10 Ways You Can Use Blogs RIGHT NOW

Now that you have got a basic understanding of the ins and outs of blogs, and some options available, you're probably wondering: How does this help my business? How does it help me to stand out?

1. Team Communication.
Companies use blogs internally to communicate project status to stakeholders and managers. It beats clogging everybody's email with mass broadcasts. It allows these missives to be archived, indexed and easily searched.


2. Enrich Your Clients.
You can easily link to articles and resources relevant to your readers and their needs. You can more easily attract experts to provide value-added content to your audience.

3. Get to Know Your Customer.
Nobody buys from someone they don't know. Blogging allows you to demonstrate your expertise and point-of-view quickly and easily. In addition, blogs allow the customers to receive your updates in the format they choose.

4. Collaborate.
You can create your own marketing buzz to drive attention and buyers to your products and services. Some companies use internal blogs to report on projects or to track work groups distributed around the world.

5. Research and Development.
Weblogs are the perfect forum to test out new ideas and receive instant feedback. You can allow others to see how you develop your products and services, and at the same time, they can tell you how best to serve them.

6. Go Global.
Blogs, like other online media, allow you to take your business and ideas to a global market. Translation services are getting better every day, allowing more people to read online content in different languages. I've helped bloggers from New York to New Zealand, from Indiana to India.

7. Hidden Entrance to the Press.
Journalists are busier than ever and blogs provide a virtual directory of pundits on any topic. You and your company can be the content expert they're looking for. Furthermore, if your company is talked about in the blogosphere it could end up using that exposure as a back door to the press.

8. Get Published.
Publishers are turning to blogs to find new writing talent. Blogs can give a publisher a taste of your writing style as well as a sample of your depth of knowledge. Content specific blogs show a commitment to a certain topic or subject matter.

9. Write your book.
Let your readers help you write your latest book or article. Post chapters or ideas, then let readers help you in researching, testing and suggesting ideas. Or, use a blog after your book is published to update the material or to answer questions from readers.

10. Success Stories.
Invite clients to blog about their successes with your products and services - it's like a living testimonial that never ends. As clients share their experiences, your prospects can see first-hand how you can help them, too.

Classical Music Bestsellers.

Cell Phones & Service Bestsellers,

Camera & Photo Bestsellers.

Beauty Bestsellers.

Baby Bestsellers.

Apparel & Accessories, Bestsellers

Books Store.

Introduction for Search Engine Optimation.

What is a Search Engine?
Search engines are the primary tools of Internet users for finding products, services and information over the web. Search engines allow people to search the entire Web (or at least those pages of the Internet that are in the search engine's database.)

How Does a Search Engine Index Web Pages?
There are four parts to an engine that you need to know about for optimization purposes:

1. The spider is a program that goes out across the internet, looks for and gathers up web pages.
2. The database is where the spider will store the pages that it finds.
3. The search engine website, e.g. google.com, is where searchers go to pull up information from the database.
4. The algorithms are programs that determine which sites will come up when searchers type in a query at the search engine website.

There are two ways that your site can get into the database:

1. The spider will automatically find your site from a link on someone else's site which is the path we recommend if you can get 1 or more quality inbound link(s).
2. You submit your URL so that the spider will come out and find it.

How To Increasing Your Website Traffic..?

How to increase website traffic deals with several different things. In the context of computing website traffic, the aim of some websites could be to increase the number of page views while some other websites may see an increase of website traffic with an increase in the number of unique and return visitors. To put it bluntly, more website traffic, means more business. So if you want to make money, you have just got to increase your website traffic.

The easiest way that I have found to increase targeted website traffic is to optimize each page of my website on a specific keyword targeted to my niche in the market. Remember that we are not just looking to increase our website traffic. We are looking to increase TARGETED website traffic.

Traffic,
In terms of traffic building, quality content connects with people at a deeper level. While I think sites that chiefly post content from others have the potential to build traffic faster in the beginning, I think original content sites have an easier time keeping their traffic, which makes for a more solid, long-term foundation.

