I’ve been an Amazon.com customer since January, 2001. That’s more than 13 years – longer than a lot of other relationships in my life. I’ve never really enjoyed the ceremony of traditional shopping…the traffic…crowded parking lots…busy checkout lanes…and (usually my luck) the store being out of the one item I needed most. Amazon changed the ceremony of shopping for me and now I shop at Amazon.com at least once a week.
I’ve purchased nearly every kind of goods and services that Amazon offers, including a Herman Miller desk chair, an electric snow blower, a lawn mower, and countless grocery care packages to surprise my mom or nieces away at college. To say I was super excited when Collective Bias (#cbias) approached me to review the new #AmazonCart collaboration between Amazon and Twitter would be a serious understatement.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAm6pa9hPKA
#AmazonCart
Getting started was easy. Once I connected my @BakedChicago Twitter account to my Amazon Prime membership, I was ready to go.
My daytime schedule is quite hectic, so I usually grab my iPad after dinner to browse Twitter and other social networks while watching the evening news. I already follow @Amazon, so now when I see an interesting product featured in a Tweet with an Amazon product link – like the spiral vegetable cutter below – I can simply hit REPLY to that Tweet with the hashtag #AmazonCart.
Then just moments after, I receive an email confirmation that I’ve successfully put this product in my #AmazonCart. I can review my shopping cart at my leisure and finalize the purchase when I’m ready.
I have been known to sometimes forget if I’ve responded to a Tweet. I accidentally hit REPLY twice, but #AmazonCart caught that and sent me an email after the second Tweet letting me know that I had already put the item in my cart – and if I wanted two of product I could simply edit the quantity when I made the purchase.
I admit it. I’m a bit of a kitchen gadget-aholic. And there have been times when I’ll buy an item that looks cool, but that I really don’t need. You’ve been there, too, right!
What I really like about #AmazonCart is that I get the satisfaction (and convenience) of the impulse buy, but I’m not forced to make the final purchase right then and there.
I’ve gotten into the routine of shopping with #AmazonCart after dinner and then going online the next day to review the contents of my shopping cart. That gives me time to fully consider my purchase, as well as research other color options. The black spiral slicer featured in the Tweet was cool, but I opted for the ocean blue version to add a pop of color to my kitchen. Good call, don’t you think!
Because I don’t do much traditional window shopping, somtimes I don’t know a better product exists until I see it somewhere like an Amazon featured product Tweet. This “low-tech” banana slicer is a great example.
I buy about 8 bananas a week, minimum. I don’t eat bananas, but my four pugs – Bing, Baxter, Della and Marlo – eat them everyday with their breakfast. I slice up one banana and divide it among their dishes. At first I used a simple table knife to slice the bananas, but getting even slices that are divisible by four takes too much brain work and hand-eye coordination for first thing in the morning. Then I tried a banana slicer gadget that had very sharp blades. So sharp that even gently touching them with the back of my finger cut my skin and drew blood.
Then I saw this plastic banana slicer in an Amazon Tweet, so I hit REPLY with #AmazonCart and decided to check it out. I liked that it was dishwasher safe, but there were no sharp edges for me to cut myself. Now my pugs enjoy fresh sliced bananas on their breakfast and I don’t have to worry about slicing myself if I’m still not quite awake.
So far, I’m really enjoying the new #AmazonCart. I can’t wait to see how both Amazon and Twitter collaborate to expand this service and if they introduce others.
If you have a Twitter account and Amazon Prime, then all you have to do to get started with the new #AmazonCart service is connect them at Amazon.com.
Social shopping just got way easier and a lot more fun!
Disclosure: Baked Chicago is an Amazon affiliate program member and the Baked Chicago’s Simply Decadent Brownies Cookbook is available in print and for Kindle at Amazon.
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