After three decades, Amazon continues to refine its initial bookstore operation.

• Your Books, a personalized space for exploring print, Kindle, and Audible books, is now available on Amazon. The platform offers recommendations based on reading tastes and helps users learn about their personal reading habits.
• Since its inception as an online bookseller over 30 years ago, Amazon has been continuously working to enhance its reader engagement through the use of technology, with AI playing a larger role in this effort.
• Some argue that independent bookstores' survival despite Amazon's growth proves their inherent value, but skeptics contend that it's merely another algorithm aimed at boosting book sales.

In its first month of operation in 1995, Amazon.com shipped books to all 50 states. By 1997, it had delivered its one millionth order, personally delivered by Jeff Bezos. Over the past three decades, Amazon has transformed its bookstore business into a retail giant, with operations in the physical world through Whole Foods and various experiments. It has also become a global logistics provider, the largest cloud computing services vendor, and a major investor in generative AI.

Despite its success in the bookstore business, there are still some challenges that Amazon must address in helping users build a library they rely on. In December, Amazon introduced a new service, Your Books, to tackle these challenges.

Amazon's customer reviews, a longstanding feature, play a crucial role in its success as a bookseller. By providing recommendations and reviews, Amazon aims to replicate the experience of browsing and discussing books with knowledgeable staff in a physical bookstore.

While reviews are applicable to all Amazon products, books have an added significance. Purchasing razor blades or sponges online doesn't significantly differ from buying them in a physical store. However, browsing in a bookstore offers the chance to stumble upon unexpected discoveries, such as exploring shelves and being surrounded by a community of fellow book enthusiasts.

Amazon has been using a combination of human and algorithmic reviews, ratings, and recommendations to help customers make informed purchasing decisions. In 2013, the company acquired Goodreads, an online forum for book lovers to discuss books. While this human approach has its advantages, it has also resulted in issues such as "review-bombing" by authors on Goodreads.

Amazon's launch of Your Books was influenced by various factors, including its desire to create a personalized space for customers to manage their entire history of book purchases on Amazon, including its Kindle and Audible businesses. This platform provides recommendations based on reading preferences and offers insights into personal reading habits.

Amazon offers a highly personalized experience for customers with their books, allowing them to filter their library and activate 'discovery mode' for tailored recommendations based on their interests. The company also links to past extensions of the Amazon book brand, such as Goodreads, to bring together a customer's history and community-building features, complementing Goodreads' discovery, community, and reviews experience.

Your Books is a reordering of existing features rather than something entirely new, as Amazon customers have always had access to book recommendations, purchases, and wish list items.

Physical books still far outsell e-books, audiobooks

Amazon's digital bookshelf resembles a physical bookshelf, highlighting the importance of the book as a tangible object. People value the visual representation of their reading history and prefer physical books over e-books or audio formats.

The Association of American Publishers reports that physical books continue to outsell e-books and audiobooks by a significant margin. Their latest annual data through October 2023 shows $10.6 billion in sales over the first 10 months of the year, with the consumer books business accounting for $7.4 billion. Of that, hardcovers were $2.7 billion and paperbacks were $2.6 billion, which represents over 70% of all sales. E-books were at $836.1 million, and digital audio at $699.2 million.

Amazon's book efforts, including Audible, have faced growing pains, with layoffs and job cuts announced in late 2022 and earlier in 2022, respectively.

To maximize the value of Your Books, it is likely that it will motivate readers to make another online purchase or, as the spokeswoman stated, "connect them to their next great read."

Independent booksellers have not gone away

Despite the threat of Amazon, recent data suggests that independent bookstores are resilient on a local level. A study by Harvard Business School professor Ryan Raffaelli found that the business model of independent bookstores has inherent value, even as Amazon continues to grow. The study used data from the American Booksellers Association to show a 49% increase in the number of independent bookstores in the U.S. from 2009 to 2018, from 1,651 stores to 2,470 stores.

The launch of Amazon in 1995 caused significant harm to the bookstore business, resulting in a 43% drop in bookstores five years later. However, the rebound only began in the 2009 decade, two years after the introduction of the Kindle in 2007. Despite this, Raffaelli believes that the bookstore model has elements that are difficult to replicate in a virtual-only world.

Independent bookstores have thrived in Amazon's wake by cultivating deep relationships with readers and authors through recommendations and curation. Such relationships represent the passion of indie bookstore employees for reading and their commitment to share the next great book with others, which is considered a sacred act of community-building.

Goliath will continue to excel in pricing and stock, but it's unnecessary for David to aim to become the largest bookstore globally.

Instead of competing with Amazon on pricing and stock, booksellers have a distinctive talent for discovering rare and undiscovered treasures in their inventory, such as emerging authors or unexplored genres, which online algorithms have not yet been able to replicate.

Both algorithms and knowledgeable booksellers aim to help readers find books they will enjoy, with algorithms becoming increasingly adept at providing a personalized touch, such as Spotify's playlist selection, even in the audiobooks space.

But independent booksellers are, not surprisingly, loathe to accept the comparison.

Robert Martin, executive director of the Independent Booksellers Consortium, founded in 1993, stated that their algorithms are designed to increase their earnings.

Independent publishers and booksellers are actively fighting against the danger of creating a reading bubble by ensuring diverse voices, genres, and styles get the platforms they deserve, as Martin pointed out.

Martin believes that recommendations from other readers and knowledgeable booksellers in a bookstore are crucial, even if the recommendation mechanism may be inefficient or uncontrollable. He prefers to understand the emotions and experiences of others rather than rely on a robot's guidance. According to him, the best way to discover your next great read is by talking to the friendly and knowledgeable booksellers at your local independent bookstore.