Visitors,
We understand that getting visitors to your web site is one of the most important parts of your business but budget is usually limited. Do your best to help your visitors out of genuine concern for their concerns and needs, and they help you build your traffic and even generate a nice income from it. Treat your visitors like real human beings. In short: create valuable, original, quality content; write for humans, not computers; be yourself; treat your visitors like human beings; focus on helping people.

Content,
Is your content worthy of being read by millions of people. Remember that the purpose of content is to provide value to others. Each time you write, focus on creating the best content you can. Content that changes is more fascinating for repeat visitors,and Google rates more highly websites that change frequently for this exact reason. Create Desirable Content: Traffic increases because people craving to read what you’ve written. Your websites popularity and visibility depends upon your writing effective engrossing and targeted content. Quality content and effective copywriting helps in generating more website traffic, by attracting more users, giving you an advantage over your competition and also helps search engines target your
website.

RSS,
RSS feeds are a great way of letting your audience keep up with the updates on your site. Make sure your site is easy to access, with RSS feeds, Atom, or a subscription option, or all of these. From analyzing your RSS feed to counting page views to visual representations of where your visitors are clicking, there is no shortage of companies looking to help you better
understand your web sites traffic.

Did you know that over 85% of all website traffic comes from search engines. Many of the sites that go under may be your competitors that had substantial website traffic but just could not succeed. As your website traffic increases and your product sales increases, reinvest some of your profits and have a link building program in place to increase your web traffic and sales even further. Initially, at the start of the dotcom phenomenon, website traffic was considered as the most important factor in reckoning how successful a website was; but recently, it is more about profitability.

Remember a steady flow of website traffic means your chance for a sale goes up with each new visitor. Because website traffic is essential to all successful Internet businesses. Sales is a numbers game, generating website traffic is no different.

Blogs and How to Make Money With Them.

Stop wondering about how to make money with blogs! Just read this article to throw light on the topic.
The internet is full of blogs and those creating them.

Many are just for the average person who wants to have a larger voice and have their opinions heard by more people.

A small percentage of bloggers have realized that, while offering an opinion is great, a blog can be so much more than a sounding board. It can be a ready source of income.

With the right tools, blogs and how to make money with them may be easier than you think. Why not take something you enjoy, like blogging, and turn it into something that works for you.

How To Make Money Selling.
Advertising Selling advertising on your blog is a good way to make it a productive venture.
When creating a blog for such a financial undertaking, make sure the blog is one that is more common to the blogging community and can be seen by as many people as possible. Advertisers will want a steady flow of customers or pay per clicks from this media option. If they do not get it, they will find a place to advertise that will. Make sure you stay on top of the promotion.

Selling Products For Others
Pay per click and affiliate links are easy to add to your blog to produce income offering a way to advertise products for others. Consider using the blog for a review of a book or product that brings you profit and add a link in the article about it. The best part is that in learning how to make money with your blog by selling products for others, you will not only be paid for the click but for any purchases it produces. It could bring in a neat little income for you.

Raising Money For Those Less Fortunate.
Blogs are a great way to help those who need it. If you would like to support a cause or current issue around the globe or in your local area, add a help contribute button to the blog. Add some of the information about the cause in your blog on a regular basis to get the readers involved also. Learning how to make money on the internet does not necessarily have to produce a self serving attitude and can provide a worthy organization the funds it needs to find a cure or help one more person than was possible before.

How To Make Money By Advertising Your Business.
An economical and easy way for you to promote your personal business or products is to use your blog in the same way you would with a website. You can tell the readers about the services you offer and expand on new product reviews and really sell yourself to them. You never know when someone who is reading your blog needs the expertise you might be offering and could become a long term client. The more popular your blog becomes, the more free advertising you can take to the bank.
Letakan Skrip Adsense Anda Disini

What a Blog Can Do For Your Small Business.

The blogging movement is picking up speed as businesses begin to realize the benefits of blogging. Discover what a business blog can do for you.

What is a Blog?

