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Amazon Says It Puts Customers First - But Its Pricing Algorithm Doesn't (propublica.org)
ProPublica has a report today in which it warns Amazon shoppers about the results that they see on the shopping portal. It notes that people often hope that the results that come up first after a search are the best deals, and that's what Amazon will have you believe, but its algorithm doesn't work that way. In what may surprise many, in more than 80 percent of cases, Amazon ranks its own products, or those of its affiliate partners higher. From the report: Amazon does give customers a chance to comparison shop, with a listing that ranks all vendors of the same item by "price + shipping." It appears to be the epitome of Amazon's customer-centric approach. But there, too, the company gives itself an oft-decisive advantage. Its rankings omit shipping costs only for its own products and those sold by companies that pay Amazon for its services. Erik Fairleigh, a spokesman for Amazon, said the algorithm that selects which product goes into the "buy box" accounts for a range of factors beyond price. "Customers trust Amazon to have great prices, but that's not all -- vast selection, world-class customer service and fast, free delivery are critically important," he said in an e-mailed statement. "These components, and more, determine our product listings."
When I buy an item, I will pay more to get it directly from Amazon or from a seller that ships through Prime. That way I don't get screwed if there is something wrong.
Free ship? Then wait 6 days. Then it ships. Just wait. No reason. Nazis!
That guy's given the Scottish musician a load of money, and he never plays my favourites. Jings, and also crivens!
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
My own data points as a non-prime customer...
- Not that long ago items purchased using "free shipping" arrived at my door 2-4 days after order; now its 2 weeks.
- Free shipping orders seem to sit in a queue for up to 10 calendar days before being shipped now.
- I've seen items in shopping cart suddenly get flagged as 'we're sorry, this product is now only available for Prime customers' and moved to the second cart.
- With paid 2-day shipping, my items hang around 2-4 days before being shipped.
For me, this all happened RIGHT as I was about to finally purchase Prime. Since I noticed this, I will never purchase Prime. And I've started shopping around for all my large purchases again, which are now made mostly elsewhere.
to replace his humans. Screw Amazon.
The quality of Amazon's search ranks right alongside the quality of Youtube's comments in the catalogue of Internet "qualities". They are both poster children for the worst quality imaginable in their respective areas.
In Amazon's case, their appallingly bad search is clearly by design. The most braindead developer could not possibly make a search return such ludicrous results by accident. The most likely algorithm being used by Amazon is to take 1% or less of the results that actually matched the query, throw away all the other matches, and backfill with 99% containing what Amazon wants to sell without any reference whatsoever to what was requested.
Far from putting its customers first, Amazon puts their customers last in so many cases that this must be company policy. There are many other examples of it, the manipulation of the Prime catalogue being another major area where abusing their customers seems to be their standard business strategy.
Thanks, Amazon!
Get a life, ProPublica.
Says who? Where does Amazon make the promise, or even implication, that it's search results will show the best bargains at the top?
a spokesman for Amazon said the algorithm that selects which product goes into the "buy box" accounts for a range of factors beyond price. "Customers trust Amazon to have great prices, but that's not all -- vast selection, world-class customer service and fast, free delivery are critically important,"
If I want to buy a widget and I'm looking for the one rated best or cheapest or whatever, why would that rating be affected by (a) how big Amazon's selection of products is (b) how good Amazon's customer service is (c) Amazon offering free delivery. Those things may be important in deciding whether or not to buy from Amazon, but how is any of that even remotely relevant to which widget is best or cheapest?
What a load of fuck.
Amazon closely guards the exact algorithm that chooses who has the buy box. It is known that they strongly favor themselves (of course.. they want the sales). So much so that I often avoid items that Amazon fulfills themselves unless the ROI and/or rank are very good, or my research indicates that amazon regularly runs out of an item and I can exploit the inevitable price jump during those restocking gaps.
If you want more info on how the buy box works, there is a company called feedvisor that does repricing and other services for amazon vendors. I do not use their services (I use others), but they give away a yearly buy box bible. This uses information culled from their clients amazon seller accounts to see how competition and pricing and other changes affect buy box percentage and sales.
http://feedvisor.com/r/resourc... - warning it does require email registration, but it is an interesting read.
