E-commerce: Lessons Learned From Being an Amazon Partner

But devising a partnership with an 800 pound gorilla like Amazon requires careful planning. Following are the lessons she and her colleagues at Caswell-Massey learned while becoming an Amazon Merchant:

¥ Read the contract carefully. Amazon requires adherence to numerous practices as spelled out in its lengthy contract, said Rue. For example, Amazon devoted about five pages just to answering the question of who”owns” the Caswell-Massey customer. “If a new customer comes onto your file from the Amazon site, you can subsequently send direct marketing pieces, such as postcards or catalogs, to that person,” said Rue. “But you can’t market to them online. Amazon doesn’t allow e-mail marketing to Amazon-acquired names, and you can’t share those names with direct mail cooperatives.”