Google Checkout will not kill Amazon
The blogosphere is going nuts about Google Checkout today. The most controversial opinion comes from Rafe Needleman over at CNET, which calls Checkout an "Amazon Killer"
He couldn't be more wrong: People don't shop at Amazon just because you have your credit card information saved there-- almost all major e-commerce sites let you save your credit card info. People shop at Amazon because of low prices, huge selection, cheap/free shipping and great reliability. Google checkout provides none of this-- it is not a store, just a system to store credit card info. It is merely the Google version of Yahoo Wallet. Amazon and eBay have nothing to worry about. In fact, there's nothing stopping them from supporting Checkout themselves (aside from potential not-invented-here reasons).
Checkout is certainly significant, but not for the reasons Needleman mentions: The best part about Checkout comes by integrating it with Google advertisements. Forget cost-per-click, it's now cost-per-sale! This change makes click fraud is no longer something to worry about, which was one of the thorns in Google's side, at least in terms of Wall St perceptions of their business model.
I think Needleman's post is just another example of people gaming the blogosphere, as Richard MacManus ranted about the other day-- just write any "XYZ vs Google" post with an sensationalist headline and watch the hits roll in (this is the #3 post on techmeme right now). For this, Needleman gets a "nofollow" on my link-- this type of stuff shouldn't be encouraged.
google checkout amazon
posted by Maurice Codik @ 5:45 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
I get it that you disagree with me. And you make a good point in your rebuttal. But that's no reason to accuse me of pandering for links.
-Rafe
Hey Rafe,
Sorry if I offended you-- I tend to be very suspicious of this sort of thing, since it's so rampant.
However, you must admit that your headline was a little sensationalist, especially since you only dedicated 1 paragraph of the post to support that claim.
I tend to agree with rafe, although I have to admit that it is just a gut reaction and I've not thought it out to the very end.
But I've been using the internet, and internet commerce since before there was an amazon.com or ebay (when the only people using the internet were virtually all scientists and scholars, so it tended to be easier trust people, but I digress...)
What I think Google Checkout has that will make it such a threat to Amazon is that it appears (or will appear) virtually wherever you go. I use Amazon.com for all of the reasons that Maurice mentioned, and it may well be the single most often used web commerce site I use.
However, it is second to the total of the REST of the internet commerce sites that I use. That is, I use buy.com, circuitcity.com, techdepot.com, newegg.com, doveapparel.com, etc., and when you add all of those up, it dwarfs Amazon's share of my business. That's what makes me think that Google, with it's long arm, is going to make deals with all of those big companies and eventually overshadow amazon.com in total click sales.
My 2 cents, although it's only really worth what you paid for it.
Rafe's was sensational indeed, but did have few valid points in it !
But let me tell you , as maurice pointed out, google checkout is too small and rustic in front of amazon & ebay !
Its becoming more like a google-sensation these days among tech-crowd ! How far google checkout will reach a common man is something only time will tell.
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