Big Picture Amazon Orders 2009-2010
I have mentioned numerous items of interest on the blog over the years: Books, music, movies, myriad art and the occasional craft.
While it is gratifying turning people on to unusual artists and craftsman, mentioning stuff from Amazon has an advantage that other sites can’t match: Tracking codes.
With these, I can see exactly how many people click to items. Its anonymous, so I cant see who bought what. But I can tell exactly how many items were purchased by Big Picture readers. Not just the quantity, but the clicks, prices and what the exact items were, as well as the prices paid for each item and the total amount spent.
The charts below are part of the reason I was upbeat on Retail in 2010. You can see the first 4 months of the year 2010 saw a big spending increase from the prior year. (You can also see the slowdown during the double dip fears and market correction in May and June). It was clear that consumers had come out of their bunkers and were spending more in 2010, culminating in the first substantial holiday season in several years. (Hey Amazon — any chance we can have a simple export function to excel?)
The AMZN codes also gave us the ability to create a nice spreadsheet (attached) as well as generate charts of purchase histories:
>
Big Picture Reader Amazon Purchases, 2009-2010
>
This is obviously imperfect — how many products were mentioned month to month was not identical, nor were the prices the same. Even blog traffic changes, and that could impact the final accounts.
Regardless, these numbers tell a story, one that the retail naysayers ignored at their own peril . . .
>
Data Source:
Amazon Order History
Tweet
Facebook
Reddit
Digg this!
January 13th, 2011 at 7:16 am
If anyone wants to take a swipe at generating more charts, have at.
January 13th, 2011 at 8:26 am
The readers here are more tech savvy than your average bear and AMZN has been increasing market share at the expense of the brick and mortar types, be interesting what their Christmas season margins look like.
I think most are sticking their noses out of the bunker a little and making some discretionary purchases but without the home ATM and with 10% of the workforce on the sidelines praying the Republicans aren’t able to stop their extended benefits permanently I’d say happy days are still a ways off. At least higher gas & commodity costs in finished goods will produce nice retail sales comps this year
January 13th, 2011 at 8:35 am
[ AMZN has been increasing market share at the expense of the brick and mortar types ]
I wonder how this bodes for commercial real estate going forward? What will the retail landscape look like in a generation?
As for consumer sentiment: I surmise that many consumers sense a generation of austerity ahead, at least relative to the froth of the last decade; a last gasp, spurred in part by jitter fatigue and funded by credit or default on other debt.
January 13th, 2011 at 8:45 am
Your readers most likely have an above average income and as mentioned above are above average when it comes to tech. I believe a review of your readers to determine the overall direction of the retail market is short sighted on your part Barry. I am a bit surprised on this one.
January 13th, 2011 at 8:46 am
curbyourrisk
No doubt about that. And as we saw, the higher end customers started buying items prior to the rest of the consumers. I will also tell you that I recieved thank you emails from the jewelery makers and artists I mentioned — they all saw an uptick in business following a mention in the blog.
But the bulk of these Amazon purchases were less expensive. Sure, people bought Beatles Box Sets, Capresso Coffee Makers and Lumix cameras, but the bulk were under $25 — mostly CDs, books, DVDs.
If I can find the time, I will do a breakdown by product
January 13th, 2011 at 8:48 am
? chart #2 YoY – I take it we mean Year over Year not Month by Month so #1 to #12 what year is #12 in your Amazon counting books?
~~~
BR: Yes, that is monthly data, 2010 compared to prior year (January = 1, February = 2 )
January 13th, 2011 at 8:48 am
Barry, I’m not sure I understand these charts. Are these the number of books/items that were sold that were bought by people clicking in from your site?
I know you said you couldn’t tell how many total clicks there were, but I assume you can tell how many clicks-that-resulted-in-an-immediate-purchase is available to you. Presumably they’d have to tell you that, because you are due some commission for those (and you probably should disclaim that when you post links, just to be squeaky clean, if that is in fact the case, and perhaps mention the opposite if you don’t).
You’d also want to normalize that based on the total number of clicks on your site. If the purchase rate is constant, but your site is growing more popular, that would also result in the “breakout” seen above. But you’ve probably already thought of that.
January 13th, 2011 at 8:49 am
Bruman
My traffic peaked in October 2008 during the crisis, stabilized in 2009,peaked again at the March 09 lows, and has been pretty consistent since then. (I’ll dig up a traffic chart).
