The Geography of Amazon.com

The Geography of Amazon.com Amazon.com has several important geographical dimensions - both real and virtual. For any Internet company the principle public face is their web site. Amazon.com's web site is vital - it is its storefront to the world. Web sites are a form of geography - geography of the screen. It is easy to use and crucially, fast loading over home modems with only a few small graphics. The site …

…in German, of course. Local distinctiveness comes from the domain names, the site design, the language employed and unique editorial content (see figure 4). Another key advantage is faster and cheaper shipping costs for books that can be sourced locally. These two national Amazon franchises have been successful since their launch and are the leading online bookstores in their respective countries. It will be interesting to see if Amazon opens further national branches in the future.