Trends in Retail Sector and Swot Analysis of Amazon

This report explores the emerging trends in the retail sector and conducts a SWOT analysis of Amazon. It discusses the importance of omni-channel strategies, personalized retail experiences, digital mobile wallets, and expanding into emerging markets. The report also provides recommendations and an action plan for Amazon to effectively adapt to the current trends in the retail industry.

Inquiry Based
Learning

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................3
Trends in retail sector.............................................................................................................3
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................4
History of organisation...........................................................................................................4
Swot analysis of Amazon.......................................................................................................5
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................6
Recommendations..................................................................................................................6
Action Plan.............................................................................................................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Trends refers to the ongoing cultural set of behaviour and activities in a certain sector. In the
following report different trends upcoming in the retail sector industry is discovered. The
following report helps in discovering various trends in the retail industry which are affecting
Amazon (Ferreira and et. al., 2020). Swot analysis of Amazon is performed in order to
understand what are the strengths and weaknesses of company related to the trends in the market
and various recommendations at the end of the report are also provided through the help of
which company can effectively fulfil needs of customer according to the current trends in the
retail industry.
TASK 1
Trends in retail sector
There is a lot of change seen in the retail industry is these days. Due to the change in
behaviour of customer the expectations of the customer are becoming higher and also this is
bringing changes in retail industry. Below mentioned are some of the major changes in retail
industry adopting which a number of retail giants have successfully achieved all their objectives.
These trains are also seen in Amazon:
Investment in omni channel strategies: It is necessary for retail industry to use omni-
channel retail strategies. It shows how a consumer who is making a purchase look for the items
before they pick it up in the store on the web (Friedlander and Zoellner, 2020). This helps them
to make sure that the item they are buying is fulfilling all the needs and requirements of
customers. Similarly Amazon sees a number of customers who have already checked the
products in the store and they are buying from Amazon due to the discounts provided by
Amazon. A number of retailers can be seen that tapping into different mobile shopping Waze for
customers. There are a number of retailers who are using mobile tablets for their sales associates
so that they can make the journey of a customer interactive as well as easy. It helps a consumer
in exploring different options for purchasing the services of products from the company.
Personalised retail experience: Another retail trend seen these days is the requirement for
personalised shopping experience by the customer. This helps the customer to get the products
based on their order history, test, research as well as previous searches. It is necessary for the
retailers to use this trend and make sure that they are getting customer engagement as well as

introduction. There are a number of ways in order to do so which include text messages,
providing update on the orders of the customer, communication Delhi-based and so on. It is
necessary to make customer feel important with unique personalised shopping experiences so
that they might invest much in shopping.
Digital mobile wallet: The much is seen trend in retail industry is use of mobile as a
method for payment of the purchase of services and products. It is seen that there are a number
of smartphone users who use the smart phones for payment at a number of places in their daily
life. The retail industry can see the customers getting convenient option while they are using
mobile for the payments. There are a number of merchants in United Kingdom and retail
industry who have accepted mobile payment. The rise in digital wallet shows that due to growing
demand of customers it becomes necessary for the retail industry to make sure that they are using
the mobile wallet effectively. Due to rise in use of mobile wallet it can also be seen customer are
demanding a number of different ways of mobile payments. It is necessary for the retailers to
make sure that they are providing customers with flexible methods of payments. This
incorporates a number of mobile payment services and also helps the retail industry to grow and
expand its business increasing customer satisfaction and convenience.
Emerging market: Another major trend seen in retail industry is company stepping into new
markets and the different channels. It is often seen that due to the growing technology it has
begun easy for a number of retail companies to start their business in international and emerging
markets (Jørgensen, and Pedersen, 2019) . It is often seen that retailers these days or not situated
in a single location or a market. A number of retails are working overseas with the help of digital
support. This helps them to work beyond the borders and a number of companies like Alibaba,
Myntra, Shin, Amazon have globally reached a number of countries including Australia, Europe,
Japan, Asia and so on.
TASK 2
History of organisation
Amazon was started on fifth of July 1994 by Jeff Bezos in Washington. It was first a place
for selling books online but with time it expanded into selling a number of objects such as
electronics, video games, apparel, furniture, jewellery and so on. There have been a number of
developments seen in Amazon since then. Amazon is majorly known for its industry which is

well-established with the help of technological changes and innovation. Amazon is one of the
world’s largest online retail market place for the consumers. There are a number of different
services provided by Amazon including live streaming platform as well as cloud computing
platform. This helps the company to increase its revenue and market capitalization. When
considering the revenue Amazon is the world’s largest company. And it is also the second largest
employer in United States. There are a number of different services which Amazon provide such
as video, music, audiobooks with the different applications such as prime video, Twitch,
Amazon Music and so on.
Swot analysis of Amazon
Amazon is a huge retail company working online. There are a number of internal strengths,
weaknesses, opportunities and threats for the company (Shults and Bit-Savva, 2019). This can be
analysed with the help of swot analysis. Swot analysis conducted on Amazon is mentioned
below:
Strengths:
 Amazon has a strong brand name which is known globally. It is a global e-commerce
giant. The position of Amazon in the market is strong and successful.
 The brand value of Amazon is very high. This helps the company to stay in the market
and grab the market share efficiently.
 There are a large number of customers who are all satisfied by Amazon every day. With
the help of inexpensive prices and customer orientation Amazon is a successful brand.
 Amazon brings in a number of creation and inventions every day. It helps company to
grab customer attention.
Weaknesses:
 The online retail business is an imitable business. A number of companies can easily
copy the style of Amazon and builders’ firm same as Amazon. There are a number of
competitors such as eBay, Netflix and oyster who are competitors of Amazon.
 Due to providing free shipping and a number of discounts to the customer Amazon is
facing a problem of low margins. Due to low margins of the company is also facing risk.
 It is often seen that a number of products which are launched by Amazon originally or
seen failure. This includes Kindle fire, fire phones and so on.

