As Amazon is well-known for online shopping and quick deliveries, let’s discuss Amazon Business, which is like a separate part of the company. Amazon Business is designed to help entrepreneurs, organizations, and startups by offering multi-user accounts and discounts for larger orders.
The company’s website claims, “Amazon Business combines the selection, convenience, and value you expect from Amazon, with features that can help improve your operations.” What does this mean, and is it smart to have an account?
Continue reading for our explanation of Amazon Business and Business Prime’s special features, how you can use them, and whether the benefits are worth the cost.
A quick overview of Amazon Business’s work
Amazon Business is great for businesses. It helps people in the US, Canada, Japan, India, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom, France, and Italy.
Amazon Business is perfect for businesses that want to buy a lot of things at once. It lets you control who can sell to you, keep an eye on how much money is being spent by different people, and gives you information about your spending.
How does the Business Amazon separate from the regular Amazon?
You might be wondering, these things sound good, but how do I use them, and are they really different from regular Amazon or Prime? In simple terms, things aren’t hugely different, but the change is from searching for stuff to more organizing and managing.
It’s still easy to find things, but Amazon Business tools help businesses work better when they need a lot of stuff.
Amazon Business and its special version, Business Prime, want to be the only place you need. They use the good things about Amazon to help businesses get what they need.
Better access and exclusive deals for business
Amazon Business is quite similar to the regular store. It lets customers buy from lots of sellers, often at lower prices. But, Amazon Business also works with sellers who might limit orders or not sell on regular Amazon. This helps customers who are certified with Amazon Business.
Here’s an example: Some sellers on Amazon Business may limit things like healthcare, industrial, or lab stuff on the regular site. They do this to make these products available only for businesses.
Pricing for Amazon Business
Talking about prices, customers on Amazon Business get special discounts. They also have a chance to keep saving money through things like:
■ Deals: Just like regular Amazon or Amazon Prime, there are special discounts every day on certain items. Business Prime also gives you exclusive prices.
■ Progressive discounts: This is like a rewards program. The more you buy from Amazon Business in a year, the more discounts you can get on certain items. But remember, these deals are only for specific things in specific amounts.
■ Repeat deliveries: If you get the same things delivered every month, you can get a 5% discount.
■ Negotiation still works: If you have a special relationship with a seller or belong to a specific group (like being a licensed hairdresser), you can talk to the seller directly to get a price that’s not shown on the Amazon Business website.
Advantages of Business Prime and signing up
Making an Amazon Business account might not cost money, but if you want to use big shipping deals, special tools to analyze things, and have many people on your team, you’ll need to get a Business Prime membership.
Let’s talk about some special features that come with Business Prime:
■ Multi-user accounts: Instead of one person doing all the ordering, many people can help. This is super useful when there are lots of big orders. Each person has a specific role, so things stay organized and not chaotic.
■ Spend Visibility: Amazon Business uses a special cloud system to gather and show you data. They use tools and filters to make it easy for you to understand.
■ Guided Buying: This tool helps everyone know exactly what to buy. You can set it up by choosing rules, like where to buy from, and leave notes for the buyers.
■ WorkDocs: Think of this like Amazon’s version of GoogleDocs. It’s a safe place for everyone to work together and talk.
Note these three things about pricing before signing up:
■ If you use the same details you use for your Amazon Prime account, starting Business Prime costs $69 per year.
■ If you go for Business Prime Essentials, which is $179 per year, you can add up to three more people, and you get free shipping, Guided Buying, Spend Visibility, and WorkDocs.
■ You can try Business Prime for free for 30 days.
Fee for multi-user access with Business Prime.
The best thing about Business Prime is the multi-user platform, which helps with organizing and managing things. You can give different jobs to users, like administrators, buyers, and finance users.
But, using this tool can cost some money. Keep these points in mind:
■ Once the free 30-day trial is over, having a Business Prime membership costs $139 per year. You also need to pay extra for each extra member you add.
■ Adding just one more person starts at $69, and if you want to add as many people as you want, it goes up to $10,099. You might need to think if paying more is worth the possible savings or the convenience.
Why should you make use of it? Here are a few important reasons.
■ People who work from home or do a mix of home and office work can order things they need for work.
■ Those in charge of offices can set up regular orders for the things they use a lot.
■ Groups with different brands or teams can decide what supplies they want and keep track of them.
Smart Spending with Approval Workflow
Letting many people use it can be both helpful and a bit messy. Amazon Business lets users control the things the organization buys by:
■ Making rules for buying: You can decide how things should be bought.
■ Creating groups with different permissions: You can group people together and decide who can buy what.
■ Choosing when things get delivered: You can decide when things should arrive.
■ Getting approval for big buys: If someone wants to spend a lot, they need permission first.
Analysis-based insights
After you spend money, especially on things for your business, you’ll probably think about whether to buy more or maybe spend your money on something else. Amazon Business has tools to help you understand your spending. You can see reports that show how much money is being used, and you can even make your own reports.
While looking at what you paid and ordered is something you can do on regular Amazon, Amazon Business makes it easy to compare records for many people or just one person using special reports.
Multiple methods of payment
Making a report about what you spent money on can be a bit of a headache, especially when many groups and people can buy things. Amazon Business makes it simpler and gives you the following:
■ You can get things now and pay for them later.
■ You can choose to get an invoice and have up to 30 days to pay.
■ You might even get rewards with the Business American Express Card.
The exemption of tax
Now, let’s talk about something important: how does not paying taxes work with Amazon Business? It’s easy.
If your group doesn’t have to pay taxes, sign up for the Amazon Tax Exemption Program. Then, when you buy things on Amazon Business, you won’t have to pay taxes.
Conclusion for Amazon Business
Amazon Business is for folks who want to buy a lot of things at once. If your order is huge and needs to be packed together, they’ll deliver it on a pallet, either to a special dock or straight to your doorstep.
Amazon Business is like a special store for businesses. It helps them buy lots of things at once and offers cool features.
There are discounts, special tools, and a teamwork space called WorkDocs. It costs money, though, starting at $69 a year. With Business Prime, which costs $139 yearly, you get even more benefits, like a multi-user team.
But adding extra members can cost more, up to $10,099. If businesses need a convenient and organized way to buy in bulk, Amazon Business could be a helpful choice, but they should check if the cost is worth the cool features.