According to Pyra Labs Blogger, "A blog is a web page made up of usually short, frequently updated posts that are arranged chronologically—like a what's new page or a journal." The term is actually weblogs coined by Jorn Barger in 1997.
The boom of weblogs happened in 1999 when several companies & developers made easy blogging software and tools. Since 1999, the number of blogs on the Internet has exploded from a few thousand to over 100 million.
Blogs can fall into two general categories.

Personal Blogs: a mixture of a personal diary, opinion posts and research links.

Business Blogs: a corporate tool for communicating with customers or employees to share knowledge and expertise.
Business blogs are sweeping the business community. Blogs are an excellent method to share a company's expertise, build additional web traffic, and connect with potential customers..
What does Blogging Provide to Small Business?
Blog software is easy to use. Simply write your thoughts, link to resources, and publish to your blog, all at the push of a few buttons. Blog software companies such as: Movable Type, Blogger.com and Typepad all offer easy blogging tools to get started.
Blogging is a low-cost alternative to having a web presence. For small business owners without the time to learn web html or the money to hire a designer/developer, blogging offers an inexpensive method to get your company's name out on the Internet.
Updating the weblog is a much quicker process than contacting a web designer with changes or doing the coding and uploading yourself.
Business blogs provide your small business with a chance to share your expertise and knowledge with a larger audience. A powerful benefit for consultants and knowledge workers.
Resources : Darrell Zahorsky, About.com

My Amazon Store.

visit my Amazon Store, choose that you like. . !

Easy Ways to Make Money Online From Home.

Taking paid surveys: there are many companies offering a reward for taking their online surveys. Some advertise their surveys with prizes (laptops, mobile phones, etc.) but some actually offer money. It takes just a few minutes to fill in a survey and it is easy money.

Affiliate programs: this means promoting products by referring potential clients to certain websites, advertising services, etc. The best way to do it is by creating your own website and turn traffic into profit. That means that you have to make your site entertaining in order to attract many visitors and then look for potential companies interested in advertising their products. You can post articles based on your personal experience, hobbies, start debates, etc. This can be a very rewarding way of making money online from home.

Selling/buying stuff: you can use sites like eBay for buying stuff (new and used) and reselling it (you can also buy cheap stuff at garage sales, flee markets and resell it on eBay). This can be a very profitable activity as long as you are patient and you do not get too greedy.

Typing/Clerical: this means transcribing handwritten text, Word processing, data processing, etc. This might be the job for you if you type quickly and correctly and enjoy this kind of routine. Otherwise you'll get bored and do a sloppy job. If you get bored easily, you'd better try other ways of making money online from home.

Writing: if you like writing you can find all kinds of jobs on the net. You can write articles for websites, do proofreading, editing, write summaries, etc. As you perfect your writing skills, you will work better, faster and you will make more money. All you have to do is document on certain topics, write or read some texts.

Testing products: many companies offer free samples of their products for testing purposes or even pay people for testing their products. You can get anything from free shampoo, washing machines to books and DVDs. Sometimes you have to pay for shipping, so be sure to compare the product price with the shipping costs. Sometimes you are asked to write a review of the product you tested.

Blogging: you can make money in a very pleasant way by writing about yourself or your life experience, your hobbies, interests, etc. There are many sites where you can post your blog and get paid for attracting visitors to the site. You can also do that on your personal website (if you have one), and earn money by advertising.

Freelance: depending on your skills, you can do all kinds of jobs on the Internet: some of the jobs are already listed here, but there are many more jobs out there. You can do all sorts of projects: software editing, writing summaries, writing articles about books, movies, TV shows, drawing, web designing, clothing designing, buying and selling things, etc.

A Retail Revolution Turns 10 (6)

One of Mr. Bezos's friends has jokingly described his management style as "ready, fire, steer." But by the fall of 2001, when Amazon had accumulated $2.9 billion in losses, the line didn't seem so funny. The mantra was no longer "get big fast" but "go-hi-o," or "get our house in order."

When they talk about Mr. Bezos, former Amazon executives tend to gush.

Mr. Eskenazi, the former human relations director, described him as an immensely likable man, as "down to earth as any billionaire can be." People who worked closely with him talk glowingly of his ability to lead and inspire, and of his brainpower.

