2008-07-15T03:55:00.000-07:00

SHOPING SECRETS 1

Create Your Own Favorites Lists and Guides

Amazon offers two other ways to recommend products to other users—lists and
guides. A list is just that, a list of items you like. A guide is a little more
involved; it’s like a short tutorial on how to do something or other, containing
your specific product recommendations. Read on to learn more about both.
Listmania Lists
Are you a lists freak? Do you constantly organize your life into top ten lists? Can
you quickly name your favorite albums—or books, or movies?
If you’re into lists, then Amazon provides the perfect forum for your obsession.
(Excuse me—your interests.) You can create Listmania Lists about any topic you
can think of; Amazon displays these lists alongside products that are included
in the list. So, for example, if you create a list of your top ten Westerns and
include the film The Magnificent Seven, your list might be displayed on the
product page for The Magnificent Seven DVD.
To create a Listmania List, go to Your Store ? Friends & Favorites and then click
the Add a Listmania List link. Give your list a name, enter your qualifications (if
any—”fan” is as good as any), and then select up to 25 products. Amazon will
create the list, automatically inserting links to pictures of the products you
selected. Once your list is completed, it will be listed on your About You page.

SHOPING SECRETS 2

So You’d Like To. . . Guides

Similar are Amazon’s guides, which are short tutorials to various subjects, also
written by Amazon users. If you fancy yourself an expert on a given topic, you
can create your own guide to the topic, which is then listed on product pages for
those products listed within the guide. For example, if you wrote a guide about
how to use Amazon and mentioned this book, your guide would be listed on
this book’s product page.
To create a guide, go to Your Store ? Friends & Favorites and then click the
Write a So You’d Like to... Guide link. Enter a title for your guide and then start
writing. Each guide has to mention at least three products; you link to these
products from within the guide by using the following code: ,
replacing number with the product’s ASIN code. Once your guide is completed,
it will be listed on your About You page.

SHOPING SECRETS 3

Create an Online Wish List or Gift Registry
Here’s a cool feature: if a big birthday or holiday is coming up, Amazon lets you
create a Wish List of items you want. Your friends and family can then browse
your Wish List and order any item directly. It’s a great way to ensure you’ll get
at least some of what you really want—and it takes the guesswork out of them
shopping for you, as well.
You create your Wish List one item at a time. Just open any product listing page
and click the Add to My Wish List button. To edit your Wish List and send the
list to potential gift-givers (via e-mail), click the Wish List link at the top of any
Amazon page. You can return to your Wish List at any time to see what items
have been purchased for you or to update the list manually.
Along the same lines, Amazon offers Baby Registries (in conjunction with
Babies R Us) and Wedding Registries. Find out more by going to Your Store ?
Friends & Favorites and then clicking either the Baby Registry or Wedding
Registry link.

SHOPING SECRETS 4

Create a Personal About You Page

If you want people to know a little more about you, Amazon lets you create your
own personal About You Web page on the Amazon site. You can use this page
to display a short bio, picture, and your Wish List. When you create an Amazon
list, guide, or Wish List (see Secrets #437 and #438), Amazon will include a link
to your About You page.
To create an About You page, like the one in Figure 17-8, select the Your Store
tab in the Amazon navigation bar and then click the Your About You Area link.
When the next page appears, click Edit About You to add or change your personal
information. Click the appropriate links in the About You section (at the
top of the page) to add or edit the information on your page.

SHOPING SECRETS 5

E-Mail Alerts
Amazon also will let you know when new products you’re looking for are
released. Go to www.amazon.com/alerts/ and enter information about what
products you want to track. Amazon will send you an e-mail alert when new
products that match your criteria become available.

SHOPING SECRETS 6

Sell Your Own Stuff on Amazon

If you actually have products to sell, Amazon will help you sell them. That’s
right, you can tap into Amazon’s established marketing and sales infrastructure
to offer your merchandise to Amazon’s millions of customers—and even let
Amazon handle all the checkout and payment operations.

Amazon Marketplace
If you have something to sell—even if it’s just a used book or CD—the Amazon
Marketplace is the place to be. The Marketplace lets individuals and small
businesses sell all manner of new and used items; it’s particularly well-suited to

selling used books, CDs, videotapes, and DVDs, although you’re not limited to
just these items.
Marketplace items are listed in the Marketplace store and also as options on
normal product listing pages in the More Buying Choices section. Customers
place their orders with and pay Amazon, and then Amazon informs you of the
sale and transfers payment (less their fees and plus a reimbursement for shipping
costs) to you. You ship the item to the customer.
You pay 99 cents to list an item in the Marketplace and then pay Amazon a percentage
of the final selling price. (You pay a 6 percent fee for computers, 8 percent
for electronics and cameras, and 15 percent for all other items.) Each listing
lasts for 60 days.
To learn more or place a listing, click the Marketplace link near the bottom of
the Amazon home page.

Pro-Merchants

If you’re a high-volume Marketplace seller, you can sign up for a Pro-Merchant
subscription. For a $39.99 per month fee, Amazon waives the normal 99-cent
listing fee for your Marketplace items, although you still pay a percentage of
the final selling price. Pro-Merchant listings don’t expire.

zShops

If you’re a Pro-Merchant and you’d like to have your own online storefront, sign
up for Amazon’s zShops service. zShops let you sell merchandise outside the
normal Amazon listing pages and can be customized with your own business
logo and graphics. Go to www.amazon.com/zshops/ to learn more.

Amazon Auctions

A final selling option is Amazon Auctions. I haven’t talked much about Amazon
Auctions, because it’s a weak competitor to eBay (discussed in Chapter 16).
That said, Amazon Auctions has a slightly lower fee structure than eBay; you
pay a flat 10-cent listing fee for each item and a maximum 5 percent final value
fee. (The final value fee is lower on higher-priced items—and if you have a Pro-
Merchant account, you don’t have to pay the listing fee.)
Go to auctions.amazon.com to learn more.

SHOPING SECRETS 7

CHAT with Other Amazon Users

Amazon has definitely become a community of users. There’s no better sign of
this than Amazon’s chat rooms and discussion boards, where you can trade
opinions and advice with other Amazon users.
Chat
Amazon lets you chat in real-time with other users via its numerous categoryspecific
chat rooms. Most (but not all) Amazon stores feature Start Chatting buttons;
click the button to launch the Java Chat applet and start chatting with
other members of this chat room. It’s a great way to discuss specific products or
categories with like-minded shoppers

Discussion Boards

Chatting’s nice, but it doesn’t let you communicate with everyone you might like
to reach. A better way of communicating with other Amazon users is through the
site’s discussion boards. You can use Amazon’s discussion boards to share comments
about products or categories, or about the Amazon site in general.
To access Amazon’s discussion boards, go to Your Store ? Friends & Favorites
and click the Discussion Boards link.

SECRETS OF ONLINE SHOPING