Wednesday, September 30, 2009
How to lose customers, the Amazon way - my farewell letter to Jeff Bezos
Bye bye, Jeff@Amazon. After more than a decade as a loyal customer, I'm outta here. Ciao. Goodbye. Close the door after me, Jeff, because I'm not coming back.
So my quitting as a long-time customer over a petty dispute might not be much more than a teardrop in the ocean for you, Jeff old chap ... but is it?
Let's drill down ...
* You're losing a solid Amazon customer of more than a decade. Go look up my customer file and look at some of the stuff you've sold me... although your useless recommendation engine still doesn't have a clue
* This customer has spent more with Amazon than *any* other e-com site. Period.
* That customer withdrew more than 30-plus Amazon reseller book offers - this has cost you at least $150 in commission
I know you light your Cuban stogies with $100 notes Jeff, so this probably doesn't bother you ... but ... if just 1,000 people follow my lead (tsk! a mere 1000!) then you're $150k down ... would that make a difference?
The actual reason why I am leaving Amazon and shall not return is simple: breach of trust. We're getting divorced, Jeff. We will not be walking down the aisle again, geddit?
In the end it came down to a petty matter of a postage stamp. I'll spend more on printing and mailing you a hard copy of this piece, Jeff B (and the B does not stand for Baby, baby) ... but it's about principles now. If you want to run a long-term business, you LOOK AFTER your long-term customers.
To spell it out, that means: When long-time buyers agree to sell on their near-pristine books at half what they gave you in the first place, AND give you a commission payment, you nurture those customers.
So when one of them ships a book in good faith to an address provided by Amazon (no doubt also in good faith, dear lawyers), then the book comes back as undeliberable, because the owner of the PO box didn't pick up in time, then you'd be sensible to ask the BUYER, not the seller, to cover the postage charge.
Yup, it's something as fundamentally simple as that has brought down a great, decade-long relationship. From now, I'll be actively seeking opportunities to use alternative services. And I'll be telling all my friends why I switched.
Oh, and I'll be in Seattle sometime next year. Maybe I can bring "my" Kindle round (I say "my" because I live outside the US of A and so it's probably Against Amazon's Rules for me to "own" it ... I certainly cannot even try to buy and transfer any content to it) and hand it over to your custody. I'll be asking you to bend over first, so that when you receive the Kindle, you gain a valuable C-level first-hand experience of how I feel about the irrevocable breakdown of relations with my former old friend Amazon.
CEOs are always trying to get closer to the customer, right? I'm offering you the chance. Let's see if you really care about the customer, Jeff.
No Regards, Simon
So my quitting as a long-time customer over a petty dispute might not be much more than a teardrop in the ocean for you, Jeff old chap ... but is it?
Let's drill down ...
* You're losing a solid Amazon customer of more than a decade. Go look up my customer file and look at some of the stuff you've sold me... although your useless recommendation engine still doesn't have a clue
* This customer has spent more with Amazon than *any* other e-com site. Period.
* That customer withdrew more than 30-plus Amazon reseller book offers - this has cost you at least $150 in commission
I know you light your Cuban stogies with $100 notes Jeff, so this probably doesn't bother you ... but ... if just 1,000 people follow my lead (tsk! a mere 1000!) then you're $150k down ... would that make a difference?
The actual reason why I am leaving Amazon and shall not return is simple: breach of trust. We're getting divorced, Jeff. We will not be walking down the aisle again, geddit?
In the end it came down to a petty matter of a postage stamp. I'll spend more on printing and mailing you a hard copy of this piece, Jeff B (and the B does not stand for Baby, baby) ... but it's about principles now. If you want to run a long-term business, you LOOK AFTER your long-term customers.
To spell it out, that means: When long-time buyers agree to sell on their near-pristine books at half what they gave you in the first place, AND give you a commission payment, you nurture those customers.
So when one of them ships a book in good faith to an address provided by Amazon (no doubt also in good faith, dear lawyers), then the book comes back as undeliberable, because the owner of the PO box didn't pick up in time, then you'd be sensible to ask the BUYER, not the seller, to cover the postage charge.
Yup, it's something as fundamentally simple as that has brought down a great, decade-long relationship. From now, I'll be actively seeking opportunities to use alternative services. And I'll be telling all my friends why I switched.
Oh, and I'll be in Seattle sometime next year. Maybe I can bring "my" Kindle round (I say "my" because I live outside the US of A and so it's probably Against Amazon's Rules for me to "own" it ... I certainly cannot even try to buy and transfer any content to it) and hand it over to your custody. I'll be asking you to bend over first, so that when you receive the Kindle, you gain a valuable C-level first-hand experience of how I feel about the irrevocable breakdown of relations with my former old friend Amazon.
CEOs are always trying to get closer to the customer, right? I'm offering you the chance. Let's see if you really care about the customer, Jeff.
No Regards, Simon
Labels: rant
# posted by Nesjo : 20:39
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