Danny Shader, who worked at Amazon for 15 months starting in 1999 after Amazon bought his start-up for roughly $200 million, described Mr. Bezos as "the smartest, best entrepreneur I've ever met in my life, and will ever meet."

Almost to a person, though, former employees said Mr. Bezos was incapable of delegating. "The good and the bad of Jeff is that he wanted to be involved with every new Web change, even if it was just to change the colors of a tab," said Brian Lent, a top technologist who worked in an office maybe 40 feet from Mr. Bezos's for most of his two years there.

Some also criticized Mr. Bezos for having killed promising companies after Amazon bought them. It acquired Junglee, a database search company, and sought to transform its core technology into an e-commerce search engine that could find any product for sale on the Internet. Mr. Bezos ended the project less than 18 months after it began.

Mr. Lent, who came to Amazon via Junglee, noted that commercial search was now one of the Internet's hotter areas. "Amazon could have owned the shopping-comparison market," he said. Instead, it is now battling to enter a field dominated by Google.

Mr. Shader expressed a similar disappointment that Accept.com, his early entry into the online payment market now dominated by PayPal, a subsidiary of eBay, never realized its potential. "Quite literally we could've been PayPal if things had worked out differently," he said.

Mr. Bezos declined to comment on what might have been. "We made the decisions we made, and we have an outcome we're pretty happy with," he said.

He prefers to talk about tomorrow more than yesterday, even as the company gears up for a 10-year anniversary party with performances by Bob Dylan and Norah Jones.

Analysts, however, want to talk about today, and to discuss Amazon's slowing sales abroad, its rapidly rising costs, and the $55 million spent in the first three months of the year on its free-shipping promotion.

Mr. Bezos brushed off these and other complaints. From the first shareholder letter he wrote back in 1997, he has consistently made clear that he would run Amazon by focusing on the future and shrugging off short-term worries. He said he would "relentlessly slash prices," even if it cut into incremental profits, because he was convinced that it was the right thing to do.

Similarly, he vowed that more than a million Amazon customers would receive the latest installment of the "Harry Potter" series this Saturday, the day the new book is released, though the company would most likely lose money on the sale of those books. "We genuinely believe by taking care of the customer," he said, "we'll create the best circumstances for shareholders as well."

DESPITE himself, Mr. Bezos has managed to please analysts on occasion. Over the years, he has spent well over $1 billion building Amazon's infrastructure - and in 2001, he began cashing in on that investment by renting out space on Amazon's Web site to retailers ranging from Target and Circuit City to mom-and-pop shops. Third-party deals, which cut across all of Amazon's categories, now account for 27 percent of the company's revenue, or nearly $2 billion.

Yet in the end that has served to frustrate analysts as they wonder why profits are falling, given Amazon's successful entry into a high-margin business like renting space on its site.

"We don't claim over the long term we're necessarily correct," Mr. Bezos said. "We just claim it's our viewpoint. We don't spend a lot of time defending ourselves."

To Mr. Anderson, the technology newsletter editor, Mr. Bezos's relentless focus on the customer - at the expense of his other audience, his shareholders - is "both Jeff's brilliance and his curse."

"If you're a long-term investor, you're probably thinking that it will be worth a lot of money to be the Wal-Mart of the online world," Mr. Anderson said.

"On the other hand," he added, "if you're the kind of investor who has run out of patience, you're probably wondering whether there's any trained management in place that knows how to get a return on investment."

Google AdSense and Blogs

If you have a blog, or are thinking about starting a blog, then you are definitely going to want to read this article. It's all about how to line your pockets with money that's just waiting to be made without working much harder than you already are.

No only are blogs the hottest thing on the 'net right now, but they are custom-made for Google's AdSense program. Why? It's simple. Blogs represent constantly changing and fresh content to Google's search engine spiders. Feeding fresh content to those little spiders is just like tossing raw meat to a tiger. They just gobble it up. The more pages of your blog that get indexed, the more traffic you get. And the more traffic you get, the more exposure your AdSense ads get. Are you beginning to see where I'm heading here?

