CASE STUDY ON

AMAZON
ECOMMERCE

SUBMITTED BY

BIBEK ACHARYA ROLL NO -5

NABARAJ POKHAREL ROLL NO -11

SUMIT KAKSHAPATI ROLL NO-26

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Table of Content
Exordium 1
How did Amazon get its start 2
Organizational Structure 3
Services 5
Customers 9
Payment Method 10
Competition 11
Advantages 12
Conclusion 13
Recommendation 14
References 15
EXORDIUM:
Amazon, online retailer, manufacturer of electronic book readers, and Web services provider
that became the iconic example of electronic commerce. Its headquarters are
in Seattle, Washington.

Amazon is a vast Internet-based enterprise that sells books, music, movies, housewares,
electronics, toys, and many other goods, either directly or as the middleman between other
retailers and Amazon’s millions of customers. Its Web services business includes renting data
storage and computing resources, so-called “cloud computing,” over the Internet. Its
considerable online presence is such that, in 2012, 1 percent of all Internet traffic in North
America traveled in and out of Amazon data centers.

The company also makes the market-leading Kindle e-book readers. Its promotion of these
devices has led to dramatic growth in e-book publishing and turned Amazon into a major
disruptive force in the book-publishing market.

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HOW DID AMAZON GET ITS START?
Most people know Amazon.com as the world’s largest online retailer. While this is where the
company stands in today’s day and age, it is important to note that its history dates back to
when it was founded in 1994.

Jeff Bezos incorporated Amazon in July 1994, with the website launching to the public a year
later. According to Quora, the original name was going to be "Cadabra," but Bezos misheard it
as "cadaver."

It is easy to believe that Amazon has had loads of success since day one, but this is not exactly
true. In fact, the company has taken many turns over the years to reach the heights at which it
stands today.

Early on, Amazon was not a retailer of "all things." Instead, the company focused primarily on
books, the first of which was sold out of Bezos' garage. Of course, this has changed quite a bit
over the years as the company now sells everything from toys to clothes to furniture and much
more.

On May 15, 1997, Amazon issued its initial public offering of stock at a price of $18/share.
Despite the fact that Amazon had a solid business plan in place, investors began to worry about
the future due to the fact that the company had no intentions of making a profit for the first
five years.

At the time, this plan was frustrating for investors. However, it ended up being a blessing in
disguise as Amazon was able to navigate its way through the dot-com bubble that crushed so
many others in the e-commerce space.

During the first quarter of 2001 Amazon finally became profitable, posting revenue of $1 billion
with a profit of $5 million. This may have been a small profit for the company, but it justified
the plan that Bezos set in place from day one.

In the early days, it was difficult to look ahead and see Amazon as the number one online
retailer in the world - but this is exactly what happened. The company now has separate
websites for a variety of markets, including: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Italy,
Japan, and China among others.

Although a lot has changed for Amazon over the years, the company has remained true to its
roots in many ways.

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ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE:
Amazon organizational structure can be classified as hierarchical. Senior management team
include two CEOs, three Senior Vice Presidents and one Worldwide Controller, who are
responsible for various vital aspects of the business reporting directly to Amazon CEO Jeff
Bezos. There are seven segments such as information technology, human resources and legal
operations and heads of segments also report to Amazon CEO.

Hierarchical structure at Amazon has developed due to the immense size of the business. The
largest internet retailer in the world by revenue employs 560,000 people worldwide and it has
more than 300 million customers globally. Amazon organizational structure integrates many
small teams that deal with various aspects of the business. Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos
is credited with the introduction of ‘two pizza rule”. According to this rule, meetings should be
held in teams small enough that could be all fed with only two pizzas.