The way Amazon works, if someone clicks over to the site through a link with my code (eg, Bailout Nation is: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0470596325/thebigpictu09-20), they track that, and anything else, that is bought.
It throws off a decent amount of data (and a few bucks) each month.
January 13th, 2011 at 8:53 am
nevermind I bet its % of change in ’09 ’10 and my 1st take was probably right .. ramp up to Christmas and the selling of tax refunds
January 13th, 2011 at 8:56 am
rktbrkr & bulfinch:
The new distribution channel of on-line retailing will further devalue retail RE (grocery stores being a possible exception). The 20th century trend towards strip malls in the suburbs and exurbs will fall by the wayside, leaving god-knows-what to fill the void of construction and expansion. Linear, as opposed to cyclical, wealth transfer can only result in imbalance.
January 13th, 2011 at 9:10 am
It’s amazing how little credit the Fed and QE get.
Look at the storyline just presented by Barry for 2010. Economy was picking up in early 2010. Double dip fears in mid-2010 mostly due to the Euro crisis. And the magically, recovery late in the year.
What he (and everyone else) leaves out is right around that time that this recovery started (late August) the Fed began to talk about more easing and more QE. And the economy continued to recover as the Fed implemented QE1.5 and then QE2.
People continue to ignore this trying to find other reasons for why business is picking up (recession fatigue?? are you serious?). They can’t and don’t want to see how much monetary policy effects the economy. And it’s not so much what the Fed does, but what is expected from the Fed.
That is why for me the biggest question mark for 2011 is what happens when QE2 is over and how will the markets react if QE3 isn’t implemented.
January 13th, 2011 at 9:46 am
Machiavelli999:
That’s fine, for a stock picker, but what about Joe Consumer? Any wage growth to offset debt, or just more debt (public and private)? What are the job/income prospects for recent and future college graduates?
I agree with the truth of your observations, absent recognition of and due respect for the 800 lb. gorilla. That said, the 800 lb. gorilla will do WTF he wants, as soon as he is ready.
The stock market isn’t the economy.
January 13th, 2011 at 9:47 am
BTW: The Fed and its reliance on QE ARE credit, and credit is debt. Are you ready to pay off the debt? I doubt it.
January 13th, 2011 at 10:21 am
Here is the traffic since I switched tot he Ritholtz.com domain and added Google Analytics:
(click for larger chart)
January 13th, 2011 at 11:06 am
Hey BR – interesting stats.. seems your bounce rate is pretty high – that indicates (to me) that people are coming in off a link posted elsewhere, reading the page and traipsing off some place else.
You might consider adding a “Related Posts” plugin near the bottom of the post (something like: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/yet-another-related-posts-plugin/, or one of the multitude of others). That might/could help the bounce rate and get the number of page views up, plus it could be a more automated way to reference previous posts on a certain topic (which I note that you do now manually) for existing users.
My two cents.
January 13th, 2011 at 11:12 am
Bary, thanks for sharing.
January 13th, 2011 at 11:12 am
Hello Barry, just read your Amazon post and wanted to let you know I can second your results. I am an Amazon reseller and December was my best month yet [after15 months full-time]. Big ticket items were selling in multiples, and my order volume was up 30% over average. Net revenue was up about 40%. The sales trend is continuing in January and now my only problem is acquiring more inventory to sell — at this rate I will be down too low to keep the sales numbers up. Traditionally I am told January and Feb are good sales months, esp. in
books, with summer slowing down, but I don’t have enough personal data to really say this for sure.
I also made several purchases for Xmas via Amazon, mainly due to convenience regarding traffic [I live in Metro DC] and Amazon’s Prime shipping program. I don’t think they break out the data for this category, but it is a sales weapon for the company that seems to me to be a big driver.
I’ve got a book coming out about the experience of running an Amazon/online business, with some content related to opportunity in the post-recession economy, and thought your post would be a good time to introduce myself and let you know I will send a follow-up when it is available.
January 13th, 2011 at 11:48 am
The biggest problem with drawing any conclusions from the comparisons would be taking account of the number of posts with Amazon affiliate links from year to year. You mention this but still try and draw some spending information from the data.
I noticed an extremely high number of Amazon affiliate posts this year. You could have simply posted four times as many affiliate links. Your gift links did seem excessive for a finance blog.
