Strategic Global analysis of Amazon to gain learnings and best practices.

1. AMAZON GLOBAL
ANALYSIS
>> THE GOLIATH START-UP
March 2018

2. / Understand Amazon and their market strategy and communication across all channels
/ Identify strategic plays and business philosophy that aid in their growth and success
/ A focus on relevant Chevrolet key markets – United States, Brazil, China and Mexico, in
collaboration with Carat
/ Better understand these plays and take inspiration from their strengths
UNDERSTAND THE
AMAZON
PLAYBOOK
WHY ARE WE HERE?
2GM CONFIDENTIAL |

3. THE TRUTH
ABOUT AMAZON
AND WHY WE
CHOSE TO STUDY
THEM …
3GM CONFIDENTIAL |

4. WHO IS AMAZON?
THE LARGEST
ONLINE RETAILER
IN THE WORLD.Measured by online sales/revenue.
$94.7 billion in online sales - representing 70% of the company’s total revenue.
Source: Wikipedia, Amazon.com Press Room

5. / ‘Cadabra’ began in a small Seattle office
/ Origins as an online bookstore
/ Bell-ringing sales
/ Expanded offerings, services, products, etc.
Leading to …
FROM
HUMBLE
BEGINNINGS
AS A SIMPLE
BOOKSTORE
…
Source: Amazon.com Press
Room

6. TO A GLOBAL
‘EVERYTHING’
EMPIRE
/ 4th most valuable public company in the world
/ 8th largest employer in the United States
/ In 2017, they acquired Whole Foods Market for $13.4
billion - vastly increased their brick-and-mortar presence
/ Expanded their retail websites in the United States, the
United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Canada, Germany, Italy,
Spain, Netherlands, Australia, Brazil, Japan, China, India
and Mexico as well as offered international shipping to
certain other countries
Source: Wikipedia, Amazon.com Press Room 6GM CONFIDENTIAL |

7. SHIPPING AND FULFILLMENT SERVICES
QUICK ORDERING DASH BUTTONS
DRONE DELIVERY SERVICES
HUMANLESS GROCERY STORES
BRICK-AND-MORTAR BOOKSTORES
AMAZON RANGE OF PRODUCTS
FRESH FOOD DELIVERY
WEB-HOSTING SERVICES
STREAMING VIDEO SERVICES
PANTRY SERVICES
AMAZON ECHO/ALEXA
AMAZON FIRE
AMAZON KINDLE

8. LEADING TO SKYROCKETING
NET SALES
1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
Net Sales 511 15,746 147,758 609,99 1,639, 2,761, 3,122, 3,932, 5,264, 6,921, 8,490, 10,711 14,835 10,228 12,828 18,707 48,077 61,093 74,452 88,988 107,06 135,98
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
160
MILLIONS
8GM CONFIDENTIAL |

9. BECOMING TWICE AS VALUABLE
AS WALMART
Source: Fact Set, Recode
$0
$50
$100
$150
$200
$250
$300
$350
$400
$450
$500
1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
BILLIONS
Amazon Walmart
billion market cap
9GM CONFIDENTIAL |

10. MAKING
UP 44%
OF ALL
U.S.
ONLINE
SALES
/ That's up from 33% in 2015 and 25% in 2012
/ Amazon used to be a way to buy books online – and
today, it’s the default buying site for just about everything,
especially for those with Amazon Prime
Source: Business Insider 10GM CONFIDENTIAL |

11. CONSISTENTLY MAKING
HEADLINES, CAPTURING
OUR IMAGINATIONS AND
MARKET SHARE
11GM CONFIDENTIAL |

12. BUSINESS
PLAYBOOK
START-UP
MINDSET
CUSTOME
R-
OBSESSE
D
12GM CONFIDENTIAL |

13. BUSINESS PLAY NO. 1
START-UP MINDSET
13GM CONFIDENTIAL |

14. 14GM CONFIDENTIAL |

15. “EVERY DAY
IS ALWAYS DAY
1”
/ To be a start-up is to claim a freshness with a finger on the pulse of the future
/ Speed and adaptability are crucial factors
/ Be fluid and adapt to any challenges that come along
Source: SEC, Merriam-Webster, Forbes
~Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon
15GM CONFIDENTIAL |