 Company have also seen negative publicity due to Tax avoidance in Japan, United
Kingdom and United States. This have resulted in negative brand publicity of company.
Opportunities:
 There are a number of opportunities present for Amazon to penetrate as well as expand
its business in a number of developing markets.
 Amazon can also open its physical stores and provide competition to a number of
different retail stores which are engaged with customers physically.
 The technological measures as well as the policies of organisation can be improved in
order to make sure that they can reduce the counterfeit sales. It is often seen that due to a
number of factors counterfeit sales proves to be bringing losses for the company.
 Company needs to make sure that they are acquiring a number of different brands into the
company and making sure that the market share of company is increasing as well as the
competition in the market is reducing.
Threats:
 There is threat of new entrant due to the easy imitation of the business model used by
Amazon.
 It is seen that the competition in retailers is very aggressive which is another threat for the
company.
 Due to increase in cybercrime the network security system of the company is facing a
number of problems.
 There are different government regulations which also prove to be threat for the business
proceeding of Amazon in a number of countries.
 It has also been seen that due to some controversies the brand image of Amazon is
depleting.
TASK 3
Recommendations
Based on the above learning of the different trends emerging in the market and a number of
different strengths and weaknesses for Amazon below mentioned are some of the
recommendations for the company to make sure that they are working on their weaknesses and

playing with their strengths in order to make sure that the current changes and trends in the retail
market can be adopted by the company successfully (Skačanová and Battesti, 2019).
 With the help of this water analysis mentioned above it can be said that the operations of
Amazon can be continued to be explained as there is a number of different opportunities
in the business environment for Amazon. Company can easily grow into e-commerce
market and also develop high growth developing economics.
 It is required by Amazon to make sure that they are revising their strategies. This is
because the strategies used by company is easily imitable and a number of companies and
copy the strategy of Amazon and start their business in the global market. Company
needs to study all the external and internal factors in order to create a strategy for the
development and expansion in the market.
 It is also advised for Amazon to make sure that they continue their diversifying business
in a number of different segments to make sure that they are strengthening the industry
specific risk. They can also develop a number of new partnerships so that they can extend
the reach of the market and also reinforce the company as a multinational operation and
brand against the competitors in the market.
Action Plan
An action plan is a plan which provides outline four different actions which are needed by a
firm or an organisation to reach its goals. The usually is a sequence of steps that are taken or the
activities which are needed to perform in order to bring a certain success (Nayak, Akbari and
Far, 2019). Action plan for Amazon to make sure that they are dealing with all the growing retail
trends in the market are mentioned below
 Amazon is making sure that they include different assembling as well as holiday season
ends goods in the sale.
 Amazon is also bringing in special discounts so that they can neutralise the plans which is
brought in the sales and also use the re-price of products in their favour.
 In order to manage the inventory of the organisation they are also using inventory clean-
up methods. It is using different warehouses in which all the stocks are transferred
effectively.

 It is also required by Amazon to make sure that they are checking their product returns
account effectively. It is necessary to manage the accounting for the return of sales as
well as the tax of sales so that the orders can be returned effectively.
 It is also necessary for Amazon to strictly monitor the news and announcements so that
they can adhere and bring changes in their warehouse as well as shipping deadlines for
the Caesars which are upcoming. It is necessary for them to make a record of all the
announcement and also fulfil different inventory storage fees for the holiday season’s
upcoming.
CONCLUSION
From the above report it can be clearly concluded that there are a number of different trains
which have been seen in the retail industry currently. The students are seen to develop the
customer satisfaction and also the requirement of customers. It is necessary by the retail industry
to address all these needs of the customer and the growing trends in the market. With the help of
a proper recommendation and analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the company it is easy
for them to create a plan which will help them to address all the needs of customer as concluded
in the report.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Ferreira, M.J. and et. al., 2020, April. The Digital Transformation at Organizations–The Case of
Retail Sector. In World Conference on Information Systems and Technologies (pp.
560-567). Springer, Cham.
Friedlander, A. and Zoellner, C., 2020. Artificial Intelligence Opportunities to Improve Food
Safety at Retail. Food Protection Trends, 40(4), pp.272-278.
Jørgensen, S. and Pedersen, L.J.T., 2019. Toward smart and sustainable business models in
retail. In Innovation for Sustainability (pp. 177-192). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.
Shults, G.M. and Bit-Savva, Y.V., 2019. Russian Retail: Modern Condition and Development
Trends. In The European Proceedings of Social & Behavioural Sciences
EpSBS (pp. 511-519).
Skačanová, K.Z. and Battesti, M., 2019. Global market and policy trends for CO2 in
refrigeration. International Journal of Refrigeration, 107, pp.98-104.
Nayak, R., Akbari, M. and Far, S.M., 2019. Recent sustainable trends in Vietnam's fashion
supply chain. Journal of Cleaner Production, 225, pp.291-303.