The Best Place to Buy Online
by jordango - Written: Nov 06 '01
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The Bottom Line
If you're buying online, buy from Amazon.com. Their prices are good, their service is great, and their reliability is unquestioned.
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| Full Review |
As the senior citizen of the online world, Amazon.com is the first place that people think of when they think about online shopping. They used to be known simply as "The World's Biggest Bookstore," with a selection as wide as the Amazon (hence their name). Now, with brand-name retailers such as Target and Toys R Us as part of their vast network, Amazon is really more of an online mall. To paraphrase Arlo Guthrie, you can get anything you want at Amazon.com. But the vast majority of their sales are still books, with music and video games thrown in for good measure.
I've been shopping at Amazon for more than five years. I made my first order with them on August 21, 1996, and I still haven't read the book I ordered at that time (talk about procrastination!). How do I know this? Easy, Amazon has so many great features and personalization options that I can look up every order I ever made with them.
While I've been buying there for five years, I haven't branched much beyond books, music and software. But I keep ordering more and more often from them. According to their order history (which I have no way of knowing if it's accurate, by the way), I made two orders in 1996, three in 1997, four in 1998, six in 1999, eleven in 2000, and five so far this year. To be fair, that five this year is more like ten, as I have a habit of pre-ordering products, then combining orders so they ship together. Also, the system apparently doesn't count orders from Amazon.com partners, such as drugstore.com, as I've made several orders from them and none are listed.
So, why am I still shopping there after five years? There are many reasons. Their prices are good, but not the best on the web. But their service and reliability are both the outstanding. When I order something from Amazon, I know I'll get it, or their customer service department will take care of me.
Start with selection - If I'm looking for a book, Amazon.com has it, usually at a very competitive price. They have great search capabilities, much better than they had previously that let you search by title, author, publisher, subject, ISBN (the book's ID number), and other factors. You can also sort a search in best seller order, publication date order, featured products, and other niceties. While some of these searches are not the most reliable, they are nice to have and can be very helpful.
Their service is also great. If I have a problem with my order, I send an email to customer service describing the situation. The problem is usually rectified that day. In no case have I had a problem that took longer than one day to be resolved. Once, Amazon sent me the wrong product. I called customer service and they immediately sent me a replacement.
If I change my mind about an order, I can easily send it back using forms that I print out on the customer service section of their website.
Their prices are not so great. They've made some strides in getting more competitive, recently discounting all their books over $20 to at least 30% off, for example. However, you can usually find a better price on the web for products offered. But the difference isn't enough for me to consider using another website to order.
I also like all of the personalization features of their site. No matter what computer I use (I have one at home and two at work), Amazon.com puts a "cookie" on my computer and knows that it's me when I get to the website. It greets me with a personalized home page that offers recommendations and specials on products I might like to buy. Today, for example, the site recommended the soundtrack to Serendipity (I just bought the soundtrack to Bandits), a video game (I just bought a video game from them), a Bob Dylan CD (I just bought one of his CDs) and a DVD (I just bought a DVD from them).
The site will also create a web page for you based on products that you've recently looked at. This can be helpful in tracking your steps and remembering if there was something you wanted to buy but forgot about.
I frequently put items in my shopping cart if I think I want to buy them. They stay there for up to 90 days. At some point during that 90 day period, I either buy the products or remove them from my cart. I love this feature as I don't have to remember what caught my eye. Currently, I have several yet to be published books in my shopping cart, as well as some CDs and DVDs that I might buy, gift ideas for relatives and friends, and some other items.
From time to time, Amazon will send you messages informing you of new products that you might be interested in. You can personalize these. Lately, those messages have gotten better and better, thanks to Amazon's use of some very good editors for many of their sections. These result in detailed reviews for many of their products.
Amazon has its flaws, but it's my choice for online purchases. I recommend it wholeheartedly.
Recommended:
Yes
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