I agree as mentioned above that posts with affiliate links should be described as such. That is common practice on most blogs I visit. I think everyone would appreciate more candor in your advertising.
At Amazon’s top payout rate of 8.5% , $8,500 seems like too small an amount to be alienating your visitors.
January 13th, 2011 at 11:59 am
John McCormick: “It is infinitely easier to criticize than to create.”
January 13th, 2011 at 12:00 pm
I’d like to be able to do a count on the number of links versus traffic, but Word Press does not make that easy.
The feedback on the gift stuff was mostly positive — go read the comments there. (As noted, the Amazon money is incidental)
I find doing this stuff to be fun and different during the holiday season.
Anyone who doesn’t want to read a 9pm post on gifts/tchotchkes can certainly move to the next post.
January 13th, 2011 at 12:56 pm
I bought 13 books related to stock mkts after reading your review. Received my first book How I made 2 Million by Darvas and that book has changed my perception about technical analysis. Thanks for your review.
January 13th, 2011 at 1:46 pm
I did all of my holiday shopping via this (and two other) blogs — it ws an enormous time saver, and my wife loved the necklace I got her
January 13th, 2011 at 3:44 pm
BR, have you re-calculated your per hour pay for writing the book in light of the new 2010 sales numbers? I seem to recall you had yourself making something around $15/hour when you calculated it in 2009, later corrected by a commentor to a bit more.
BTW, I thought KOL would out-perform ACI in the near term when you mentioned it a couple months ago, but it’s been about a push. However, the speculative play I mentioned, PCX, has been a virtual moon-shot in that sector.
January 13th, 2011 at 3:48 pm
I still have yet to see one dime in royalties — all of the monies were off of the original 6 figure advance (I am not complaining, its merely the facts).
And truth be told, getting $100k for writing what I would have written anyway was manna from heaven!
January 13th, 2011 at 4:03 pm
I have to second the shopping suggestions, and add Bring back Friday Night Jazz!
January 13th, 2011 at 4:54 pm
BR, if you’re owed any money, you need to be aggressive when going after it. From conversations I’ve had with a former owner of a major recording label , it seems the longer they have your royalty money, the more likely it is they will think it belongs to them, not you. It may not work the same in publishing, especially since you’re a lawyer, but I thought I’d mention it.
January 13th, 2011 at 6:27 pm
You seems to have a good eye and ear for things…it would be interesting to see these stats on Amazon had you a regular habit of posting something/anything on a regular basis–instead of when we are all in gift-mode. I know you’ve enhanced my jazz collection and other genres…I bought “The Wire” b/c you spotted the one day steal of a lifetime of $75. Sadly, most of the things you post are things I want for me, so they aren’t helping me in the wife gift category!!!
I’ll bet you could start your own “Groupon” knock off with a “Big Picture” co-operative group… I suspect the demographics are pretty good for someone wanting to sell toys to grown boys…
January 13th, 2011 at 7:01 pm
The book needs to sell 50k more copies before I see royalties — I am happy with my deal.
I like the gift stuff, and the email is running 8 to 1 in favor.
I occassionally g et emails from people telling me “don’t do THIS I don’t care for it” — there are 50 posts a week, move on to the next one.
Here’s a dirty little secret — I write this blog for me, it helps me figure out what I think. The fact that half a million people a month read it is interesting, but not why I do it!
January 13th, 2011 at 7:37 pm
BR,
contrary to some other Hoots, heard above, this: “I’ll bet you could start your own “Groupon” knock off with a “Big Picture” co-operative group… I suspect the demographics are pretty good for someone wanting to sell toys to grown boys…”
could be a, real, good idea..
as you’ve, already, heard: “tell you that I recieved thank you emails from the jewelery makers and artists I mentioned — they all saw an uptick in business following a mention in the blog.”
&
“I have to second the shopping suggestions, and add Bring back Friday Night Jazz!” (as example..)
January 13th, 2011 at 10:54 pm
Barry — you got it exactly right. This is a valuable and interesting tool in your kit, particularly the comments section — however, it is, in the end, an apparatus for helping suss your thoughts. I’m not even an investor in the classical sense, but I come here because I think you are a great thinker.
I dig your mind!
January 14th, 2011 at 6:04 am
This is one of the few sites that is transparent in its traffic stats, Amazon relationship, and what you do as a find manager. I appreciate this
Keep doing what makes you productive and fulfilled and the profitability will follow