One Click: Jeff Bezos and the Rise of Amazon.com

by Richard L. Brandt

Overview

Amazon's business model is deceptively simple: Make online shopping so easy and convenient that customers won't think twice. It can almost be summed up by the button on every page: "Buy now with one click."

Why has Amazon been so successful? Much of it has to do with Jeff Bezos, the CEO and founder, whose unique combination of character traits and business strategy have driven Amazon to the top of the online retail world.

Richard Brandt charts Bezos's rise from computer nerd to world- changing entrepreneur. His success can be credited to his forward-looking insights and ruthless business sense. Brandt explains:

• Why Bezos decided to allow negative product reviews, correctly guessing that the earned trust would outweigh possible lost sales.
  
• Why Amazon zealously guards some patents yet freely shares others.
  
• Why Bezos called becoming profitable the "dumbest" thing they could do in 1997.
  
• How Amazon.com became one of the only dotcoms to survive the bust of the early 2000s.
  
• Where the company is headed next.

  Through interviews with Amazon employees, competitors, and observers, Brandt has deciphered how Bezos makes decisions. The story of Amazon's ongoing evolution is a case study in how to reinvent an entire industry, and one that anyone in business today ignores at their peril.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781101516232
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	10/27/2011
Sold by:	Penguin Group
Format:	eBook
Pages:	240
Sales rank:	992,911
File size:	331 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Richard L. Brandt is an award-winning journalist who has been writing about Silicon Valley for more than two decades. He is well known throughout the technology community as a former correspondent for BusinessWeek, where he won a National Magazine Award. He lives in San Francisco. Visit richardbrandt.com

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“Richard Brandt compellingly profiles one of the greatest Internet executives of the era.”
—Stephen Leeb, author of The Oil Factor and Red Alert

“Brandt is an award-winning magazine writer and he has the classic U.S. journalist’s approach—meticulously researched and with breathless, pithy commentary . . . a good story well told. If you want to understand the Bezos phenomenon, this is an easy and efficient way to do it—just like shopping on Amazon.”
—Management Today

Editorial Reviews

Richard Brandt compellingly profiles one of the greatest Internet executives of the era.”
—Stephen Leeb, author of The Oil Factor and Red Alert

“Brandt is an award-winning magazine writer and he has the classic U.S. journalist’s approach—meticulously researched and with breathless, pithy commentary . . . a good story well told. If you want to understand the Bezos phenomenon, this is an easy and efficient way to do it—just like shopping on Amazon.”
—Management Today

From the Publisher

With a workmanlike performance, Neil Shah delivers a cursory examination of the founder and CEO of amazon.com. Shah’s tedious staccato delivery does not provide the characterizations or varied intonation necessary to give this interesting story an engaging delivery. Bezos’s ruthless business sense is explained within the context of his fierce focus on superb customer service—even at the expense of potential profits in the early years. The content is a solid introduction to amazon.com and the genius who created it. However, Shah’s narration does not assist in making this more than a surface examination. W.A.G. © AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine

JANUARY 2012 - AudioFile