Choose a business that you are interested in and write an informal report about that company (Amazon).
-your final report must be presented in APA style
-You must use at least 3 secondary sources.
-Your paper must contain a clear statement of purpose (topic sentence)
Informational Report must include:
-Statement of purpose
-Company Description
-Background and History
-Mission Statement
-Product and services
-Major Competition
-Marketing Strategy
-Diversity Plan
Amazon’s Informal Report
Statement of Purpose
Marketing is a strategic force that allows modern businesses to gain a competitive edge in the market. The recent technological advances have made marketing emerge as a decisive factor determining companies’ success or failure in the contemporary market environment. Today, marketing approaches present new opportunities and challenges. In Amazon, the marketing communication mix utilizes a wide range of sales promotions, events, direct marketing, and other distribution channels as part of the overall marketing strategy. It is no doubt that Amazon is the largest marketplace that deals in e-commerce retail. However, the company faces competition from the different brands, which increases the general ad load on the Amazon platform. The paid advertising campaign will likely reach a pleasure in a given market-making a reduced revenue margin for partners. To overcome these potential challenges, the company must create a marketing plan in a data-driven manner. I am confident that with the marketing diversity plan, Amazon will understand its goals, target its audience, and assess its marketing strategy.
Company Description
Amazon is a leading internet-based marketplace that sells all forms of merchandise such as books, housewares, movies, toys, electronics, and other goods. Through a business-to-consumer model, Amazon sells its products directly to consumers or as a middleman between retailers and its customers (Hall, 2020). Over the years, the company has grown from being a book retailer to a more diversified model incorporating books, music, electronics, video games, furniture among several housewares to its large consumer base. The marketing and business expansion strategy has enabled the company to gain a substantial competitive advantage in the online marketplace.
Background and History
Amazon Company is a digital marketplace with headquarters in Seattle, Washington. The company has a global presence because of its business model. Jeff Bezos founded the company in 1994 to sell books online. The company’s initial name was Cadabra Inc, which later changed to Amazon.com because most customers, suppliers, and partners had problems pronouncing the name. The company operates through North American, global, and Amazon web services. All these segments offer the retail sale of different consumer products and subscriptions through focused websites.
Amazon’s first retail comprises publications, professional, scientific newsletters, and articles (Hall, 2020). Over time, Amazon has grown, utilizing a business strategy that has helped it diversify its products. Currently, the company is retailing almost every product and merchandise in its online marketplace platform. Amazon has expanded, covering all comers of the world with its global systems of delivery and logistics. As an electronic commerce company, Amazon has achieved a market niche since its creation in 1994 as an online bookstore.
Mission Statement
Amazon’s mission statement is “To offer Earth’s biggest selection and to be Earth’s most customer-centric company” (Amazon Staff, 2021). The mission demonstrates the company’s objective to serve the consumers across all market segments through digital and physical stores focusing on convenience, price, and product selection. The mission statement outlines the goal of emerging as a customer-centric approach using technology to satisfy their wants. The mission is critical for the digital marketplace driving economic productivity and competitiveness in the global economy.
Product and Services
Amazon offers retail sales of various consumer products such as books, toys, electronics, and general housewares. Primarily, Amazon offers millions of books and media, clothing, home furnishing, office products, pet supplies, software, jewelry, consumer electronics, and hundreds of other product categories. The services include subscriptions through North American websites such as www.amazon.com and www.amazon.ca. Consumers can sign up through the website to enjoy subscription services to video content, movies and series, and other services. The main video and television services subscription service is the Amazon Prime segment. The Amazon Web services segment comprises the international sale of computer electronics, databases, storage, and services to governments, startups, enterprises, and learning institutions (Amazon Staff, 2021). Amazon manufactures and sells electronic devices. They include Fire TV, Kindle, Echo, and other devices related to the media content.
Major Competition
The digital marketplace industry is more competitive today with opportunities for technological expansion. Most companies such as Netflix, Google, Alibaba, Aliexpress, and Fiver continue expanding in the market due to the increased design and product implementation level. The business-to-consumer model has several players offering low pricing strategies. They challenge the value proposition of Amazon and allow a high buyer bargaining power, increased business approach, and access to high-quality products.