It's not just Google that loves new content, all of the major engines do. In fact, some web-savvy bloggers are testing Google ads on one page and Overture ads on the other. It doesn't take too long to see which ads are doing the best when you have nearly side-by-side comparison statistics to look at. Just don't make the mistake of putting Google and Overture ads on the same page together. While they won't kill each other like a pair of Siamese fighting fish in the same bowel will, you will be violating both sites' Terms of Service, and it isn't worth killing the goose (geese) that laid the golden egg.

It's a snap to set up Google AdSense ads on your blog. Everything you need to know is right inside of the Google control panel. What's not so easy is figuring out what ads are going to appear on each page. Since Google targets your key words, and your blog articles could possible wander towards any subject, you never know what you're going to get.

Well, "never" is a strong word because there actually IS a way to pre-test your blog's ads before you post your newest edition. Here's what you do:
Write your blog article like you normally would.
Plug in your AdSense code and then post your newest page to a sub directory that's not part of your blog.

Click refresh a few times until Google wakes up and starts sending ads.

If you don't like what you see then fine-tune the article until you see the types of ads that you're looking for.
With some ads paying as much as $5 per click or more, I'd certainly spend an extra 30 minutes or so tweaking my blog. That's for sure.

If you're working hard to get your blog in front of visiting eyeballs, then it doesn't make any sense at NOT to be using Google AdSense to draw every penny out of your site that's possible. OK, that's the end of the article. Now get busy tweaking your blog and checking your ads. You've got money waiting to be made!

Say Hello to The New Kindle

Slim: Just over 1/3 of an inch, as thin as most magazines

Wireless: 3G wireless lets you download books right from your Kindle, anytime, anywhere; no monthly fees, service plans, or hunting for Wi-Fi hotspots

Books in Under 60 Seconds: Get books delivered in less than 60 seconds; no PC required
Improved Display: Reads like real paper; now boasts 16 shades of gray for clear text and even crisper images.

Longer Battery Life: 25% longer battery life; read for days without recharging
More Storage: Take your library with you; holds over 1,500 books
Faster Page Turns: 2 0% faster page turns

Read-to-Me: With the new text-to-speech feature, Kindle can read every newspaper, magazine, blog, and book out loud to you, unless the book is disabled by the rights holder

Large Selection: Over 240,000 books plus U.S. and international newspapers, magazines, and blogs available

Low Book Prices: New York Times Best Sellers and New Releases $9.99, unless marked otherwise

Amazon in Big Push for New Kindle Model

Setting up an obvious battle with Google and another possible one with Apple in the fast-growing electronic-book business, Amazon.com on Monday introduced the Kindle 2, a new version of its popular e-book reader.

The announcement strengthens the bid by Amazon for control of the e-book market and the devices consumers use to read them.



Amazon hopes that the Kindle becomes the iPod of the literary world, challenging the printed book.

Perhaps most significantly, Amazon said it would start selling e-books that can be read on mobile phones and other devices, although Amazon did not say when it would do so or which devices would be compatible.

The Kindle 2 has several incremental improvements over its predecessor, which went on sale in 2007. Amazon said the upgraded device has seven times the memory of the original version, turns pages faster and has a sharper display.

It also features a new design with round keys and a short, joysticklike controller — a departure from the earlier design, which some buyers had criticized as awkward. The device will ship Feb. 24. The price remains at $359.

For $3.99, all Kindle users can buy a short story by Stephen King that will be exclusive to the Kindle for a limited time.

“Our vision is every book, ever printed, in any language, all available in less than 60 seconds,” said Jeffrey P. Bezos, Amazon’s founder and chief executive.

Amazon also announced a new feature, Whispersync, which would allow readers to begin a book on one Kindle and continue, at the same point in the text, on another Kindle or a mobile phone.

Analysts say the move is aimed at establishing Amazon as the dominant e-commerce platform for books, a position similar to the one Apple has assumed in music with its iTunes Store.

“For the Kindle format to really take off, it has to go beyond being a very expensive device that has broad but still limited appeal and be able to get the content onto other devices like the iPhone,” said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at Interpret, a market research firm.

