Out with the old

The Amazon.com home page, before the revamp

The old design – while clearly showcasing the flagship Kindle e-Reader, still makes it clear that there are such things as physical, paper books for sale here amidst the digital wonders and assorted other categories of physical goods.

As Amazon (with revenues of over $US34 billion last year) expanded, its core offering of paper-and-print books, delivered cheap and fast, started to be crowded out by the other goods. Whether sold directly by Amazon, or through the range of partners, the focus has moved away from print, and squarely towards “other”.

Lately, of course, “other” has largely meant “Kindle e-Reader” and associated eBooks. With the redesign, this move is accelerating considerably.

In with the new

The Amazon.com home page, after the revamp

The new site – again, showcasing the Kindle,  is cleaner, crisper, and unashamedly minimalist. It looks very much at home on a tablet – and will probably look outstanding on the soon-to-be-released Amazon tablet device.

The products listed on the front page will of course be driven by customer habits, but as Amazon.com focuses more on eBooks, and drives customers there, it seems likely that the dynamic content of “What customers are looking at right now” will reflect that.

Books, incidentally, do get a mention on the Amazon.com front page. Right down here in the footer. Sort of.

Books at Amazon.com - in the new design

Conversions will likely take a hit in the next quarter while visitors get to grips with the major changes, but with plenty of time before Amazon’s traditional landmark fourth quarter, Christmas trading should follow the familiar pattern.

Ultimately, it’s not going to be a question of how pretty the design is, or how elegant the tablet experience is with the new Amazon design; it will be a question of the facts and figures, the metrics behind the scenes.

What will the new cleaner, leaner design do to the average order value, value per visitor, average time spent per visit, conversion percentage?

What will the new optimised-for-the-tablet model do to the overall revenue?

And of course, how this will all affect affiliates is another question…

Agreement by Cobrasoft via sxc.hu

Relationships are not built without communication – real communication. Your communication should demonstrate genuine empathy for your customers’ needs which will be the basis for building a mutually beneficial relationship with them.

Another key aspect of building a solid, lasting relationship with your customers will be the attitude you display toward them, and your mindset in dealing with them.

Show appreciation

Create a bond with your customers by telling them – and more importantly – showing them that you actually care about their feelings as well as their material needs. Demonstrate that you appreciate your customers through giving them exclusive offers or access to benefits.

Show concern

Everyone – customers, prospects, business partners – needs to work with someone who genuinely cares about their problems. Consistently show concern for each customer’s individual situation and build a good, solid relationship with them. Continue to keep your focus on meeting the needs of your customers, and making sure they are satisfied with the outcomes.

Show humility

We all make mistakes. Businesses make mistakes. When that happens, own up to your mistakes and do what you can to compensate your customers for their inconvenience. Customers respond warmly to humbleness and are put off by businesses who refuse to budge or admit wrong. At times, the customers are in error. When this may be the case, you may have to apologize for their inconvenience and then direct them to the page where you state your policy or where details are shown regarding your products or services. Again, keeping a humble spirit can help your customers respond better while dealing with such situations that arise.

Show generosity

At times, refunds must be made. Don’t make your customers beg for their money back. If a refund is due, do it in a timely manner that shows your customer that they can trust your business. Some businesses deliberately make it difficult for their customers to get a refund. Customers remember such experiences and will be less willing to spend more money with businesses like that in the future. There are many other creative ways to show generosity to your customers through value-added benefits. Many value-added benefits are very low cost compared to the value of the impression that they make. Consider the value instead of the cost. Doing so will be just as rewarding to your business as it is to them.

Show respect

Avoid thinking about your customers as just a “group” of people. Don’t focus on the money by viewing your customers only as people who spend money with your company. Keep a humble mentality toward your customers by realizing that your business survives and thrives because of them and the choices they make. Use their name appropriately when you communicate. Care genuinely about your customers’ feelings and be courteous to them in all your business dealings.

Mean it

By displaying real human emotions of concern and humility and by showing appreciation, generosity and respect you’ll help to build a good, solid relationship with your customers. When you build a solid relationship, you’ll also build a solid foundation for your business success.

Image by slworking2 via flickr.com

Your brand is everything about how you are seen on the internet, and it is increasingly accessible in sophisticated aggregated forms, and there are companies lining up on all sides of the brand management market, for better or worse.

The Gatherers, the Guardians and the Generators are all watching your brand.

If you have any form of interaction on the internet you have an online brand. If you have a website, a blog, a Facebook page, a Google+ profile, a Twitter account or all of the above, you have a brand. If you post on forums (in any way that is identifiably you), you have a brand.

There are Gatherers, for finding out information, uncovering the core of your personal brand on behalf of your prospective partners, customers and employers. The 21st Century private investigator, carrying out due diligence and lifting up rocks to see what scuttles away.

There are Guardians, for monitoring and reporting on your personal brand, on your behalf. The modern day clipping-service, writ large. Running a fine-tooth comb through your public electronic past, to warn you of any skeletons that may be lurking in your cupboard, any bodies that weren’t buried quite as deeply as you thought, and alerting you to anything that Brand Gatherers might find out.

Then there are Generators, able to run grass-roots whispering campaigns to put out the good word, and drown out the bad news about your brand. In a pure, playing-by-the-rules world, the Generators will draw attention to your good deeds and your positives, to draw attention away from those few cranks who maliciously play up your rare mistakes and foolish indiscretions, or misconstrue innocent acts.

In a darker world, the Generators drown out your critics, and mask your evil acts with torrents of minor good deeds, until the evil is forgotten and the good deeds are all that live on in popular memory. (“Forgotten”, incidentally, means “buried on page 3 or 4 of Google results” and “popular memory” means “page 1 of Google results, ideally the top half”).

Where does this leave you and your brand? Well, you can either do it yourself, or you can employ a professional. Whether the DIY approach or the out-sourcing model work best for you will depend on your brand, your position, and your future trajectory.

More and more these days the services of Gatherers, Guardians and Generators are increasingly accessible to you – and to your competition.

Dictionary by Jaboney via flickr.com

In the shiny technological age of the internet, sometimes it’s the old fashioned skills that make the difference.

Internet audiences have notoriously short attention spans, and are put off very quickly by something that looks fishy – or phishy for that matter.

In the UK, where internet sales are estimated at more than £527M (USD 848M / AUD 789M) Oxford University’s “Oxford Internet Institute” claim that the simple inability to write without spelling mistakes, and without grammatical errors is reducing revenue.

Website visitors may associate poorly written text with phishing scams and be wary of those behind the scenes.

Technical skills are good, but without basic communication ability it all comes to nothing.

What we need now is for Google to use spell checkers and grammar parsers in their ranking algorithms…

Start of the unexpected incident, end of incident. Review why this didn’t fit the mould. Review how this can be avoided in future.

Unpredictable things happen, but you can have a process for handling kinds of unexpected things.

An emergency kit.

A library of partial plans and resources.

Don’t just call it random and wait for it to happen before picking up the pieces, and pulling together a solution.

The last stage of the “other” process is to ask “Why was this not covered by the normal process?“