Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is likely the defining salesman of our prison term . But in a sit - down with a small group of journalists yesterday that was apparently aboutnew Kindle hardware , it became more clear than ever that his troupe ’s success has come not from any case-by-case product line , but from one impossibly ambitious strategy : Be everywhere , do everything . It ’s insane . It ’s working .
https://gizmodo.com/kindle-fire-hdx-amazons-tablet-all-growed-up-at-last-1381587552
We ’re meeting in a small circuit card room on Amazon HQ in Seattle , and Bezos is giving us the rundown on a few of the more telling lineament of the new HDX annunciation . He ’s unmistakably casual birth what ’s understandably a well rehearsed subject matter — really , he ’s just a undecomposed fibber , gathering us around him to look over his berm as he demonstrate this feature or that — but is noticeably more animated when let the cat out of the bag about how Amazon really works .
“ There are some thing that you may only do , ” Bezos sound out at one point , “ Or only do really well , if you get to wreak in the total stack , include all the style down to the ironware and the operating system . ” He was speak about the ambitious newMayday expert support buttonon the Kindle Fire HDX , which provides 24/7/365 live video assistance , but this idea ( and really , Mayday itself ) is as disposed a metaphor as you ’ll witness for Amazon ’s content for success .
https://gizmodo.com/amazon-building-24-7-365-video-tech-support-into-kindle-1381717261
Mayday was also a chance for Bezos to distill the unconscious process of what happens when Amazon decide it absolutely needs to build a machine to resolve a problem . “ This , ” he enunciate , direct to a white board he ’d filled up at the beginning of the encounter with a Venn diagram of “ Customer delectation ” and “ recondite integrating throughout the stack ” . ( The summing up of what “ the stack ” way is scrawled off on the side . Bottom up , it reads : Hardware , OS , Key Apps , Cloud , Services . ) And in the middle of the two — between pleasure and integration — is “ where some of the hardest to do , but also the coolest to do thing ” shack . “ And the Mayday button is a perfect instance of that . ”
It really is . With Mayday , Amazon is play “ the stack ” at both ends . On one side , there ’s a mysterious , OS- and hardware - spirit level integration the serve itself , which comprises a release in configurations that , within about 15 arcsecond , will have a live customer armed service technician video recording - chatting with you , right on your tablet , complete with the ability draw arrow or directions , or even change setting themselves . It requires an incredibly all right grade of customization , which Amazon can do because it ’s building its own hardware , has pitchfork its own version of Android , Fire OS , and has mastery over a image of avail . “ so as to get this to work out , ” Bezos says , “ We ’ve even had to optimise how we ’re grapple the packet for the television transmission . So this is a very deep integration to make that oeuvre . ”
On the other side , this is a truly monolithic undertaking . Imagine the call centers and data point centers and cloud substructure necessary to assume the load of one thousand thousand of Fire owner , at once , press a button and summon a live human being to video chat with them . It ’s astonishing , but also pragmatic , since Amazon is already pay thousands of people to provide Kindle technical living , and this will ultimately make that process easier .
It ’s only potential , though , because Amazon has the money , the clout , and the aspiration to progress itself solutions to its problems , to fill in any missing opus of its stack , in a way that every consumer electronics company tries to but few accomplish .
As Amazon has grown , that ’s left it in a position to nail unique opportunity for client “ delight , ” and leverage its entire command of several stacks ( or one marvellous , coordinated one ) to get there . “ This is one of the thing [ Amazon ] is uniquely suited to do , ” Bezos order , “ To espouse together high tech and heavy lifting . That ’s really what this is already about . ”
Still , on the surface , this is a foreign way to visualize the estimation — customer satisfaction , or delight , could just as easily add up from that integration itself , no ? specially in an long time when consumer technical school ecosystem are more tightly guarded than ever .
It makes more sense when you remember how focused Amazon has always been on the customer , specifically . Bezos is known to read through private customer complaints and ahead them to his executives , sometimes requiring senior staff to work long hr to figure out an issue only a few people have bothered to cover . Like any good salesman , he knows that customer stick with you when then know you ’ll solve their problem , however swelled or belittled .
This is Amazon ’s other biggest philosophy , and strength . You ’re not a drug user . Only advertizer really worry about user . You are , at all clip , a client , and Amazon is going to treat you like one . It ’s extend to keep sell to you , whenever and wherever you ’re within a Harlan Fisk Stone ’s cam stroke of its products . But Bezos reject the melodic theme that this is inherently — or at all — a negative .
The Kindle Fire mantra has always been that Amazon only make money when you use it . To some , that ’s like buying a tablet that ’s evermore asking you if you ’d like fries with that . Not so , says Bezos . Even “ Buy Now ! ” features like the insistent soundtrack - purchase option in new features like X - Ray for Movies ? “ That ’s convenient ! ” he fires back , as if from an ejector seat . “ Someone ’s not pass away to buy something they do n’t want to buy . But if they do need to corrupt it , they do n’t need it to be seven step when it could be one . ” It also , incidentally , keeps Kindle Fire hardware prices unprecedentedly low .
Like Amazon itself , Bezos is always pitching . Even throughout mostly casual conversation about the HDX , he reflexively loop back around to his main talk and selling point . Premium merchandise for non - premium pricing . We only make money when you use it . Customer delight . It ’s mesmerizing enough that you almost intercept remark it .
This is how innovation will probably look for the Fire and Fire OS in the near future . Progress through well , elongate hardware upgrades , and software that ’s unambiguously Amazon . One of the principles of Amazon under Bezos is that the cyberspace , even now , is in its infancy . And the pill particularly , Bezos recollect , is immature compared to what it will finally be . Amazon ’s already been surprised by how many families and kids are using Fire machine , and how many fire end up at the office or as productivity machines .
“ But as we depend forrard , ” Bezos allege , “ I think a lot of the most innovative things are going to come on the software side . I ’d say the technology difference between the generation just prior to the Kindle Paperwhite and Kindle Paperwhite is probably a much bigger leap than what you ’ve consider in tablet so far . … At launching of new generations of products , people be given to get very hardware - focalize , but as you see what customer in reality do with the equipment , the software turns up to be critically authoritative . So things like the Mayday button I think are also significant . ”
Mayday represents Amazon ’s capability to do almost literally anything it dress its judgment to . Combine that with the brain - boggling ubiquity of a Kindle app on every platform . To you , valued customer , that can be a tantalizing suggestion , as long as you ’re buying what Jeff Bezos is selling .
AmazonJeff Bezos
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