The figure below illustrates Amazon organizational structure:

Amazon Organizational Structure

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It is important to note that despite its large size, unlike many other companies with hierarchical
organizational structure, Amazon remains highly flexible to adapt to frequent changes in the
external marketplace. Moreover, the online retail giant leads changes in external business
environment, it has caused disruptive innovation in e-commerce and currently it is about to
cause a disruptive innovation in global logistics industry. This is mainly due to visionary and
efficient leadership by Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos.
It can be forecasted that with the acquisition of Whole Foods for USD13.7 billion in 2017,
Amazon organizational structure is going to change in the foreseeable future. Moreover, due
to the company’s adherence to business diversification strategy in an aggressive manner, its
organizational structure will remain dynamic, being subjected to certain changes in a regular
manner.

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SERVICES:
Amazon considers itself a completely customer-centric company. In fact, it has described itself
as "customer-obsessed." The company really believes that if it doesn't listen to customers, it
will fail. Amazon has stated that it wants to take advantage of any opportunity that presents
itself to the company during a time of unprecedented technological revolution.

1. Amazon (Amazon.com) — The largest Internet-based retailer in the world by total sales
and market capitalization.
2. Amazon Advertising — Connect your brand to Amazon customers wherever they share,
read, listen, purchase, research and download online, across devices.
3. Amazon Alexa — Amazon’s voice control system.
4. Amazon Appstore — Amazon Appstore for Android is an app store for the Android
operating system operated by Amazon.com.
5. AmazonBasics — AmazonBasics offers quality and value on everyday products delivered
straight to your door.
6. Amazon Books — Amazon Books is a chain of retail bookstores owned by online retailer
Amazon.
7. Amazon Business — Everything you love about Amazon. For work.
8. Amazon Dash Button — Amazon Dash is a consumer goods ordering service which uses
a proprietary device for ordering goods over the Internet.
9. Amazon Drive — Get unlimited online storage to backup, protect and share photos,
videos and files from any device.
10. Amazon Echo — Amazon Echo is a hands-free speaker you control with your voice. Echo
connects to the Alexa Voice Service to play music, provide information, news, sports
scores, weather, and more—instantly. All you have to do is ask. Also check out, Echo
Dot, Echo Dot Kids Edition.
11. Amazon Elements — Amazon Elements is a line of premium everyday essentials
exclusively available to Amazon Prime members.
12. Amazon Fire OS — An Android-based operating system by Amazon for its Fire Phone
and Kindle Fire range of devices.
13. Amazon Fire Phone* — A 3D-enabled smartphone designed and developed by Amazon.
14. Amazon Fire Tablet — A tablet designed and developed by Amazon.
15. Amazon Fire TV — Amazon Fire TV is a tiny box you connect to your HDTV. It’s the
easiest way to enjoy over 250,000 TV episodes and movies on Netflix, Amazon Instant
Video, and HBO NOW, plus games, music, and more.
16. AmazonFresh — It is a grocery delivery service by Amazon.
17. Amazon Handmade — Discover genuinely handcrafted products created by Artisans
around the world.

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18. Amazon Home Services — Amazon Home Services is a new and simple way to buy and
schedule professional services such as furniture assembly, house cleaning, and plumbing
directly on Amazon.com.
19. Amazon Hub — Hub by Amazon is a comprehensive solution that frees you and your
staff from daily package management, from high-rise buildings to garden-style
apartments.
20. Amazon Inspire — Amazon Inspire is an open collaboration service that helps educators
discover, gather, and share educational content.
21. Amazon Go — Amazon Go is a new kind of store with no checkout required.
22. Amazon Kindle — Amazon Kindle is a series of e-readers by Amazon.com that enable
users to browse, buy, download and read e-books, newspapers, magazines and other
digital media via wireless networking to the Kindle Store.
23. Amazon Launchpad — Amazon Launchpad offers online shopping of products from
startups, with a great selection of new technology, innovative gadgets, electronics,
wearable tech, workout, style, and home products from startups.
24. Amazon Locker — Amazon Lockers are secure, self-service kiosks where customers can
pick up Amazon.com packages at a time and place that is convenient for them.
25. Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk.com) — An on-demand scalable workforce.
26. Amazon Merch — Merch by Amazon makes it easy for you to create, promote and
market your branded merchandise.
27. Amazon Music Unlimited — Amazon Music Unlimited is a premium music subscription
service featuring tens of millions of songs and thousands of expert-programmed
playlists and stations.
28. Amazon Pay — Amazon Pay makes it simple for hundreds of millions of customers
around the globe to check-in and check out using information already stored in their
Amazon account.
29. Amazon Prime — Enjoy fast free shipping, exclusive access to movies and TV shows, ad-
free music, unlimited photo storage, and Kindle books.
30. Amazon Prime Air — Amazon Prime Air is a future service that will deliver packages up
to five pounds in 30 minutes or less using small drones.
31. Amazon Prime Book Box — A subscription that delivers hand-picked children’s books
every 1, 2, or 3 months.
32. Amazon Prime Music — Ad-free and on-demand music service for Amazon Prime
members.
33. Amazon Prime Now — Prime Now offers household items and essentials you need every
day plus the best of Amazon, with FREE 2-hour delivery.
34. Amazon Prime Video — Enjoy exclusive Amazon Originals as well as popular movies and
TV shows.

