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Dingshan
A comparison of the basic situation of Mei Sen and Dangdang.
Some similarities and differences between Amazon and Dangdang deserve our attention:
(A) Dangdang announced profits faster than Amazon.
Dangdang was founded four years later than Amazon, but the two bookstores announced profits almost at the same time. From this point of view, Dangdang seems to be more successful than Amazon: different national conditions and different business concepts have prompted them to choose different development paths to some extent:
Amazon started by selling books at first, and quickly succeeded: while the sales of publications increased, Amazon also rapidly expanded the types and scope of commodity management. Dangdang is still an online bookstore in the pure sense, and the goods sold belong to publications. Compared with the rapid expansion of Amazon at a loss, Dangdang seems to be more inclined to the steady and steady development policy that Chinese people have always advocated: first make a profit, give yourself a "reassurance" and then seek development. In the words of Li Guoqing, co-president of Dangdang Online Bookstore, the reason why it can make a profit in such a short time is that "Dangdang focused on making publications, and Amazon's loss was mainly due to the continuous expansion of product categories and striving for greater market share, otherwise it would have made a profit two years ago".
(2) In the location of the headquarters, Dangdang is as well prepared as Amazon.
Amazon settled in Seattle, and Dangdang is headquartered in the capital. Talent and logistics are the same elements of e-commerce and traditional commerce, and both websites have seen this.
(3) the way to show your magic.
Judging from the initial financing methods of Dangdang and Amazon online bookstore, there are similarities: they have successfully attracted venture capital from investment companies from the beginning. Since then, there have been some differences between the two online bookstores in the way of obtaining funds. Amazon is a listed company, and issuing stock financing is one of the important means to obtain development funds. Although Amazon has not made continuous profits, its development prospects have been optimistic, and its share price has remained high, which has raised considerable development funds for Amazon. Although Dangdang has not yet issued shares, it still relies on investment companies for financing, but to achieve greater development, listing will be the first choice for Dangdang to expand financing channels.
Second, the service comparison between Amazon and Dangdang
(a) Information search has its own advantages.
With the help of Junglee search technology, Amazon online bookstore can provide customers with extremely difficult search services, which can be searched in many ways, such as book title, author, theme, character strings related to content, cover color and pattern. This method is very suitable for people wandering in online bookstores. As long as you enter any interesting keywords, you can find a lot of relevant commodity information, which is very convenient. The search engine of Dangdang online bookstore not only provides fast search, but also provides combined search, which is divided according to the category, name, author/director/actor name, publishing institution, publication date, discount range and price range of goods. This kind of search is more conducive to customers who have already purchased the target to find the goods quickly, saving time and energy.
(2) Personalized services and featured services are not as good as Amazon.
Amazon's personalized service can remember the customer's IP address after registration, and when the customer visits again, it will directly enter the "personal store". A personal store is a web page designed according to visitors' personal preferences. Registered users can find what they need directly and quickly, eliminating the interference of other information. This service successfully takes advantage of the rapid interaction of the network and meets the personalized needs of customers. In terms of special services, Amazon has introduced restaurant introduction, travel ordering and gift recommendation. While providing these services, it loses no time to promote products on the website, making people pay for them unconsciously. Dangdang is an online bookstore with good service in China, but there are still many gaps compared with Amazon. At present, the services it provides are only basic services, and there is no personalized service like Amazon, and the featured services are not perfect: although new book notification services such as E-Weekly have been launched, the work efficiency is not satisfactory.
(three) the same price card, the discount is high or low.
Amazon has always adhered to the principle of selling books at low prices, with 30% discount for books over $20 and 60% discount for books of its own choosing. The long-term low-price marketing strategy not only attracts a large number of customers, but also leaves people with such psychological hints: Amazon is a bookstore that will only be cheap, not more expensive. Dangdang also followed the low-price strategy and played the slogan of "more choices, lower prices", but the average discount rate was lower than Amazon; The price advantage is not obvious.
(D) The gap between logistics and distribution is narrowing day by day, and the mode of payment reflects the gap between consumption concepts.
There is not much difference between Amazon and Dangdang in the way of logistics distribution. They all set up their own distribution team or choose a courier company. However, due to the different levels of logistics development between China and the United States, the average delivery time of Dangdang is slower than that of Amazon. In terms of payment methods, Amazon generally adopts online settlement, while Dangdang mostly adopts the disguised mail order method of "online ordering and offline trading", and the proportion of credit card consumption is not very large.
Third, some suggestions.
From the above comparison, we find that there is a big gap between Dangdang and Amazon. It can be said that Dangdang and most online bookstores in China have always taken Amazon as an example and learned from its experience. China's specific national conditions determine that it is unrealistic to mechanically imitate the Amazon model, and domestic online bookstores must find their own development model. Here, combined with the current situation of online bookstores in China, some suggestions are put forward:
(A) clearly establish brand awareness
Bezos once said that location is an important condition for the success of traditional bookstores, and brand is the most important for virtual online bookstores. In order to seize market share, Amazon puts profit in a secondary position and is willing to spend huge sums of money on advertising. Compared with Amazon, the advertising efforts of online bookstores in China are obviously inferior, not only the propaganda media is limited to the network, but also the efforts are not enough.
(2) regard customers as God and strengthen service quality.
Advertising has gained popularity, and the reputation of the website should be achieved through good service. Amazon's pursuit is to make online shopping as real as in traditional bookstores, and regard customers as God, which has been fully reflected in the design and production of web pages. However, most online bookstores in China do not pay enough attention to book information and book reviews.
(three) to expand the scope of business and establish a distribution center, we should proceed from reality and avoid blindness.
Although Amazon's business expansion is amazing, the expansion is not blind. In addition, Amazon also made full consideration when choosing to establish a distribution center, all on the premise of saving money. It is particularly important for domestic online bookstores to expand their business and conduct sufficient market research. The expansion speed should not be too fast: the establishment of storage centers requires a lot of capital investment, so we should be more cautious when choosing the construction location and quantity to avoid rushing headlong into it.
Excerpt from: Publishing Wide Angle