Question

Amazon Dash Buttons are now available for more than 250 different products (have a look at the website if you are not very familiar with how this product works). Other companies are also trying to implement a similar concept (for example, Brita is working on a pitcher that will reorder water filters and Whirlpool is working on a dryer that automatically reorders detergent).

How does the Dash button fit into the 5-stage buying process? Will the concept work for products that required extended decision making? Can you identify some products that would not benefit from the reorder buttons?

Answer 1

As we see, now everything is becoming automated or using AI to improve the efficiency of a system or reducing the human efforts and interventions. Clearly there is a vast majority of products which the system can predict to order or suggest analyzing the past purchase orders and even search results. It can be either reorder or purchase of complementary products like a brush to a hair dye.And amazon dash buttons works like the same. There will he a button for say, your Listerine. Whenever it is about to finish, a simple press on the button will evoke the reorder through amazon app connected via WiFi.

Lets see how Amzon dash button fits into the 5 stage buying process. As we said, Amazon dash button works for reordering a product for you saving your time spent on the app or website So clearly the target products are low-involvement products which we tend to buy every month or every two weeks. So Amzon dash button is used by an individual once the go through these 5 stages of purchasing decision. First, customer recognizes his need. In my example, solution to dental problems. Once he identified the need for a product, he in the 2nd stage finds how to avoid the problem he faces, ie information search. Third stage would be finding out what are the currently available products to satisfy his need. He may find a list of products like various toothpastes, mouthwash. Going to the 4th stage of evaluation of alternatives. Once he find his ideal product, in this case Listerine mouthwash, he purchases it fron Amzon website. The post purchase behavior includes how easily he got the product and how much the product satisfied his expectations. If he is perfectly okay with using the product again and again it would be better to buy a dash button from Amazon because he only needs to press it once to replenish his shelf. Yes the Amazon dash buttons is there once the 5 stages of purchase is made and customer has a very pleasant post purchase experience.

As the example shows, Amzon dash button only works for products which has a very short life and has become a habit to the user. Brand loyalty comes into play here. Those customers who tends to try different products and don't stick with a single product, sorry to say that Amazon dash button doesn't work in that case. Another drawback of Amazon button is it can't be used for hight involvement products which we buy very rarely and use for a longer time. Example consider an Air Conditioner,lots of information search and evaluation of alternatives happens here and finally purchases the product from Brand X. But, the next purchase comes after years once the AC is broken ans most of the times, customers won't be buying the same model. Hence Amazon dash button won't be suitable for high involvement products with longer lifetime and also for products changing or upgrading very rapidly. Few products which can't be associated with Amazon dash button are : All consumer durables including Television, mobile phone, Washing Machine,laptops etc, clothes, fashion accessories where repurchase is not done (eg. Sandals, ornaments, watches, , books, toys, automobile accessories, etc.

Interestingly Amazon has decided to kill dash buttons after five years, because of the new technologies and especially Alexa which can effectively replace the dash buttons which became useless in that case. But Amazon still supports the existing dash buttons.