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35. Amazon Prime Video Direct — Prime Video Direct helps content creators and visual
storytellers reach millions of Prime Video customers worldwide.
36. Amazon Robotics (formerly Kiva Systems) — It’s all about robotics.
37. AmazonSmile — Amazon donates 0.5% of the price of your eligible AmazonSmile
purchases to the charitable organization of your choice.
38. Amazon Storywriter — A cloud-based screenwriting app.
39. Amazon Studios — Amazon Studios is a subsidiary of Amazon that focuses on
developing television series, and distributing and producing films and comics from
online submissions and crowd-sourced feedback.
40. Amazon Sumerian — Amazon Sumerian lets you create and run virtual reality (VR),
augmented reality (AR), and 3D applications quickly and easily without requiring any
specialized programming or 3D graphics expertise.
41. Amazon Tap — A portable Bluetooth and Wi-Fi enabled speaker that gives you rich, full-
range sound.
42. Amazon Video Direct — Helping content creators and visual storytellers reach millions
of Amazon customers across hundreds of devices with the same distribution options
and delivery quality available to major motion picture and television studios.
43. Amazon Vine — Amazon Vine is an internal service of Amazon.com that allows
manufacturers and publishers to receive reviews for their products on Amazon.
44. Amazon Wag — Amazon’s pet product brand.
45. Amazon Warehouse Deals — Deep discounts on open-box, and used products from
Amazon.
46. Amazon Web Services (AWS) — Amazon Web Services offers a suite of cloud-computing
services that make up an on-demand computing platform.
47. Amazon Wickedly Prime — A new line of distinctive food and beverages, available
exclusively to Amazon Prime members.
48. Amazon Wireless — Cell phones with service powered by Amazon.com.
49. Amazon WorkDocs — Amazon WorkDocs is a fully managed, secure enterprise storage
and sharing service with strong administrative controls and feedback capabilities that
improve user productivity.
50. Amazon WorkSpaces — Amazon WorkSpaces is a fully managed, secure desktop
computing service which runs on the AWS cloud.
51. Amazon Your Garage — Find parts and accessories that fit your vehicle and ask other
owners for tips and advice.
52. A9 — A9.com is a subsidiary of Amazon that develops search engine and search
advertising technology.
53. AbeBooks (AbeBooks.com) — Shop a vast selection of books, art and collectibles from
independent sellers around the world.