16. “You need to be making big, noticeable failures. The great
thing is that, when you take this approach, a small number
of winners pay for dozens, hundreds of failures, and so
every single important thing we’ve done has taken a lot of
risk, risk-taking, perseverance, guts, and some have
worked out. Most of them have not. That has to happen at
every scale level all the way down.”
~Jeff Bezos, CEO of
Amazon
HIGH-VELOCITY
DECISION-MAKING
COMES WITH
FAILURE
SOURCE: SEC, Amazon 16GM CONFIDENTIAL |

17. AMAZON
DECISION-
MAKING
PARADIGMNot reversible, and you
have to be very careful
making them.
Like walking through a door — if
you don’t like the decision, you
can always go back.
TYPE
1
TYPE
2
Vs.
SOURCE: SEC, Amazon 17GM CONFIDENTIAL |

18. AMAZON’S NEW
GROCERY STORE
PROVES THE
$350 BILLION
COMPANY ACTS
MORE LIKE A GIANT
STARTUP
/ Bezos considers Amazon Go a “Type 2” decision, in
which he can go back and change things
/ By not making it a “Type 1” decision, Amazon can move
fast and minimize the risk, preventing the company from
wasting time and resources
SOURCE: Business Insider 18GM CONFIDENTIAL |

19. BUSINESS PLAY NO. 2
CUSTOMER-OBSESSED
19GM CONFIDENTIAL |

20. CUSTOMER-OBSESSED
SINCE THE BEGINNING
/ In the beginning, every email sent was signed by Jeff Bezos
/ Amazon.com employees spend two days every two years working at the customer service desk —
even the CEO — to help all workers understand the customer service process
“Our vision is to be earth’s most customer-
centric company; to build a place where
people can come to find and discover
anything they might want to buy online.”
~ Jeff Bezos
20Source: Business Insider, Amazon, YouTube GM CONFIDENTIAL |

21. “WE’RE NOT COMPETITOR-
OBSESSED, WE’RE
CUSTOMER-OBSESSED.
WE START WITH THE
CUSTOMER
AND WORK BACKWARDS.”~ Jeff Bezos
21GM CONFIDENTIAL |

22. 22GM CONFIDENTIAL |
CONTINUOUS,
STREAMLINED CUSTOMER
JOURNEY
SOURCE: Forbes
/ The classic Journey: An extended consideration and evaluation phase before entering a new round
of consideration and evaluation that may lead to the subsequent purchase with a different retailer
/ The New Journey: Compressed consideration step and a shortened/eliminated evaluation step -
Amazon excels at delivering and locking customers directly into the loyalty loop

23. THE AMAZON
EFFECT
/ To offset the Amazon Effect, brands must get ahead of
the expectations curve
/ 76% of consumers expect organizations to understand
their individual needs – they take for granted that a
company will know and understand their individual
needs, search and ordering history
SINGLEHANDEDLY RAISED THE BAR
OF CUSTOMER EXPECTATIONS
SOURCE: Forbes 23GM CONFIDENTIAL |

24. WINNING STRATEGIES
GM CONFIDENTIAL | 24
BENEFIT-
FOCUSED
RETAIL
CAPTIVATIN
G
IMAGINATIO
NS
RAPID
PROTOTYPI
NG OF THE
FUTURE
MOBILE
FIRST

25. WINNING STRATEGY NO. 1
MOBILE FIRST
25GM CONFIDENTIAL |

26. / Mobile purchases are rapidly increasing - 25%
increase in 2015 and 29% early 2016
/ 70% of Amazon customers purchased items on
mobile devices (Q4 2015)
MOBILE-FIRST SALES
LEADING A MOBILE-
FIRST STRATEGY
SOURCE: CPC Strategy
15.3 19.9
11.0
9.9
73.7 70.2
0%
50%
100%
2015 2016
ORDERS BY DEVICE
Phone Tablet Desktop
Total
Mobile
26.3% 29.8%
Share (%) of e-commerce orders by device
26GM CONFIDENTIAL |

27. SOURCE: CPC Strategy
UNIQUE MOBILE VS. DESKTOP
APPROACH
DESKTOP
/ The desktop buyer experience is more conducive to the
“shopping around” and research phases of a purchase
/ Advertisements are a more abundant on the desktop and
slightly easier to identify
/ More detailed product descriptions and suggestions for
users “shopping around”
MOBILE
/ Quick purchase and suggestions aimed at providing a fast
and simple “on the go” shopping experience
/ Advertisement is limited to subtle banners and internal
marketing
/ Unique product descriptions and suggestions for users
Vs.
27GM CONFIDENTIAL |

