Express Delivery
The other day I ordered a copy of the graphic novel, The Watchmen, from Amazon.com. I like to bargain shop, so I picked a “new” copy on sale at a lower price from another member of the Amazon.com community. I picked this specific seller because their price, plus expedited shipping, was about 10 cents less than the normal retail price of the book. I figured it would be worth it to save 10 cents and only have to wait two days for my book.
I ordered my book on the 9th. Everything was paid and I was excited! Then I got my email confirmation from Amazon.com:
The seller has agreed to ship by 11-December-2008. This message serves as advance notification of your shipment–most sellers will NOT send a separate shipment confirmation.
Your order will be shipped via an Expedited Shipping method. The arrival expectation is 3 to 6 business days. If your shipment does not arrive by 19-December-2008, please contact the seller to check the status of the shipment. Your seller should provide the same level of customer service you expect from Amazon.com.
The expedited option on Amazon, as we all know, seems to promise 3-day shipping. It doesn’t promise 3 to 6-day shipping after a 2-day wait for the seller … a total of 5 to 8-days if everything happens on time.
I’ve been to the bookstore twice since then (I go fairly regularly) and I could have easily picked up a copy on the 12th, which was when I originally expected I’d be getting my book. Or I could’ve picked up a copy yesterday. Instead, I’m waiting for the invisible hand of a seller somewhere else in the country to finish packaging and delivering something I thought would be cheaper and more convenient.
Moral of the story? Amazon made money on a promise that they had no obligation to keep. Whenever I order products with expedited shipping from them it arrives on time … some times early! Through the Amazon Marketplace program, though, they paint less reputable sellers with the same classy image … and make money even when other people fail to live up to Amazon’s steller reputation.
This is the power of a brand. I bought online because I trusted the Amazon.com brand (I still do for the most part) and trusted a brand I’d never heard of because of its association with Amazon.com. Co-branding can be a powerful way to bolster a growing new entrant to the market. You can transfer equity from one body to another and improve sales and market power far more quickly than with advertising and costly brand development campaigns.
The lesson to learn from this story, though, is one of care and foresight. Transfering brand equity can be easy, but make sure you know who you’re transfering it to and that they actually deserve it. If your new partner won’t live up to your reputation, co-branding can actually hurt you more than it will help them. You never want to sacrifice your brand.
I love how you write. Many of your blog posts follow a format that reminds me a bit of Grimes Brothers’ tales. They have a story that have the pathos that people can relate to, and then they have the lesson. We love them, even though they are predictable. Perhaps it is their predictability that we love — gives us comfort, and we learn from the shelter of the comfort.
Your stories are good for the same reason. We know there’s a lesson at the end. But we like the story. It takes us somewhere else, to your life, to the little facets of your life that we can relate even though we may or may not have experienced the same things. And in the end, we know there’s something we can learn, an over-arching idea that sums up why you told us the story in the first place. It’s like the dessert that we anticipate, we know it’s coming, but when we get to it, it always surpasses our expectations.
Keep up the good work. (PS. Ooh, Amazon, that sneaky little thing!)
I’ve heard some goody things about this blog. Remember to balance the pics with the text tho
but over all very nice post, keep up the good work