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54. Alexa (Alexa.com) — An Amazon company that provides commercial web traffic data
and analytics.
55. Audible.com (Audible.com) — Audible sells digital audiobooks, radio and TV programs,
and audio versions of magazines and newspapers.
56. AWS Cloud9 — AWS Cloud9 is a cloud-based integrated development environment (IDE)
that lets you write, run, and debug your code with just a browser.
57. Book Depository — A UK-based online book seller with a large catalogue offered with
free shipping to over 160 countries.
58. Box Office Mojo — Box Office Mojo tracks box office revenue in a systematic,
algorithmic way, and publishes the data on its website.
59. Brilliance Audio — Publishes audio books for consumers, resellers, and librarians in the
United States.
60. Diapers* (Diapers.com)— An online specialty retailer for baby products.
61. Digital Photography Review — It’s all about digital cameras and digital photography.
62. Goodreads (Goodreads.com) — Share book recommendations with your friends, join
book clubs, answer trivia. Note: Shelfari has merged with Goodreads.
63. IMDb (IMDb.com) — Find showtimes, watch trailers, browse photos, track your
Watchlist and rate your favorite movies and TV shows.
64. Junglee* — Junglee.com is an online marketplace by Amazon designed uniquely for
India.
65. LOVEFiLM* — A DVD rental and streaming video on demand service.
66. Ring (Ring.com) — Ring lets you monitor every corner of your property with Video
Doorbells and security cameras.
67. Souq (Souq.com) — It’s the largest e-commerce site in the Arab world.
68. Twitch (Twitch.tv) — A live streaming video platform by Amazon.
69. Whole Foods Market — A supermarket chain that specializes in selling food products
without artificial preservatives, colors, flavors, sweeteners, and hydrogenated fats.
70. Woot — Daily Deals for Electronics, Computers, Home, Tools, Garden, Sport,
Accessories, Kids, Shirt, Wine, & more.
71. Zappos (Zappos.com) — An online shoe and clothing shop.

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CUSTOMERS:
Amazon defines what it refers to as three consumer sets customers, seller customers and
developer customers.

There are over 76 million customer accounts, but just 1.3 million active seller customers in its
marketplaces and Amazon is seeking to increase this. Amazon is unusual for a retailer in that it
identifies “developer customers” who use its Amazon Web Services, which provides access to
technology infrastructure such as hosting that developers can use to develop their own web
services.

Members are also encouraged to join a loyalty program, Amazon Prime, a fee-based
membership program in which members receive free or discounted express shipping, in the
United States, the United Kingdom, Germany and Japan.

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PAYMENT METHOD:
The following credit and debit cards can be used as payment:

 Visa
 Delta
 Visa Electron
 MasterCard
 EuroCard
 American Express
 UK based Maestro and Solo cards

If you are paying for your order using a credit or UK debit card you'll be asked to enter your
card details as part of the ordering process, and you'll find further instructions when you
process your first order.

If you want to change your existing payment card details, you can do this in Your Account. Visit
your Amazon Wallet by clicking on Payment options. There, you can also add a completely new
credit card for future orders.

You can add a completely new payment through your account without having to place an order.
Under Payment Settings, click Add a credit card, then sign in and enter the card details.

You can also use Gift Vouchers and Gift Cards to pay for your order

Amazon doesn’t accept:

 Cheques or postal orders.

 Cash in any currency.
 Book tokens.
 Purchase orders.
 International wire transfers.
 Direct debits or standing orders.
 PayPal.
 Bank transfers.
 Pay Monthly

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COMPETITION:
In its 2017 SEC filing Amazon describes the environment for our products and services as
‘intensely competitive’. It views its main current and potential competitors as:

1. Online, offline, and multichannel retailers, publishers, vendors, distributors,

manufacturers, and producers of the products we offer and sell to consumers and
businesses;
2. Publishers, producers, and distributors of physical, digital, and interactive media of all
types and all distribution channels;
3. Web search engines, comparison shopping websites, social networks, web portals, and
other online and app-based means of discovering, using, or acquiring goods and
services, either directly or in collaboration with other retailers;
4. Companies that provide e-commerce services, including website development,
advertising, fulfillment, customer service, and payment processing;
5. Companies that provide fulfillment and logistics services for themselves or for third
parties, whether online or offline;
6. Companies that provide information technology services or products, including on-
premises or cloud-based infrastructure and other services; and
7. Companies that design, manufacture, market, or sell consumer electronics,
telecommunication, and electronic devices.