28. WINNING STRATEGY NO. 2
BENEFIT-FOCUSED
RETAIL 28GM CONFIDENTIAL |

29. / A Human Truth Reflected In Their
Communications: Customers will always want
fast delivery, vast selection, low prices
/ A Range of Tones All Focused on the End
User Benefit: Retail communications range
from heartwarming to humorous, all with one
thing in common – illustrating how can
Amazon can benefit/enrich their lives
USER BENEFIT.
USER BENEFIT.
USER BENEFIT.
US JAPAN
MEXICO
CHINA BRAZIL
BRAZIL
29GM CONFIDENTIAL |

30. WINNING STRATEGY NO. 3
CAPTIVATING
IMAGINATIONS 30GM CONFIDENTIAL |

31. PAINT A VISION OF
WHAT
THE FUTURE COULD
/ Drone delivery, human-less grocery stores,
Amazon services, etc.
/ Not a promise of the future — an amuse-bouche to
whet our appetites and let us know that they care and
see what the future of consumerism means
/ Amazon holds a wealth of data and information about
its customers, giving them a unique perspective on
what consumers want from their retail outlets for their
homes, for their lives, etc., and they are able to use
this data to help ideate on future initiatives
WILL
BE
31GM CONFIDENTIAL |

32. / Rethinking the workspace of the future — as an
“alternative workspace” to boost collaboration
and creativity
/ Help the retail giant attract, retain and enhance
the productivity and well-being of its fast-
growing workforce
/ Amazon has partnered with Toyota to answer the
question of what the future of services, cities and …
even festivals (Burning Man) may look like
/ Toyota’s e-Palette is a flexible mobile box — it can be a
delivery unit, e-commerce vehicle, mobile hotel, ride
share vehicle and more. Together they are painting a
picture of what cities and infrastructure can look like
NEW WAYS TO INSPIRE AND
ATTRACT INNOVATION
TRANSFORM MUSIC
FESTIVALS WITH MOBILITY
INNOVATIONS
32GM CONFIDENTIAL |

33. WINNING STRATEGY NO. 4
RAPID PROTOTYPING
OF THE FUTURE 33GM CONFIDENTIAL |

34. / Investing its profits in expansion for decades
/ “Because of our emphasis on the long term, we may
make decisions and weigh tradeoffs differently than
some companies”
LONG-TERM VISION
OF CONTINUED
IMPROVEMENT
Mar '98 Sep '00 Mar '03 Sep '05 Mar '08 Sep '10 Mar '13 Sep '15 Mar '17
$0
$5
$10
$15
$20
$25
$30
$35
$40
$45
BILLIONS
Sales Net Income
$35.71
$0.72
34GM CONFIDENTIAL |

35. / Amazon uses its excellent Prime service as a way to
collect that valuable data - and increase the basket value
of products that its Prime customers will buy over time
/ They also mine hundreds of business metrics to assess
performance and determine what matters most to
customers now and in the future
DATA-DRIVEN
OBSESSION AIMED
AT IMPROVEMENT
SOURCE: Forbes, News Online 35GM CONFIDENTIAL |

36. THE POWER OF VOICE
TECHNOLOGY
36GM CONFIDENTIAL |SOURCE: Comscore, Mediapos, Activate, Technavio via Skyword
50% OF ALL
SEARCHES WILL
BE VOICE
SEARCHES BY
2020
ABOUT 30% OF
SEARCHES WILL
BE DONE
WITHOUT A
SCREEN BY 2020
THERE WILL BE
21.4 MILLION
SMART
SPEAKERS IN
THE U.S. BY 2020
BY 2019, THE
VOICE
RECOGNITION
MARKET WILL BE
A
$601 MILLION
INDUSTRY
40% OF ADULTS
NOW USE VOICE
SEARCH ONCE
PER DAY