Silence is a state of mime.
I don't think I've ever paid shipping at Amazon if I ordered it from them or their "affiliates". Even when I wasn't a Prime member.
So Amazon lists items with zero shipping ahead of similarly-priced items that have shipping charges? So what? They are cheaper! Are they listing their house/preferred seller items before indentically-priced (including shipping costs) items? So what? Somebody has to go first! Dear lord, are we heading towards a 'retailer neutrality' movement where all items offered up get precisely equal ranking? How stupid. Did you know that supermarkets get paid for their premium shelf space (end cap, eye level)? Are we going to have a tizzy over your grocery store preferring one detergent over another through premium placements? What is the issue, really - what is it?
I agree, and it's all fine and great. But what is the alternative?
Seriously, I'd like to know because Amazon is about a step above eBay to me at this point. Even with prime, I don't get my stuff in 2 days anymore. I order stuff, it's in stock but it doesn't ship for 4 days. Or I order it, and it says it isn't in stock anymore and it takes 4 days but it still shows they have plenty in stock on the site. Everything appears to ship from china.
I guess the few people that still don't know that "business ethics" is an oxymoron don't know what an oxymoron is. But that won't stop them from pissing editos faster than silicon valley interns can piss code.
Amazon need customers, not sellers. So guess which ones are getting screwed.
Amazon invents criteria for "best buy" which coincidentally match their own products. Surprise surprise surprise.
Table-ized A.I.
I hate the term "Free Shipping." If there were free shipping UPS, USPS, FedEx wouldn't be paid to move Amazon purchases to your door. The term should be "Price includes shipping." And of course the value of this shipping depends on the distance from the shipping point to your door. Maybe the price depends on that, but I don't know. If the included shipping price is the same then those farthest from the shipping point to their door are being subsidized by those close to the shipping points. I'm surprised that some Federal regulator hasn't come down on Amazon and every other mail order company for using this term.
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell
I'm not a huge fan of everything Amazon does, but this is just whining. What do you expect, of course, their own products will appear first when they think they can get away with it. It's their house.
...to repeat customers.
Maybe I'm misremembering this, but wasn't there a similar but more scandalous Amazon pricing technique where they were actually tracking customers and jacking up prices to repeat buyers?
Maybe they gave that up due to bad press or maybe they weren't doing it all.
I'm pretty sure airlines have done this -- I've looked at flights a couple of times and when I was ready to book, bam, price had gone up. Checked from another device where I hadn't looked at flights (using a different browser) and I had the original price.
I know Dell did something like this years ago, too -- logged into their site with some corporate credentials and priced a server, did the same thing from another computer/browser which had never used them and the price was a lot lower.
Good, because half the time the non-Amazon sold items are defective or counterfeit these days...since Amazon refuses to properly police marketplace. And then allows marketplace sellers to harass customers for negative feedback, or even just for not leaving feedback.
I live in metro Altanta. When I ordered things years ago and got the free shipping, it would go into the shipping queue, it would say preparing for shipment and out the door from their Kentucky center. Two days later it was here. It was great having free two day shipping!
Now, with free shipping, it sits in the queue for days before it even changes to the "Preparing for Shipment" status. I'll get it in about a week.
As for Prime. When I need to get a lot of things that need to be shipped to different areas of the country, I get the 30 day free trial and cancel right before they bill me. They allow you to do it once year. And when you quit, oh the hard sell! But the thing is that Prime video sucks almost as bad as Netflix and the free books are garbage. If they lowered the Prime price to $49, then maybe it'd be a good deal.
Amazon Says It Puts Customers First - But Its Pricing Algorithm Doesn't
I think most people understand that the phrase "putting customers first" means "We strive to serve our customers well, with the expectation that we are going to be well-paid for it." So this complaint doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Amazon isn't necessarily going to offer me the lowest prices in the world. They aren't giving away stuff for free, after all. And I want them to profit so they will be around to serve me tomorrow, because I do feel like they serve me well.
the company gives itself an oft-decisive advantage
Decisive advantage over what? The customers? Is shopping a competitive experience between the buyer and the seller where one only gains at the expense of the other? This reads like an attempt to alienate a merchant and its customers. It's probably not actual astroturfing by a competitor, but one could be forgiven for wondering.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
There's a product I buy routinely (if it's cheap enough).. sometimes it's like $20.49, other times it's as high as $26.49, or it could be somewhere in the middle. REALLY fucking annoying.