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ADVANTAGES:
There are more than ten benefits of shopping on Amazon, but we have narrowed it down.
Amazon is one of the easiest ways to purchase items sold by companies or re-sold by
consumers.

Convenience: The best thing about Amazon is you can go shopping without ever walking out
the door. You can wake up and go shopping in your pajamas. You can go shopping naked if you
want!

Low Prices: Because many of the products are re-sold by consumers, you can get gently used
books or previously purchased items, often for much less than you would pay for them retail.

Safety: Amazon is a much safer website than most when it comes to paying for your items. If
you do not want to use your credit or debit card on the site, you have the option to use PayPal,
which is a safer way of payment.

Variety: Amazon is better than any mall you could walk into, because you can buy virtually
anything on Amazon, all at the click of the mouse or the tap of the keyboard. Want a book?
Done. Want a George Foreman Grill? Done.

Reviews: On Amazon, you have the ability to read user's reviews before you even buy the
product, and you can also see reviews of the seller, so you can be sure that you are getting
what you pay for.

Options: If you choose, you may visit mturk.com to do small tasks to earn money. You can then
use your earnings to directly buy things from Amazon.

Saves Gas: Instead of driving to a store or mall, you do not have to spend any money on gas!
Shop When You Are Sick. When you are home sick from work and can't get out of bed, worry
not! You can still shop from Amazon in your sickbed, using your laptop.

Flexible Shopping Time: If you are up late at two in the morning and you feel like shopping,
you can do that. A mall would be closed at two am.

Wish List: If you don't have the money to shop now, you can still go on the website, create an
account, and make a wish list of everything you want to buy so you can shop later.

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CONCLUSION:
On the part of conclusion we conclude that Amazon.com uses Business to Customer Model for
its better growth. Amazon mainly focuses on the customer satisfaction by providing the various
ways to ensure that like as personalization, user ratings and reviews, minimum shipping charge
which act as the key ingredients for success of Amazon.com. But still Amazon has to do some
change on its system like as Global Expansion, Integrating on New Technologies, Innovation of
New products.

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RECOMMENDATION:
Amazon.com is the ultimate online retailer around the world. Its nearest but not even close
competitors are e-bay and best buy. But the competition is growing day by day.

1) Competing in the market:

Like past, amazon in future will have to come up with special something. The global market
is changing day by day. Business competitors are investing large to take amazon down.
There is no room for relaxation. It is very challenging and has to be consistent in the market
to be number one retailer shop.

2) Innovation of new Product:

It is essential for amazon to think out of the box and bring new products to satisfy and
retain customer to be loyal to Amazon.com. Amazon always offered its customer better
quality and better service. But in future it may not be the same. People in today s world ask
‟ for more. Amazon has to be smart enough to understand the customer need before even
customers know about it.

3) Integration of New Technology:

Technology is making progress like the spread of light. Company like ‘Amazon’ needs to be
adaptive and technology friendly to retain its domination in the market. Amazon ’s new
technology of Drone delivery system indicates it is planning and investing significant
amount of money in technology for near future.

4) Customer Loyalty:

For a upward revenue stream customer loyalty is essential. Amazon’s most of the buyers
are its repeat customers who are loyal to amazon. But growing competition can be a risk to
Amazon’s loyal customer.

5) Global Expansion:

Amazon is expanding its business around the world. But this may cause significant strain in
number of sectors like management, inventory, supply system and more over to Amazon’s
market place. International market is very challenging because of political and economic
conditions. Upgrading e- CRM and investing more towards customer information for better
understanding the customer needs and behavior is essential.

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REFERENCE:
1. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Amazoncom
2. https://www.thebalancecareers.com/amazon-com-company-research-2071316
3. https://research-methodology.net/amazon-organizational-structure-2/
4. https://www.minterest.com/list-of-all-amazon-products-and-services/
5. https://www.smartinsights.com/digital-marketing-strategy/online-business-revenue-
models/
6. http://www.mademan.com/mm/10-benefits-shopping-amazon.html

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