37. 37GM CONFIDENTIAL |

38. / Voice Technology Is Here To Stay: 30% of our interactions with technology happened through
conversations with smart machines in 2017
/ Amazon’s Alexa Goal: help Alexa break free of the Echo speaker so that it can become a platform
all on its own. A new kind of operating system that we won’t see on a screen, but talk to
/ Alexa’s Growth Power Comes From Amazon Skills: Amazon opened its platform early to third-party
developers to program “skills” — the equivalent of “apps” — just months after it launched. Today,
Alexa has more than 5,000 skills – making the platform more enticing to users and brands alike
ALEXA IS THE LEADER IN
SMART VOICE
TECHNOLOGY
SOURCE: Wired, CES, Forbes 38GM CONFIDENTIAL |

39. 39GM CONFIDENTIAL |

40. 40GM CONFIDENTIAL |
DEVELOPING THE SMART
HOMES AND SMART
SERVICES
OF THE FUTURE/ Built on the Amazon trust and customer-obsessed
business philosophy
/ Built on customer insight and data
/ Amazon recognizes what consumers fundamentally
need/want – time

41. / The alliance between Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and
JPMorgan will focus on a non-profit solution for healthcare
of their 1.1 million employees and their families.
/ “Our goal is to create solutions that benefit our U.S.
employees, their families, and potentially, all Americans,”
said JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon.
TACKLING HEALTHCARE

42. SUMMARY
42GM CONFIDENTIAL |

43. STAYING A START-UP REQUIRES YOU TO
EXPERIMENT PATIENTLY, ACCEPT FAILURES,
PLANT SEEDS, PROTECT SAPLINGS, AND
DOUBLE DOWN WHEN YOU SEE CUSTOMER
DELIGHT. A CUSTOMER-OBSESSED
CULTURE BEST CREATES THE CONDITIONS
WHERE ALL OF THAT CAN HAPPEN.
~ Jeff Bezos
43GM CONFIDENTIAL |

44. BUSINESS PLAYBOOK
/ Start-Up Mindset: Every day is always day 1
/ Customer Obsessed: Focus on the customer and not the competition to get ahead and stay ahead
WINNING STRATEGIES: HOW THE PLAYBOOK COMES TO LIFE
/ Mobile First: Thinking mobile first means putting the customer at the center
/ Benefit-Focused Retail Communications: Focus on the end user and what they can get out of the product
/ Captivating the Imagination: Type 2 programs can captivate the imagination, even if they don’t come to fruition
/ Rapid Prototyping the Future: Act fast and smart – use data to guide and not control your decision
UNDERSTANDING
THE AMAZON
PLAYBOOK
44GM CONFIDENTIAL |

45. / The mindset of a start-up is a powerful business philosophy that can harness creativity and
innovation when lived earnestly
/ Putting the customer at the center of everything you do can shape a company
/ Being innovative and forward thinking should be celebrated and communicated with your target –
inspire them and share your creativity
45GM CONFIDENTIAL |
WHAT WE’VE
LEARNED
FROM AMAZON

46. APPENDIX
46GM CONFIDENTIAL |

47. “I KNEW THAT IF I FAILED I
WOULDN’T REGRET THAT,
BUT I KNEW THE ONE THING I
MIGHT REGRET IS NOT
TRYING.”
~ Jeff
Bezos
47GM CONFIDENTIAL |

48. AMAZON IS TOP OF
MIND FOR CORPORATIONS
/ Amazon is mentioned in more corporate conference
calls than Google.
Source: Fact Set, Recode (Data through Oct 11 – searched for Google or Alphabet and beyond)
0.0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1.0
1.2
1.4
1.6
1.8
2.0
2.2
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Thousands
Amazon Google
(transcriptsinwhichit’smentioned)
GM CONFIDENTIAL | 48

49. 10 YEARS OF RAPID BUSINESS
EXPANSION
GM CONFIDENTIAL | 49

50. DRIVING THEM TO E-
COMMERCE
MARKET DOMINATION
21%
25% 27%
31% 32% 33% 34%
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
Amazon U.S. e-commerce Market Share
GM CONFIDENTIAL | 50

