Ecommerce: A Comparison of Strategies between Amazon and Alibaba

Running head: E-COMMERCE
Ecommerce
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The 21st century is the era of changes and modern scientific advancements. In short, we
can say that this is the time of competition and the companies all over the world are trying to win
this battle by some or the other means. This is the age of online retail sales and the customers can
find it really easy to shop via the online shopping sites. One of the issues that are arising in the
modern scenario is the growing popularity of Amazon. The growing popularity of Amazon is
attracting a major portion of the customers to shop from them. This is becoming one of the
major concerns for the other retail firms is that they might have to give in to the power and the
popularity of Amazon (Heinemann & Wenzel 2018).
It must be noted that the customers are paying much less attention to the physical stores
as they are getting a good range of products in the online sites of Amazon. As per the opinion of
Chiu et al., (2014), Alibaba is making huge investments in the markets that are located outside
China or US. This is indeed one of the innovative and interest idea as it helps them to gather a
huge amount of new ideas that are not that common in the US. Their main aim is to connect the
Chinese products to the rest of the world.
On the other hand, Amazon has not invested such huge amounts in the companies located
in the places outside the USA. The main concern of Amazon is to make sure that they are
capable of investing majorlyin globalizing or internationalizing their marketplace. It has to be
noted that Amazon is not really interested in making any minority investments in places outside
the US. Therefore it can be said that in the context of diversification and innovation in the
Global market Alibaba is trying to go ahead than Amazon. Wang, Wang & Liu, (2016) is of the
opinion that Amazon uses the strategy of acquiring whereas Alibaba uses the strategy of
investing. So, Alibaba has been able to take a minority stake in companies outside the US in

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comparison to Amazon. On the other hand, Amazon has been able to acquire 5times number of
companies than Alibaba.
One of the best approaches that can be taken by these online sites is to make the shopping
experience much easier and smooth for the users. It has been seen that the users usually find it
easier to shop on the Amazon sites as it is customer-centric. This is one of the best strategies that
are used by Amazon (Thakur & Srivastav, 2015). It really very user-friendly and it gives a free,
someplace and straightforward shopping place for the customers. However, at the same time,
eBay which is another e-commerce site following a seller-centric approach. They usually try to
bring in to focus on a large number of sellers who might have a wide range of the same product.
So, it is an obvious fact that the customers will like to buy the products from Amazon as it is
really very smooth and easier for them.
The other important strategy that is used by Amazon in order to boost the online strategy
is indeed a very good and innovative one. Einav et al., (2014) has suggested that the option if
Amazon prime logo is indeed very important for getting the attention of the customers. The
Amazon prime subscribers are eligible to get a large number of facilities.
The customers might not like to shop from other e-commerce sites as they will not get
these benefits. Shang et al., (2017) is of the opinion that Amazon is still capable of marking their
presence felt within a large number of customers all over the world. Though Alibaba tries to
develop a very innovative and large number of contacts even outside the US, it is seen that
Amazon is way ahead of it. Amazon is still spread over a large number of areas than Alibaba. In
the year 2016, Amazon alone took about 53 percent of every dollar that was spent by the