Amazon operates in a highly competitive market environment. The quest for market share involves major largest corporations such as Walmart, Alibaba among others. Walmart is a global online marketplace that generates approximately double net sales than Amazon. The main point of focus is that Walmart’s sales originate from brick-and-motor purchases. The company has over 11,000 physical stores in 27 countries alongside online stores for e-commerce (Inci, n.d). Alibaba and Aliexpress are China-based online marketplaces. The international giants specialize in wholesale and retail, which is a differentiation factor in comparison to Amazon. The critical difference, therefore, emerges from their model of business. While Amazon runs its business under one roof, Alibaba separates its business into Alibaba, Taobao, and Tmall. Also, Otto is a competitor for Amazon (Inci, n.d). The European online retailer is a leader in innovation. Otto sells products from other brands on its platform. Therefore, it is a one-stop-shop for busing online in Europe specializing in Fashion, electronics, sportswear, and home merchandise. eBay competes with Amazon in a similar business model. Ebay provides consumers with opportunities to buy and sell their new and used merchandise through the consumer-to-consumer model.
Similarly, there are few competitors in web-based services. Netflix is the main competitor for the video and media content with Amazon Prime Video. The company offers a diversified range of video streaming and subscription. Google Home Products competes with Alexa, which is Amazon’s virtual assistant. Other compactors in the cloud computing segment, such as Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, give Amazon web services stiff competition (Inci, n.d). Therefore, Amazon faces a high level of competition from both local and international companies.
Marketing Strategy
Amazon’s marketing strategy relies on the four pillars of diversified product, customer-friendly digital marketplace, affiliate product and resources marketing, and cloud computing. Through offering a wide range of products, Amazon continues to be the largest retailer. Today, 58 percent of global online purchases come from Amazon’s third-party sellers (Dudovskiy, 2020). Besides, Amazon uses an advanced interface that allows customers to enjoy personalized product recommendations. The marketing approach is critical in building customer bonds and helping the consumers enjoy their purchase experience.
Amazon explores different marketing channels for its business. In this strategy, Amazon uses associate programs, social media advertisements, and direct sales. Also, it employs television advertisements and sponsored searches, among other initiatives (Dudovskiy, 2020). The principles of 7Ps of marketing allow Amazon to focus on place and product elements in their marketing mix. As a result, the company offers millions of products for online and offline retailers. Also, the company offers competitive prices with discounts and sales.
Positioning, targeting, and segmentation are effective. Amazon targets the broader consumer segments through adaptive, anticipatory, and multi-segment positioning techniques. There is a wide range of products and services delivered in the shortest time possible (Dudovskiy, 2020). The exceptional customer service helps Amazon to place unique selling prepositions as the primary marketing communication message. The effectiveness of Amazon’s strategy is that most customers prefer it as an online store. Amzon.com emerge as a platform that increases efficiency for shoppers. The marketplace eliminates the need for consumers to call a customer care representative or wait for specific products. The consumer protection program gives customers confidence in using the products and services of the company.
Diversity Plan
To fully achieve marketing goals, Amazon is committed to fostering cultural competency, research and development, and operational efforts.
Goals | Activities | Timelines |
Build Amazon’s capability to achieve a diversified product range | -Create a standing diversity committee.
-Create a lead cross-segment implementation team. -Increase market research programs. |
Six months |
Increase access to consumers from diverse a population through informational products | -Develop effective marketing communication channels
-Expand the channels of distribution and shipmen. |
12 months |
Design more marketing research and product development | -Design products and service development team.
-Carry out market surveys across different market segments-Design methods of collaborative affiliate programs. |
Ongoing/Continuous |
Design additional promotion and branding | -Create programs for increased use of promotional activities and exhibitions.
-Design diversified use of loyalty programs -Create a moderate pricing strategy |
Ongoing/ Continuous |
References
Amazon Staff (2021). Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/
Dudovskiy, J (2020). Amazon Marketing Strategy: a brief overview. https://research-methodology.net/amazon-marketing-strategy-2/
Hall, M. (2020, April 9). Amazon.com. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Amazoncom
Inci, D (n.d). Competing With Amazon: How Amazon’s Top Ecommerce Competitors Survive and Thrive. https://www.bigcommerce.com/blog/amazon-competitors/#conclusion