When Amazon let customers post negative reviews, vendors complained: "You make money when you sell things — why would you allow negative reviews on your website?" Though negative reviews cost some sales in the short term, helping customers make better purchase decisions ultimately pays off for the company.

When we launched Instant Order Update — which reminds you that you've already bought a particular item — we were able to measure with statistical significance that the feature slightly reduced sales. Good for customers? Definitely. Good for shareowners? Yes, in the long run.

Eliminating defects, improving productivity, and passing the resulting cost savings back to customers in the form of lower prices is a long-term decision. Price reductions almost always hurt current results, but relentlessly driving the "price-cost structure loop" leaves a stronger, more valuable business.

Our pricing strategy does not attempt to maximize margin percentages, but instead seeks to drive maximum value for customers and thereby create a much larger bottom line — in the long term.

Amazon deliberately targeted jewelry margins substantially below industry norms, betting that "customers figure these things out."

Engineering a feature like Instant Order Update for use by 40 million customers costs nowhere near 40 times what it would cost to do the same for 1 million customers.

Why software-driven customer experience behaves like a fixed cost that scale keeps shrinking.