Amazon faces a serious challenge from Google, which has scanned some seven million books, many of them out of print. Google said last week that it would soon sell books from its publishing partners for reading on mobile devices like the iPhone from Apple and phones running Google’s Android operating system.

Addressing Google’s initiatives, Mr. Bezos said in an interview that Amazon knows what book buyers want and stressed the company’s digital catalog of 230,000 newer books and best sellers.

“We have tens of millions of customers buying books from us every day, and we know what it is that people want to read,” Mr. Bezos said.

Apple poses another potential threat to Amazon’s plans. Several companies have created e-book programs for Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch, which have been downloaded more than a million times.

Mr. Bezos said that reading on these kinds of gadgets might be fine when waiting in line in the supermarket, but that most people would want a dedicated device with a specialized screen for reading.

“If you are going to read for a couple of hours, you are going to have problems with battery life with a mobile phone, you are going to have eye strain and you are going to have problems with screen size,” he said. “Reading is an important activity and deserves a purpose-built device.”

For publishers, Amazon’s e-book efforts could represent a bright future, as the book industry struggles to sell traditional formats. But some worry that Amazon may be assuming too much control over pricing, similar to the influence Apple has established in the music business.

Amazon generally charges $9.99 for the digital versions of best sellers, although many publishers still sell the digital content to Amazon for the same price that they sell physical books. That means that for now, Amazon is taking a loss or making a small margin on the sale of some e-books.

“We do not agree with their pricing strategy,” said Carolyn K. Reidy, chief executive of Simon & Schuster. “I don’t believe that a new book by an author should ipso facto be less expensive electronically than it is in paper format.”

Mr. Bezos disagreed. “E-books should be cheaper than physical books. Readers are going to demand that, and they are right because there are so many supply chain efficiencies relative to printing a paper book,” he said.

Paul Aiken, the executive director of the Authors Guild, said that at some point Amazon was likely to put pressure on publishers and authors rather than raise consumer prices.

“The thought that there might be one very dominant player who could squeeze most of the profits out of this new market is frightening for authors and publishers,” Mr. Aiken said.

Richard Sarnoff, president of Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments, a unit of Bertelsmann, which owns Random House and is the world’s largest publisher of consumer titles, said that for this reason, publishers have remained vigilant in fostering competition in the e-book market.

“The key thing for us as publishers and our authors is that the value to a consumer of the underlying content is not undermined by artificially low pricing policies that end up sticking,” he said.

By BRAD STONE and MOTOKO RICH

Published: February 9, 2009

A Retail Revolution Turns 10 (5)

For a time, no one seemed to mind very much. Certainly, Mr. Bezos appeared not to be worried by Amazon's losses. "There were no sacred cows with Jeff," said Venky Harinarayan, who was a top strategist at Amazon for two years, starting in 1998. "There was no conventional wisdom."

There also didn't seem to be an organizational chart, or anything that much resembled a personnel department in Amazon's first five years, said Jeremy Eskenazi, who joined the company in 1999 as its top recruiter but soon found himself running its human resources department.

"If Jeff is passionate about something, he pays attention to it," said Mr. Eskenazi, who left Amazon in 2001. "But H.R. and legal and accounting and all that more mundane stuff Jeff tended to look on as nonsensical, and he didn't support those areas."

Instead, Mr. Bezos focused on expansion. He directed an acquisition binge that he now concedes led to excesses that turned out to be as excruciating as "root canal without anesthesia." Among the more painful ones were his decisions to buy a majority stake in Pets.com in 1999, and then to pay $60 million for a large portion of the online delivery service Kozmo.com.

Both turned out to be legendary dot-com bombs that went out of business shortly after Amazon invested in them. Pets.com seemed perhaps the most foolish; among other things, pet food is very heavy, and ruinously expensive to ship.

"We believed that if we did not participate in these categories at that time, we would be forgoing the opportunity to participate in those categories forever," Mr. Bezos said. "We believed, incorrectly as it turns out - and this was my bad - that these were land-rush opportunities." Amazon took $350 million in losses between 2000 and 2002 for its failed investments in dot-com companies.