Then I'll buy it, and have to buy enough to hit whatever the raised "free shipping" quota is, then it sits unshipped for a week, then I finally get it.
I only buy from Amazon if they are the cheapest. Otherwise I have zero loyalty to them.
I purchased something years ago, living in Washington state as does Amazon; I was told I was being taxed as there's a chance they will be taxed. Now if they aren't taxed well they would keep the extra monies.
Newegg.com has been my shopping area for years now and right after my Amazon purchase.
I gave up on Amazon after minimum purchases and refusal to sell star wars to non-prime members.
When companies start spending that much time and money on ways to maximize profits like this seems better to cut your losses and take your business elsewhere.
Bad enough the "search" function has always been worthless. No matter what you type into the search box even smashing the keys randomly brings up search results. I don't want to wade thru crap in the off chance intentionally not having a rational relevancy cutoff pays off for them. If you want to screw with me that's your right just don't expect me to do business with you.
the really don't like this sort of thing and will quite happily take the likes of Google on for what it sees as unfair/anti-competitive behaviour. The only trouble is that it takes them an age to act.
TFS manufactures a controversy by begging the question from both sides.
Assumption 1: "(P)eople often hope that the results that come up first after a search are the best deals"
Assumption 2: "(T)hat's what Amazon will have you believe"
The article basically accuses Amazon of favoring options that are favorable to Amazon, vs. random marketplace entities. That seems pretty logical to me.
The controversy only exists if Amazon agrees with ProPublica that offering the lowest price, regardless of Prime discounts, is the only correct definition of "customer-centric".
The gist of the piece seems to be that shadowy algorithmic machinations are conspiring against us.
From the summary it looks like it says: "If Amazon is selling it for $6 + free shipping, and someone else is selling it for $4 + $3 shipping, then prefer Amazon for the buy box". Damn right I'd rather pay $6 than $4+3, I don't care which dollars go to which part of it.
By far the worst thing I've found at Amazon is the OnTrac delivery service. It's just awful.
When I buy an item, I will pay more to get it directly from Amazon or from a seller that ships through Prime. That way I don't get screwed if there is something wrong.
Totally agree. Amazon's satisfaction policy is reasonable and uniform, so no surprises or hassles trying to save a dollar.
Here's something that puzzles me about their search algorithm. The first search will pull up "most, relevant" items. And you quickly scan the first pag or two for the cheapest version and find something you like. Then you switch to "lowest price first" sort order. And when you do this something really odd happens. That item you found using the relevancy search is often not there at all???? That is to say as you scroll down pass the irrelevant cheap stuff listed first eventually you reach the price point of the item you saw before and it's simply not there.
This also works in the reverse direction too. Sometimes a cheap item doesn't show up in the relevancy search as well. This I sort of understand: it must not have been indexed with the right key words so it gets knocked out of the relevancy search.
But the other direction I can't fathom. Why would a relevant item not show up in the price sort?
A cynical person might think they were trying to hide the cheap items from you but I sincerely doubt that.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Duh.
Do you think that ANY amount of profit would satisfy Amazon's unsolvable and fake problem. Greed is NOT a real problem and NO amount of money would satisfy them.
Thought experiment for clarification: Imagine you did 100% of your shopping via Amazon. Would Bezos be happy? No. To increase Amazon's profits of course he will try to redirect your shopping to the merchandise that gives him higher percentages. Once 100% of your money is going there, he'll just have to boost the prices some more.
Hey, what else can Amazon do? The greed is NEVER satiated.
My own reason for stopping my Amazon shopping (more than 10 years ago) was the abuse of my personal information.
Quite recently and for over a year, it appeared that I had become an Amazon customer again. Considering how long it took for them to respond to the imposter, my current theory is that Amazon has a Wells Fargo problem with fake accounts. My latest conspiracy theory is that some of their people are using the information of dormant customers to create fake business. Presumably some kind of commission or incentive system? However the only thing I am certain about is that Amazon suddenly got real quiet about it.