51. AMAZON SUCCESS
PHILOSOPHIES#1 SET THE BAR HIGH IN HIRING
/ “This has been, and will continue to be, the single most important element of Amazon.com success. You can work long, hard, or smart, but at Amazon you can’t choose two out of
three.”
#2 TRUE CUSTOMER OBSESSION
/ “Staying a start-up requires you to experiment patiently, accept failures, plant seeds, protect saplings, and double down when you see customer delight. A customer-obsessed culture
best creates the conditions where all of that can happen.”
#3 PROACTIVITY TO CREATE TRUST
/ “When we’re at our best, we don’t wait for external pressures. We are internally driven to improve our services, adding benefits and features before we have to. We lower prices,
increase value for customers and invent before we have to.”
#4 RESIST PROXIES
/ “As companies get larger and more complex, they focus on doing the processes right instead of the outcomes. The process is not the thing. It’s always worth asking, do we own the
process or does the process own us?”
#5 EMBRACE EXTERNAL TRENDS
/ “If you fight trends, you’re probably fighting the future. If you embrace them, you will have a tailwind. We’re in the middle of an obvious one right now: machine learning and artificial
intelligence.”
#6 HIGH-VELOCITY DECISION MAKING
/ The team at Amazon keeps its decision-making velocity high. Speed matters in business – plus it’s a more fun environment.
1. Never use a one-size-fits-all decision-making process.
2. Make most decisions with ~70% of the info you wish you had.
3. Quickly recognize and correct bad decisions.
4. “Disagree and commit” if you trust the people but not the idea.
5. Recognize true misalignment early and escalate it immediately.
GM CONFIDENTIAL | 51

52. A BRIEF HISTORY OF AMAZON
/ In 1994, Bezos left his employment as vice-president of D. E. Shaw & Co., a Wall Street firm, and moved to Seattle, Washington. He began to work on a
business plan for what would eventually become Amazon.com.
/ On July 5, 1994, Bezos incorporated the company as Cadabra, Inc. Bezos changed the name to Amazon.com, Inc. a few months later, after a lawyer misheard
its original name as “cadaver”. In September 1994, Bezos purchased the URL Relentless.com and briefly considered naming his online store Relentless, but
friends told him the name sounded a bit sinister. The company went online as Amazon.com in 1995.
/ After reading a report about the future of the Internet that projected annual Web commerce growth at 2,300%, Bezos created a list of 20 products that could be
marketed online. He narrowed the list to what he felt were the five most promising products, which included: compact discs, computer hardware, computer
software, videos, and books. Bezos finally decided that his new business would sell books online, due to the large worldwide demand for literature, the low
price points for books, along with the huge number of titles available in print. Amazon was founded in the garage of Bezos’ home in Bellevue, Washington.
/ In October 1995, the company announced itself to the public. In 1996, it was reincorporated in Delaware. Amazon issued its initial public offering of stock on
May 15, 1997, trading under the NASDAQ stock exchange symbol AMZN, at a price of US$18.00 per share ($1.50 after three stock splits in the late 1990s).
/ In a move indicating that its aspirations extend to selling far more than books over the Internet, Amazon.com announced its purchase of Junglee Corporation in
August 1998 – a service that lets people shop for everything from clothing to computers. Separately, Amazon.com also bought Planet All, which operates a vast
Internet address service that allows people to stay in touch with their friends and associates.
/ Amazon.com hopes to sell books and its expanding variety of goods to Planet All’s 1.5 million members.
Source: Amazon Press Room GM CONFIDENTIAL | 52

53. / Amazon has more than 300,000 employees worldwide,
and 40,000 in Seattle alone.
/ As a portion of the city's working-age population —
roughly 528,000 — that comes out to 7.5% of the city
working at Amazon.
/ For perspective, if the same portion of New York City’s
adults worked for one company, that company would
have about 488,000 locals on staff.
7.5% OF SEATTLE’S
WORKING-AGE POPULATION
ARE AMAZON EMPLOYEES.
Jason Redmond/Reuters GM CONFIDENTIAL | 53

54. / The sum total of those investments in infrastructure and
supply chain management have made Amazon by far the
most valuable retailer in the United States.
/ Amazon’s $356 billion valuation is so big, it’s larger than
Walmart, Target, Best Buy, Macy’s, Kohl’s, JCPenney and
Sears combined.
/ With the recent acquisition of Whole Foods, there are no
signs the retailer has any plans to slow down.
AMAZON IS MORE
VALUABLE THAN ALL
MAJOR BRICK-AND-
MORTAR RETAILERS
COMBINED
Amazon GM CONFIDENTIAL | 54

55. THANK YOU