Shop at Amazon through text messages

Oh, the wonders of technology. Its been a while since I lived in the US, but when I did, I remember my life fully revolved around Amazon.com. I recall every time I had a craving for something, (certainly not food in this case-for that I had a wonderful convenience store right downstairs my dorm) I’d go on the site and begin my quest. From my college books, to just about all the CDs I own today, to my favorite black and yellow Puma Sparcos, to even an outdoor teak shower we bought for our beach house in Venezuela…I mean, everything! My stereo, my first digital camera, Adidas gym bag, embroidered bath towels, Ralph Lauren down comforter, desk lamp, a metal Slinky?!…ok, I think you get the idea.

I’m beginning to think maybe it was not such a good plan coming to Italy(yeah right) since Amazon has recently started up the new modality of shopping through text message. So now mobiles have become an even more precious gadget in our lives- girls we can shop, shop, shop ’til our phone runs out of…battery, i guess. This is what I call ‘comfort shopping’; no need to leave home nor wait in queue for hours.

The service is called TextBuyIt and all you have to do is text message ‘Amazon’ (262966) and insert either a ‘keyword’ or product name, a description of the same or its UPC/ISBN code. Within seconds, Amazon replies to your text message displaying the products matching your keyword. Once you get this message, all you have to do is text them back with the number pertaining to the product of your choice and finally the last step will be someone calling you from Amazon to verify the purchase and order details.

If you’re a first timer, Amazon will ask you your email and Zip Code in order to use your default settings, which include your credit card and shipping information. This is very convenient I’d say, since you’ll never have to pop out your credit card in public, its all online, hence there’s no risk for theft, forgery, cloning, etc.

If you wish to get even more picky in terms of using Amazon’s website features like 1-Click and the WishList, you can also access www.amazon.com through the web browser provided by your mobile and you will be immediately redirected to a site specifically optimized for mobiles.

Learn more about shopping via text messages.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 17th, 2008 at 8:57 am and is filed under Mobile Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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