Amazon in a Word: ‘Convenient’, ‘Great’, ‘Efficient’

The American public’s impression of the Internet retailer Amazon is unparalleled by other firms: 29.4% of respondents named Amazon as the company they admired most or second most, in a statistical tie with Apple, mentioned by 29.3% of respondents. However, Amazon has the highest positive sentiment and the lowest negative sentiment of the 11 companies studied, while Apple has the highest negative sentiment (38%).

When asked what one word comes to mind when thinking about Amazon, the most frequent responses were convenient, great, efficient, reliable, amazing and awesome. The old saying is that “you can’t be good, fast and cheap – pick any two”. Yet Amazon is considered good, fast and cheap, each term being chosen by at least 20 respondents out of 1,030.

In a national survey by Researchscape, conducted September 8 to 30, 2012, with 1,030 U.S. adults, most people offered a positive term. Overall, 85% of the terms used to describe Amazon were positive, 13% were neutral (e.g., shopping, online, cheap) and only 2% were negative. In fact, no negative word was chosen by more than 5 respondents. The only negative terms used by at least 2 respondents were domination, greedy and monopoly.

Amazon’s enormous range of products was mentioned by many: 24 people used the word everything, 24 variety, 23 huge, and another 73 used the terms diverse, vast, big, comprehensive, expansive, extensive, large, and selection.

Top One-Word Descriptions of Amazon

What one word best describes your impression of…

Count	Term	Sentiment
61	Convenient	1
45	Great	1
43	Efficient	1
41	Reliable	1
39	Amazing	1
39	Awesome	1
34	Fast	1
31	Cheap	0
24	Everything	1
24	Variety	1
23	Huge	1
22	Shopping	0
21	Easy	1
20	Good	1
19	Innovative	1
18	Trustworthy	1
13	Diverse	1
13	Helpful	1
13	Vast	1
12	Useful	1
11	Big	1
11	Quick	1
10	Comprehensive	1
10	Excellent	1
10	Online	0
9	Deals	1
9	Friendly	1
8	Affordable	1
8	Books	0
8	Expansive	1
8	Fair	0
8	Honest	1

Source: Researchscape; sample size = 1,030

Much of the admiration for Amazon stems from high customer satisfaction. According to ACSI LLC, Amazon has had the highest level of customer satisfaction for Internet retailers for the last two years measured: 87 out of 100 in 2010, and 86 out of 100 in 2011. The company has outscored eBay every year that ACSI has measured the two firms.

	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010	2011
Amazon	84	84	88	88	84	87	87	88	86	86	87	86
Internet Retail	78	77	83	84	80	81	83	83	82	83	80	81
eBay	80	82	82	84	80	81	80	81	78	79	81	81