1) Amazon’s invited group of trusted reviewers who review products after receiving them for free.
2) Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library (SNFL). A New York Public Library that reopened in 2021, located in the heart of Midtown Manhattan.
3) Amazon’s paid membership service offering various benefits, including fast free shipping, Prime Video, Prime Day discounts, and Amazon Fresh through a subscription program.
4) A premium organic supermarket chain in the US that Amazon acquired in 2017.

1 Amazon Knows Everything About Me

In my second column, I discussed Amazon’s algorithm. While conversion metrics, such as clicks and purchases, remain essential, individual shopping history appears to be the most crucial factor influencing purchasing decisions. This makes perfect sense when you think about it. The reason products with high conversion rates are prioritized at the top is ultimately because Amazon believes customers searching for those keywords will have a high probability of clicking and purchasing those products. However, what they’re most likely to click and purchase are products they’ve already clicked on and bought before. That’s why Amazon shows hyper-personalized product recommendation pages and search results based on the various customer information on the platform.

Perhaps for this reason, Amazon gathers customer information and preferences through multiple channels. Records of clicked and purchased products are just the baseline—there’s a ‘Shopping preference’ page where they collect clothing sizes, skin types, preferred ingredients, food preferences, and main interests. Separate pages called ‘Your Garage,’ ‘Your Fanshop,’ and ‘Your Pets’ collect specific information like what type of car you drive, which sports teams you support, and what breed and age your pets are, if any. With this level of data collection, it’s no wonder my preferences naturally reveal themselves.

But that’s not all. A recently introduced feature called ‘Interest’ allows you to indicate products you’re interested in, and AI continuously recommends corresponding products. The ‘Wishlist’ is a list for products you don’t want to buy immediately but might want to purchase someday—once you add something there, it reminds you through phone notifications so persistently you’ll never forget.

Based on this detailed information, Amazon recommends products tailored specifically to me. The top section of the main page continuously shows products I’ve viewed or purchased, or those from categories I frequently browse or buy from. On search results pages, products I’ve purchased or clicked on appear at the very top. Since I work in the cosmetics industry, most products I browse on Amazon are skincare products, so it’s not surprising that these appear on my Amazon main page. However, having bathroom cleaning product brands continuously recommended after just a few clicks and purchases feels like my secrets have been exposed, because I am incredibly passionate about cleaning bathrooms.

2 Amazon’s Various Delivery Methods

Everyone knows that Amazon delivers as fast as same-day or within 1-2 days at the latest. So I’d like to share the various other delivery methods Amazon offers. The first is ‘Amazon Day.’ Prime members can designate a specific day of the week to receive all items ordered during that week in a single delivery. This is a worthwhile option if you work from home only on certain days of the week, need to receive packages simultaneously, or want to minimize the number of packaging boxes you use. From Amazon’s perspective, this reduces packaging waste and enables more efficient delivery; therefore, they sometimes offer rewards, such as cash back, to customers who choose this option.

The second method involves pickup at locations other than home. ‘Amazon Locker’ consists of unmanned pickup boxes located throughout the city. When ordering, you enter your preferred Amazon Locker location, and after delivery is completed, you enter the Pickup Code sent via notification into the Locker to retrieve your package. There’s also an upgraded version called ‘Locker +’ that allows returns. Similar to this offline pickup method is ‘Amazon Counter,’ a pickup service partnered with brick-and-mortar stores like CVS and GNC.

Some people find offline pickup inconvenient, but they also feel anxious about leaving packages outside their homes for extended periods. In the US, where garages are commonplace, Amazon provides an ‘Amazon Key’ in-garage delivery service for these customers. In partnership with smart door companies like MyQ and Aladdin Connect, this service allows deliverymen to open garage doors and place packages inside. You connect your smart door to the Amazon app, and when the deliveryman arrives at the address and scans the package barcode, the garage door opens. Once delivery is complete, the deliveryman cannot open the door again. If there’s a camera, you can view the inside of your garage in real-time through the app, eliminating concerns about theft.

3 The Journey of a Single Review

Having transitioned from waiting for customer reviews to leaving reviews myself, I naturally find myself imagining how sellers will feel when they see my reviews as I write them. When leaving a 5-star review, I get excited just thinking, "How happy will they be to see this?” When leaving a 3-star review, I quietly offer consolation, thinking, “I’m sorry... the product just wasn’t what I expected.”

Although it would be ideal if reviews reached sellers promptly, all reviews undergo Amazon’s screening process after submission. Approved reviews appear on product detail pages, and customers receive a ‘Your review is live’ notification. The time required for screening varies based on several factors, including whether the review contains photos and whether the author typically leaves reviews. Since reviews significantly impact sales, this process prevents malicious activities, such as leaving negative reviews on competitors’ products or rapidly accumulating reviews through methods that violate the policies.

For these published reviews to shine, they need recommendations from other customers. On Amazon, reviews with ‘Helpful’ recommendations have a higher probability of being displayed at the top. And reviewers who receive many such recommendations are more likely to become Vine reviewers. Having received four recommendations from 6 reviews so far, I plan to accumulate more reviews and recommendations during my remaining time in New York.