Amazon is unique among the big tech companies, including Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, and Google. It’s because the tech giant made its fortunes mainly in the trade of physical products, not digital (as Google, Facebook, and Microsoft do).
Amazon is even different than Apple, whereas the latter company makes most of its money selling its own psychical goods (iPhones, Macs, etc) Amazon built its hundreds of billions of pounds empire selling other people’s physical goods.
That’s why it may not be surprising to hear me say that out of all of the big tech companies, Amazon could have the best future in front of it. It effortlessly crisscrosses the physical/digital divide and can increasingly provide us with our desired goods on both sides of the chasm.
Perhaps there is no better example of that than Amazon’s Amazon Prime service. The £79 a year service (or £7.99 if you go month-to-month) is most well-known for offering unlimited one-day shipping in the UK and US and elsewhere, however, the service provides much, much more than quick access to physical goods.
It also offers a host of the most common and important digital goods we’ve come to demand. Now that I’ve been using Prime for a month I can say it’s the best subscription service I’ve ever used – and it shows Amazon has a better foothold on the future of commerce and consumption than any of the other tech giants.
Here’s why:
Amazon Prime: Unlimited One-Day Delivery
Hands down, this is the most well-known (and best) feature of Prime. Order one of the million of eligible items using your Prime membership and you’ll get free one-day delivery on it. If this was the only thing Prime offered, the £79 annual fee would be worth it alone.
I went back and looked at my shipping cost total last year to see how much I spent just receiving package from Amazon. Across 30 sales the whole year, I spent £150 on shipping. With Prime, I’ll spend only £79 max and receive my items much faster and at almost half the cost.
That being said, while Prime delivery is amazing (it’s so great ordering an item today and getting it tomorrow) not every item sold by Amazon is available via Prime. The items which are not are usually those sold by third-party sellers. Most other products, however, are available on Prime.
Amazon Prime: Prime Video
Prime Video, also known as Amazon Instant Video, is the biggest competitor Netflix has. And the fact that it’s bundled in with an Amazon Prime membership really shows you how the value of a Prime membership begins to stack up.
While Prime probably does have fewer popular films on offer than Netflix, it generally has a better supply of television series. Prime Video also offers excellent exclusive Amazon-produced original series, including Man In The High Castle, Transparent, and Sneaky Pete.
Amazon also offers Prime Video apps for virtually every device out there, from smartphones to tablets to to games consoles to smart TV’s. However, Apple TV users are still waiting for that Price Video app. As for cost, considering you pay £79 for Amazon Prime and get full access to Prime video in addition to all the other Prime features, it makes it a MUCH better deal than Netflix’s £7.49 a month fee.
Amazon Prime: Prime Music
This is perhaps the nicest surprise of your Prime memberships. Other music streaming services will cost you £8-15 a month, but if you’re a Prime member you get access to Amazon’s Prime Music catalog for free. It includes 2 million songs which you can stream and download to any supported device.
Prime Music isn’t a service I ever thought I’d use (I mainly joined for the free shipping and Prime Video), but once I started playing around with its offerings, it's what really made me recognize the value of Prime–and I discovered some great tunes too.
And considering it's included in the Prime membership when competing service charge twice as much for just streaming music alone, it goes to show what a great service Prime is. The only issue I have with Prime Music is it doesn’t offer an app for games console, the Apple TV, or most smart TVs.
Amazon Prime: Prime Photos
To be honest, this isn’t a feature I use of Prime–but it’s nice that it’s there. Being a Prime member allows you to store an unlimited amount of photos in Amazon Prime, the company’s digital locker.
Have a terabyte of pics? That’s no problem. And while this feature doesn’t offer all the tools or robust abilities of services like iCloud Photo Library or Google Photos, it’s a nice backup option for those people who aren’t already spending money on other cloud photo storage services.
Amazon Prime: Kindle Owners' Lending Library
This is another feature of Prime I don’t use–but only because I like reading physical books. But it’s incredible that in addition to all the other Prime features, Amazon also gives you the option of borrowing one book a month (from over 600,000 titles) for you to read.
And you don’t even need a Kindle to take advantage of this benefit. The Kindle app on any smartphone or tablet can read books from the Kindle Owners' Lending Library.
Amazon Prime: Verdict
In addition to all the above, an Amazon Prime membership also gives you 30-minute early access to Lightning Deals, a 20% discount on Amazon Family products, bonus game content on Twitch. Like I said, the £79 annual fee is worth it from a cost-perspective for the free one-day shipping alone.
But add in the benefits of Prime Video, Prime Music, and the Kindle Owners' Lending Library, there’s little reason anyone who already orders physical product from Amazon shouldn’t sign up for Prime. You even get a 30-day free trial.