That same land-rush logic fueled Amazon's decision to start selling toys, electronics, tools, patio furniture and even cellphone service plans - all in 1999 and 2000. It also went head to head with eBay in online auctions, but it has yet to gain much traction after six years. More recently, Amazon has started selling jewelry, health products and musical instruments, bringing to 31 the number of categories on its Web site.

"I do think Amazon may have expanded too far, too fast," said Peter S. Fader, a marketing professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Another Wharton marketing professor, Jerry Wind, added: "With Amazon, there is always a danger that it is spread too thin."

Aram Rubinson, a financial analyst at Bank of America, is inclined to agree. In a research report he published last November, he said Amazon should cut its inventory and sell only profitable items, even at the expense of revenue growth. "Other retailers, like Best Buy, Home Depot and Staples, have opted to slow growth in order to improve profits," wrote Mr. Rubinson, who has a sell rating on Amazon.

As is, books, music and videos - the first three categories Amazon entered - still account for nearly three-quarters of its revenue, and Ms. Johnson at Forrester said she doubted that Amazon would ever "make much of a dent" in many of the other markets it has entered.

Mr. Bezos scoffed at skeptics. Amazon has gold-plated customer service, he said, and has championed any number of nifty early innovations, like one-click buying. With such superior service, he seems to suggest, why won't the world beat a path to his door to buy everything from toasters to trumpets and tennis rackets?

"It takes a long time to teach 49 million active customers about our company and all we offer," he said. "Given it takes a long time, why not get into those areas as early as we can?"

Ms. Johnson offered one reason: Amazon has trouble focusing. "Frankly, there aren't the resources dedicated to each category," she said, "because Amazon in the meantime is launching more new categories, and getting into new services, and trying to develop a search engine and doing all these things trying to become all things to all people."

Read furthermore -> A Retail Revolution Turns 10 (6) Finish.

A Retail Revolution Turns 10 (4)

IN 1994, Mr. Bezos was a 30-year-old hedge fund analyst with a degree in computer science and electrical engineering from Princeton when he came up with the idea for an online bookseller. He originally planned to call it Cadabra but later realized that it sounded too much like "cadaver." Ultimately, he settled on Amazon, in part because he thought it would convey the vast breadth of books he intended to sell.

At the conference in Aspen, the moderator of Mr. Bezos's panel introduced him with a bit of Internet lore about how Mr. Bezos had written Amazon's business plan on a laptop computer in the passenger seat of a 1988 Chevy Blazer as his wife, MacKenzie, drove them across the country.

Reality is a bit less colorful. The couple actually flew from New York to Fort Worth, where they picked up the Blazer - and a $300,000 check - from Mr. Bezos's father, a former engineer at ExxonMobil. And while Ms. Bezos did most of the driving on their way to Bellevue, Wash., where they started their business, she said her husband took turns at the wheel.

The business plan that Mr. Bezos wrote on the road called for Amazon to turn a profit long before it did. But, as he points out, the plan anticipated a far more modest company. In no small part because of Amazon's early success, the Internet quickly evolved into a footrace to place first dibs on as many new online markets as an enterprise could.

Mr. Bezos's reaction to that rush goes a long way toward defining his management style, and toward illustrating what analysts love and hate about it.

"Brands are a bit like quick-drying cement," Mr. Bezos said last week, "so it became very important to get into new categories beyond books reasonably quickly." Inside Amazon, the mantra was "get big fast," and it was everywhere, even on T-shirts. The race to own e-commerce was on.

Amazon's strategy seemed to work beautifully in those first years. In June 1998, for example, the company said it would start selling music, and within months it was the Internet's top music retailer. Amazon seemed so rich with potential that $10,000 invested in its May 1997 initial public offering was worth more than $350,000 by the end of 1998, just 19 months later.

But that surge came without profits, and Amazon's success appeared to prove that the primary difference between dot-com survivors and many flameouts was the amount of cash they managed to raise before the stock-market bubble burst in 2000. At the time, Amazon was burning cash almost as fast as its investors could shovel it in.

Read furthermore -> A Retail Revolution Turns 10 (5)