私の趣味の一つに書店巡りがあるのですが、本を買うという点ではＡｍａｚｏｎを利用する頻度のほうが多くなっています。初めてAmazonを利用したのは6～7年前でした.。当時はオンラインショッピングすらしたことがなく、恐る恐る利用したことを覚えています。Amazonが提供するサービスには、お勧め商品の紹介、ギフト券の発行、迅速な配達など様々なものがありますが、個人的に特に役に立っていると感じるのは書評（レビュー）です。この書評、「購入前の参考」という意味でも非常に有用なのですが、自分の読んだ本を他の人がどのように評価しているのか、ということも分かるので非常に面白いです。（ただ、書評の中には、「組織票」（？）みたいな感じのものもあるので、100％信頼は出来ませんが･･･。）
日本のAmazonだけでなく、米国のAmazon.comやAmazon.UKも時々訪れて書評を読んでいます。（英語の勉強にもなりますし、ネイティブの書いた書評にはユーモアもあって面白いものが多いです。 ）
I am wondering if you’d have tried online shopping such as Amazon. Amazon offers wide varieties of product line including books, magazines, music and so forth at very competitive prices.
By using sophisticated information systems or marketing techniqueｓ, the company can recommend a lot of products that customers are likely to buy. Our buying behavior or history has been tracked and analyzed completely, and the company can identify exactly which types of products we will likely to buy.
For example, after purchasing a financial book, I will be asked to buy other financial books which are popular among the customers. Whenever I visit the Amazon web site, customized "recommendations" sign appears. And the comprehensive recomendation list of books provides me with very useful information. Thanks to the list, I can select the books I am interested in more efficiently. In addition, my evaluations of the listed books are promptly reflected in my list, which enables the list more suitable for me.
Amazon's business is not affected by Pareto-law(80-20 law), which is widely known as an empirical rule. According to Pareto-law, the majority of company's revenues or profits are derived from the minority of the customers. Therefore, we should prioritize the customers and focus on most profitable customer groups.
On the contrary, Amazon's business seems to be based on long-tail theory, which is explained by using a dinosaur's extended long tail. This theory means that a company can generate substantial profit from many smaller customers whio are ignored by Pareto-law. Of course, not every company can exploit the advantages of long-tail. Some prerequisites are necessary to justify the long-tail theory: relatively small marketing cost.
In conclusion, a state-of-the-art marketing technique and wide variety of products enable Amazon to attract more and more customers at lower marketing cost. Without IT, such one-to-one marketing would not be achieved. One-to-one marketing takes advantage of information technology to construct relationships with customers. It is said that the ultimate purpose of marketing is to know the targeted customers. One-to-one marketing can create bespoke markets which are best suited to individual customers with less marketing cost or efforts.