Amazon – A Seller’s Ecommerce Battle
In the ecommerce space there is one dominant player, Amazon. According to Bank of America, Amazon is the first stop for 60% of all online shoppers, up from 58% in 2019. Amazon has managed to stay ahead of changes in the ecommerce industry, becoming the market leader and has increased their power as the one-stop place to purchase practically anything online. As of September 2020, Amazon ranked 12th in global internet traffic engagement. With the coronavirus pandemic, brick and mortar stores have shuttered as customers have shifted to making purchases online, further fueling growth and cementing Amazon’s lead as the dominant ecommerce retailer.
How did Amazon become so successful? Their focus on customer service, execution, shipping speed, diversification, and user experience excellence have all propelled the company’s success.
Customer Service - Amazon’s mission is to be Earth’s most customer-centric company. Their Customer Service team is focused on preventing and solving problems for customers, from designing and developing self-service technologies, building and managing products and programs, to interacting directly with customers. They are constantly innovating to raise the bar on customer service.
Execution - Amazon gets everything right when filling customer orders. They select products and services that customers want and need—and leverage distribution centers across the globe that allow them to quickly ship products.
Shipping speed - With Prime Delivery, customers coast-to-coast can get more than 10 million items delivered next day with no minimum purchase. In select markets, free same-day delivery is available on millions of best sellers and everyday essentials.
Diversification - What began as an online bookstore in 1995, Amazon now offers almost everything practically imaginable. By continuously diversifying its offerings, including its purchase of Whole Foods Markets in 2017 for $13.7 billion, Amazon is continuously pushing reach and relevance.
User Experience - Amazon’s strong UX makes it easy for e-commerce customers to find what they are looking for and move further down the conversion funnel, resulting in more sales.
With its extensive reach, ecommerce retailers want and need to be a part of the millions of sellers represented on Amazon. Given Amazon’s dominance, small and medium-sized retailers are at the mercy of Amazon when it comes to selling products on their platform. It is a necessary evil to sell on the platform. Amazon can list products, but if sellers are unable to advertise or promote their products on the platform, they can become lost in the thousands of results that delivered when customers search on Amazon.com. Listing products on Amazon is just the first step, retailers need to gain traction with the site and its algorithms and gain search visibility and customer engagement through purchases to make it in the Amazon world.
In addition to the need to gain visibility on Amazon, sellers know the pains and necessity of working with the ecommerce behemoth. Not only can working in and with Amazon be frustrating for small and medium sized businesses, but it’s also challenging to talk with different teams/units/departments within the ecommerce giant in order to get anything accomplished and move business forward. Contacts change often with new internal contacts not having the knowledge of what the prior representative did. This frustrating cycle of continually educating and re-educating contacts about our business, needs, and what was already done for us keeps small companies down and does not allow them to fully maximize their potential on and with Amazon.
With the continued emphasis on ecommerce because of the global COVID-19 pandemic, it is more important than ever for retailers to be successful online and with selling on Amazon. At LumberUnion, we create quality clothing for the new modern American. Visit our website and see which one of our made-in-America organic cotton pieces catches your eye. We are American cotton. American craftsmanship. Guaranteed for a lifetime.