Today, Amazon is the industry standard to which all other on eCommerce sites are measured against.
The Amazon strategy is to not only create the best online shopping experience, but to make it a better experience then shopping in a physical store. Amazon upped the game by eliminating most of the issues associated with shopping bout online and offline: Ease of returns, free shipping and product reviews that inform customers prior to purchase.
This has impacted many traditional retailers and other sites, although traditional retailers seem to be waking up and competing, as seen by the emergence of WalMart.com and Target.com. But many of these retailers and online competitors are struggling and are thinking like the old Tareyton cigarette commercial “I’d rather fight than switch!” But instead of fighting against them, how can you leverage what Amazon has to offer and even the playing field?
There are a few things brands can do to leverage the power of this behemoth for improved sales in across all their channels.
Use Amazon to “power” your Brand
The first thing to do is to narrow what you and your distributors sell on Amazon. Only have your most iconic product on Amazon…leveraging their marketing influence to grow your brand recognition. This way you are controlling the narrative, not Amazon
Create Amazon specific advertising on the pages where your project is exhibited to make you stand out from the crowd and pull traffic from them to your site.
Create Brand Loyalty by leveraging one of Amazon’s greatest weaknesses
While Amazon has done an amazing job of creating a friction-less buying experience, they have no loyalty programs.
Incentivize consumers to come to you or your distributors sites by creating a loyalty program that provides loyalty points, discounts or special, one of a kind gifts only available through buying from your chosen sites.
Studies show that people prefer to buy directly from brands they are loyal to, and an incentive program can encourage them to…
By-pass Amazon altogether and use your site exclusively for your products
The best way to encourage customers to do this is to offer things they won’t get on Amazon. Offer price matching or discounts not available anywhere else after they are in the shopping cart. This way your MAP is upheld and there is no incentive for other sites to lower MAP on your products.
Another turn off for consumers is making them enter all their information and join your site when they are just browsing. Let them do everything on your site except buy what is in their cart prior to signing in order to access deals and promotions.
By implementing a cohesive strategy, Amazon can go from a “frienimy” to a tool that turbocharges your brand and ultimately, sales of your product across all channels.