Amazon is easily the world largest marketplace in the whole world today. You can buy almost anything on there. but when it started out in 1995, Jeff Bezos had an idea to make an online book store only. How did Amazon start out, what where its flops like the fire Phone and successes like Kindly Table? I explain the whole story in this my Article. Learn hoe Amazon became one of the most valuable companies in the world today.
- Hello Friends, In the year 1994 Jeff Bezos left his cushy investment banking job to work on his startup. Internet was blowing up at the time. So he got the idea of doing something internet-related. Of creating an online store, to sell books! What should he call this online store? He thing of the first name (cadabra) from Abra-Cadabra.This name was so weird that, when he started using this name then his lawyers questioned the name. When they called up customers they customers often didn't recognize or understand the name of the company. They him that the name has to be change, so Jeff Bezos started thinking about other names. He registered several domain names (awake.com, browse.com, bookmall.com, ) Because it was supposed to be an online bookstore, he thought of Bookmall. relentless.com in fact , this is the domain name that still redirect to Amazon.com when you type in this website on your browser. But finally settled on the name Amazon, because Amazon is the largest rainforest in the world, and the Amazon River is the largest river in the world. He wanted the Amazon company he built to be the largest Bookstore in the world.
- If we fast forward to 25 years into the future, Today Amazon is not only the largest bookstore in the world but also is the largest online store for buying just about anything.
- Prime video - is of the largest OTT platforms.
- Amazon Web Services (aws) - is number 1 in its field.
- Amazon Alexa
- Amazon Kindle
- Amazon Drive
- Amazon Music
- Amazon Audible
- Amazon Pay
- Amazon Fresh - Amazon has even started delivering groceries in some countries .(At the point, Amazon had tried to launch their phone called Amazon Fire.) Though that turned out to be a flop idea.
But today, Amazon has become so successful not only as an online store rather as a company spread over soo many sectors.
- How was it possible ?
- What is the Business Model of Amazon ?
- The idea of Amazon was quite simple right from the start. But it was a unique idea for its time to create a online bookstore. At the time people had to go to physical bookstore to buy books. Why not let people buy book online through a website on the internet initially Amazon's website was a only bookselling website, the advantage of selling books online was that customers could access thousands of books on a single website. A very basic practical and convenient idea One that people needed. Right from the beginning, even as a startup .Amazon was a successful company.
- The website was launched in 1995 And by December 1996, they had amassed a customer base of 180,000.
- 1997 they revenue had reached $148 million.
- At the point in time Jeff decided that he didn't want Amazon to remain a private company, Instead he wanted to list it as a public company in the stock market, so that the company could access more funds to grow.
- In 1997 Amazon became a public company
- And by 1998 Amazon's revenue had reached $600 million.
- They are said to be two main reasons behind Amazon's success, (First) Amazon was offering a hug convenience to the customers, and at the there were next to no companies, that was offering the same service as a competitor. (Second) is something that's called the Flywheel Effect. A flywheel is basically a spinning wheel, it keeps spinning evenly even when faced with changes in external conditions, Amazon's business model had become like a flywheel by then, They sold book at lower prices and millions of book were available in their online store so the customers had a positive experience since the customers were happy it drew more customers to their website and because more customers were joining their website the seller of the books, especially the third-party commission-based sellers wanted to join Amazon to sell their books because they could see the large number of customers it had so more and more sellers listed their books on Amazon leading to more options of book to buy on Amazon for the customers. So it had become a wheel that was being pushed in the same directions twice and increasing the rotational speed
- When Amazon earned more profits Amazon used that money to improve their website, and to improve the customer experience as well as keeping the cost low. Because this was a game of low costs. When books were being sold at low prices more customers and sellers would use their services. And the nice Business Model was create.
In 1998, Bezos Thought
if using the same strategy to sell not only books, but to sell computer game and music also.
In 1998 Amazon expanded their business in addition to books, they were also selling computer game and music on their website. It saw unprecedented success to such an extent that in 1999 Time magazine's Person of the Year was Jeff Bezos.
His photo was printed on the front page.
- One Click Button
- with time Amazon adopted many ideas big and small driving forward the growth of the company. One of these ideas was "one click button" When you shop on Amazon you would've seen this an option Add to Cart and below it there's the option Buy Now with 1-Click, with one button you can buy the product and get them delivered, And it was so successful.
- Jeff Bezos skills ?
- How Jeff Bezos had the knowledge of computer of science beforehand
- While working at the investment bank (he had an idea of the potential of the internet
- Amazon Marketplace
- In 2000, the Amazon Marketplace was launched. Jeff didn't want to be limited to books and games, he wanted everything to be sold on Amazon.
- aws (Amazon Web Services)
- He create their own data storage facility.
- This business was so successful for Amazon. That currently this is the highest profitable business that Amazon is involved in.
- 40% of the profitability of Amazon is from AWS. (Amazon Web Services)
- Most of the top companied in the world who have an online presence (Netflix, Pinterest, Twitch, LinkedIn, Facebook,) use Amazon Web Services to store their data.
- 2007 He Was Launched Kindle (e-reader)
- He was tell that books could now be read digitally as well as physically.
- Jeff Bezos decided that Kindle would be a zero-profit device. But the books that could on Kindle had to be bought on Amazon bookstore.
- This business strategy was very successful too. Many people started buying it and today Kindle is the world's number one e-Book Reader.
Amazon could become a $1.6 trillion company. This was Amazon interesting story.