the more amusing popped up last night at the Digital Reader Blog: a comment flatly stated that if the new Rowling book isn't on Amazon on release, she would just "get the free version and pay for it when it shows up at Amazon".
Now that is loyalty to scare the bejeezus off publishers.
(Much like a certain website discussed over at Teleread that offers thousand and thousands of pirate editions in epub only...flanked by purchase links to Amazon. Apparently the website operates on the premise that Kindle users will willingly pay for books they know are available for free right there.)
"It's a strange, strange world we live in, Master Jack..."
Master Jack
Four Jacks and a Jill, 1968