Amazon’s product strategy
Amazon Inc. is an amazing company.
What started as a simple online bookstore over the years became an all-encompassing “Everything Store” that sold anything and everything. Beyond that it grew bigger by opening up Marketplace, allowing individual sellers to utilize its powerful and convenient logistics infrastructure; and created Amazon Prime, the company’s all-in-one membership program that includes fast free shipping, grocery delivery, music, TV shows, and games — all the shopping and entertainment needs any consumer needs. What’s more, close to 20 years ago it launched the world’s first do-it-yourself cloud service, and today it’s still the de-facto market leader in this field.
Over the past 10 years, it sped up its product development and acquisitions even more to the point where almost anywhere you look you’ll see an Amazon service ready and available at your service. From delivery drones and game streaming services to cashier-less stores and smart speakers that can control any device in your home, seems like Amazon is just everywhere in our lives, and most of the time the best choice in the field.
How has Amazon grown so big? And how is it that Amazon can seemingly jump into a field that they have no previous experience in and within a couple of years emerge as the industry leader? Why are they able to disrupt industries so easily? How is it possible that a company that’s not even 30 years old can now have what seems like an infinite list of products that engulf almost every facet of our everyday lives?
In this series, I’d like to talk about the evolution of Amazon’s product strategy over the years and break down from a product manager’s perspective just how they build their products to win in any field.
This series is broken into 4 parts:
- Intro — Amazon’s product strategy
- Part I — Amazon’s product strategy in the early years
- Part II — Amazon’s product strategy in expansion
- Part III — Amazon’s product strategy as a conglomerate
I hope you enjoy the series, click below to read the first article:
#1. Part I — Amazon’s product strategy in the early years
Best,
Albert T.
My other product strategy articles on Medium:
