With Black Friday just a few days away, arguments will ensue again as to which online retailer is on top.
In reality, you have to consider a combination of factors to be able to decide which online retailer is on top. As far as this combination of factors goes, I recently had an experience with Amazon (AMZN) that further reinforced my belief that Amazon stock is ahead of the pack in the online retail business.
Working with AMZN Firsthand
I have had an account with Amazon since around the first quarter of 2014. At the time, the only thing I did with Amazon was purchase Kindle books. By March of this year, I unfortunately lost access to my main laptop, on which I opened my Amazon account, for about seven months and had to switch to a temporary laptop.
Before I had my laptop restored, I needed to make some tangible orders — two Sony (SNE) Xperia Z3 cell phones and some accessories. As with most online accounts managed by reputable companies, I was asked to verify my identity by answering a security question, since I was trying to access my account from an unfamiliar computer.
It seemed Amazon set up the security question automatically, as I never actually set a security question on the site myself. So I couldn’t answer the question and as such, couldn’t access the account. I tried chatting with the support team to have them solve it for me, but I guess I couldn’t explain my issues in a way that they would understand, meaning my account remained locked.
As I really needed to make those purchases, I ignorantly opened another Amazon account to place the orders. I placed the orders, they were declined, and my access to the new account was blocked due to payment information issues. I thought the issues were related to my billing information. However, it turned out that the orders were declined because the credit card information was identical to that of another account. I only found out after I tried opening a third Amazon account and I got blocked again for the same reason, even though I made sure all details were correct.
Out of frustration, I thought, “if Amazon won’t let me order with it, there are scads of online stores where I can place my orders.” Walmart (WMT), Target (TGT), eBay (EBAY) and Best Buy (BBY) still exist, right? And I said to myself that Amazon stock just lost a customer. But then …
Sure all of these retailers are awesome, but I didn’t find them so awesome on this occasion. Of all the online stores I checked, I found the Xperia Z3 cellphone only on eBay and Walmart. Other stores didn’t have that product at all. And even at eBay and Walmart, the cheapest offers came at nothing less than a $50 premium to the cheapest available offer on Amazon at the time.
I instantly thought I had to settle things with Amazon. So I decided to call Amazon stock customer care, and my original account was restored once I was able to verify my identity.
Yeah, I know it was dumb to not try that all along.
I finally placed my order. I decided to try Amazon Prime with this order to see how Prime works. I chose the two-day free shipping at checkout. And my items were delivered few hours before the estimated delivery time after two days.
Have you noticed the values I mentioned earlier yet?
Here they are.
Amazon Stock Provides Top-Notch Security for its Customers: On some other sites, with the full credit card information I had, another person could have successfully used my card to place orders. In fact, the card that was attached to my original Amazon account had expired and I had received a new one. So it is quite remarkable that AMZN had a system in place that was able to match the information of the two cards and conclude that they were technically the same credit card.
Amazon Lists More Items Than Other Online Retailers: I know this because after I was frustrated with Amazon and wanted to place the orders elsewhere, I couldn’t find the items on most similar stores.
Amazon Stock Has Most of the Best Deals You’ll Find Online: I learned this through the fact that I couldn’t find the cellphone at a cheaper price than what was offered on Amazon.
Amazon Prime Actually Works: First, it gave me access to some juicy deals. Eventually, I got to ship my order free of charge — and the fact that it was free shipping didn’t even stop the items from being delivered within two days. I know there will be times where it won’t always go as planned, but I really plan to pay the $99 Prime fee.
Bottom Line
As I found during the process of finding an alternative online store, there is no other store that offers all the four values at the same time. And this will almost always make online shoppers use Amazon over competitors.
As such, for investors who are looking to tap into the opportunities that lurk in the online retail space, there can’t be a better stock to own than Amazon stock.
As of this writing, Craig Adeyanju did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