Super tinfoil hat time? If Amazon notices this post (and similar ones I've made), they will suddenly get back to me with a cock-and-bull story about what REALLY happened. They expect me to respond "Riiiiight."
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
A couple of clicks and a little bit of math and it's pretty easy to figure out what the best deal is.
Price and shipping are but two items on my mental list to go through when I'm looking around. The time and cost of buying it local. Tax. Speed of delivery. Hassle factor if it is broken/wrong item/size etc.
If you can't do the mental arithmetic then you probably shouldn't be allowed on the internet unsupervised.
you can pay for various speeds of shipping. As people use the priority ones more the slower ones get slower as there are less gaps to insert the slow ones into and they get even slower.
everyone knows this.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
the search and display of items on the site is poor. the way I shop, I like things broken down into
brands first-particular class of item-all the models with feature comparisons from particular manufacture side by side.
generally what I have found is every item I buy comes in multiple models with stripped down versions, and multiple upgrades to choose from.
w/ the current site design, it's actually impossible to locate all the specific different models in an easy fashion. you will literally be going in and out of the results, multiple types of searches, etc.
also there's lots of duplicate results- pictures for items that are all the same, etc. the whole site is a mess unless you know precisely what you're looking for!
often times I will have to go and search on the manufactures site and google to try to learn all the available models to choose from- and even then I sometimes miss models.
example I was shopping for the very best power strip I could get w/ QC USB port and all the rest 2.4amp- I found a 6-outlet Bestek. I had no idea that there was a similar 8-outlet unit also available with identical specs otherwise plus an extra feature: EMI filter built in. What I did see was a worse unit, an 8-outlet Bestek w/ only 5amp's max for the USB ports, instead of every port being 2.4amp at the same time for a total of 2.4amp. I literally combed the pages looking for suggestions, clicked the bestek brand page, and I did a search for bestek QC 2.0- the rare 8-outlet unit was mislabeled and didn't even have the QC 2.0 in the title like the other bestek's.
anyway I came across it after my purchase, forcing me to return the 6-outlet and get the 8-outlet.
similarly I run into the same problem searching for many other types of items such as mirrorless cameras, TVs, computers, etc.
generally, I like to shop by class- I eliminate all the cheap crap, and I shop for premium upper end models only.
Amazon makes that hard to do w/o lots of searching in and out of the results.
drrobertduncan.com
just my opinion they need to invest in a new front end interface- and more advanced MySQL query style search so we can search performance and specific features of classes of items easier.
Amazon is becoming more and more like a sketchy third-world bazaar. Last month, I bought some hair product my GF liked thru Amazon. What we received were two jars, unsealed and only partially filled with... something other than the actual product. It finally occurred to me that the weird smell of it was akin to linseed oil.
Amazon quickly refunded the purchase, but even after posting a blistering review of this counterfeit and possibly dangerous product, I do believe that vendor is still a valued partner to Bezos and company.
If they yet again raise the cost of Prime, just like the higher packages on my cable service, I'll be dropping it as well.
A company favors it's own products and the products of people that pay them? It's unprecedented!
I've been a Prime member since shortly after it started. Laley though, most packages arrive late. And they're no longer as competitive on price for small ticket (cheap) items. They still seem to be competitive on big ticket itmes, and even ship them on time, but I buy those seldom enough that Prime doesn't pay for itself.
In my experience, the "price plus shipping" rankings are accurate and even include the effect of tax. In other words, the first offer listed has the lowest total delivered cost, and so on. Shipping charges are omitted for most shipments from Amazon because I'm a Prime member and thus shipping is free - the listings even say "free shipping with Amazon Prime" and how long the shipment will take. There are some things that are not eligible for two day delivery - those are either especially large and heavy items that would be too expensive to use two day shipping for, or things that must be shipped ground such as large quantities of liquids or big lithium ion batteries. And occasionally something says "may take an extra 1-2 days to ship" - I think some of those are products that they produce on demand, which can include books, videos, and printed items like T shirts.
If the difference is small, I'm likely to choose the shipment from Amazon because I'll get the package faster and because their return policy is good. If there is a big difference in cost I may take another deal.