The geniuses over in the Amazon marketing department have done it again. They’ve added a free lending library to all Kindle owners that have an Amazon Prime membership.
This morning I went over to Amazon to do some quick holiday shopping and I saw a huge announcement on their front page. Amazon announced today that they will start a free lending kindle lending library for all Amazon Prime members.
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The brilliance of this is astounding! It make the kindle together with Amazon prime a more desirable device than ever. I already had an Amazon Prime membership, but have been debating whether to get a kindle. However, with this new service, they’ve nudged me over the edge to getting one. After this deal, I would seriously recommend a kindle for anyone. If you already have one, then perhaps it would make a great gift. Kindles start at an affordable price at $79.99 and don’t forget that you can preorder the upcoming kindle fire as well.
Why is this Awesome Marketing by Amazon?
Think on it.
Amazon Prime is an amazing service as it is. You get free two day shipping as well as access to thousands of free movies, one day shipping at a low $3.99 per item if you can’t wait two days. It’s so convenient, that most people that have the prime membership just don’t shop anywhere else and they gladly pay the $79.99 annual fee for that privilege. You can read more about Amazon Prime here
So, they have a great service for their customers. But that’s only half the equation. The real reason that this is just awesome marketing is that they’ve convinced their customers to pay for the privilege of shopping at Amazon.
Not only that, but the customers feel like they get a great benefit by joining the membership.
So, that’s pretty good, but this isn’t just a simple membership site.
Amazon was able to create a really great product by including a lot of services that customers would pay for and bundle it together with their product sales. This way the customers get a benefit and Amazon gains customer loyalty. It’s a win-win situation.
Previously, I thought that the addition of the free movie streaming was a fairly average service. Most people that were interested in streaming movies already had netflix as I did. Also, I’ve heard that the movie selection wasn’t spectacular. Recently, I’ve been reading that Amazon has been consistently improving their movie selection and of course the netflix debacle has generated some converts. Nonetheless, the movie service hadn’t really nudged me towards purchasing a kindle.
However, I love books.
With the addition of a lending library giving me access to potentially thousands of free books to read, I think that Amazon has really rounded out their services. This will definitely encourage many people who were on the fence like me to purchase a kindle.
Of course, the kindle is simply a portal to shopping on Amazon. So again, this is a huge win-win situation for everyone.
What Marketing Lessons Can We Learn from Amazon
The biggest lesson that we can take away from this is that the best way to generate customer loyalty is to generate goodwill by creating win win situations for everyone. give your customers great service and they will come back.
The other thing is that Amazon has created a great service for their existing customers. Often times, we see marketing efforts that are geared towards simply getting someone in the store. However, we don’t often see much done for generating return customers. Amazon has really made an effort to keep a customer coming to their store. We don’t want one and done customers. We want people who are so impressed with our services that they will keep coming back.
So, think on how you can improve your customer relations and follow Amazon’s example.
And if you haven’t started your christmas shopping, think about taking a look at the Amazon Kindle
Richard is a full time professional, husband, father and blogger juggling all the responsibilities of life and running a blog. Richard enjoys writing about life and online money matters.
I heard about this recently Richard over at my friend Carolyn's blog. She writes all about tech stuff and I found this a very interesting addition. Unfortunately, I don't have a Kindle so it's not an option I would be able to take advantage of at this moment. Still not sure if I even want a Kindle. I know they are convenient, but my Mom and I like to share our books with each other and our friends so that wouldn't be possible with a Kindle.
Great addition thought and for those Kindle lovers, I'm sure they will really find this a great feature too! Who wouldn't right!
~Adrienne
Hi Adrienne,
I’ve thought about this issue as well since I occasionally like to lend out books to friends. I’ve discovered that kindle does allow lending to other kindle devices, so one can “borrow” a book on another kindle or ipad, or any tablet or computer with the kindle app. Although if you are an avid book trader, this may still not be for you as I think their lending policy is a bit too stringent.
Hello Richard,
You're right, it's a very smart move by Amazon – which is hardly surprising I suppose, they seem to never put a foot wrong in the ebook reader and ebook market. The Kindle is a great device – and the new $ 79 version is perfectly fine if all you want to do is to read books. I got one for my son's Christmas and I can tell you that the new screen is great.
The only small problem I have is that, although I am an Amazon Prime member, I live in the UK. So, I can't access the free lending library just at the moment. I expect that the service will come to the UK fairly soon though (I certainly hope it does).
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Rich,
I agree, Amazon is taking great pains to make the Amazon prime membership a complete no-brainer. Besides the lending library (brilliant!) there also offering tons of free movies, TV shows and streaming downloads to prime membership now.
This is all great boon for the user, but also brilliant on Amazon's part since it gets people buying their products and locking them in for many future e-book, streaming video, etc. etc. purchases
Truly brilliant moves by Amazon!!
Steve
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