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Help & Customer Service

# FAQ

What is Amazon.com?

Amazon.com is a leading online retailer of products that inform, educate, and inspire. The Amazon group also has stores in the Canada, Germany, France, Japan and United Kingdom. Because we exist "virtually" on the Web, we have unlimited shelf space and can offer a selection of over 17 million titles including over 13 million Book titles and over 1 million music titles. Compare that to a typical physical-world book superstore, which carries around 170,000 books, or a typical physical-world music superstore, which carries around 34,000 CDs.

Why do I encounter various availability listings on your site?

Titles have different availabilities simply due to their demand, proximity, and availability to Amazon.com. We also source our products from various distributors. The availability on products we obtain from distributors may vary according to whether the distributor has the product in stock or not.

If a title is listed as out of stock or unavailable, it means that it is not currently available to Amazon.com or not in stock through our distribution channels. However, you may still be able to sell out of stock items through our Marketplace feature.

What does the sales rank mean?

Our sales rank is just like a bestseller list, except instead of listing just the top 50 or so titles, it includes millions! The lower the number, the higher the popularity for that particular title in comparison to other items listed. Items are ranked within their product category only, so a book, CD or DVD ranked at Number 1 is the best-selling book, CD or DVD at Amazon.com, but may not be the overall best-selling item.

Sales rank data is calculated hourly. While we cannot provide specific information about our calculation formula, Amazon.com Marketplace sales are also included in the calculation. Please keep in mind that our sales rank figures are simply meant to be a guide of general interest for the customer and not definitive sales information for vendors - we assume you have this information regularly from your distribution sources.

How do I find sales information for my title?

We don't provide sales information to vendors at this time due to the competitive nature of our business. It is recommended that authors/artists/actors contact their publisher/label/studio, or publishers/labels/studios contact their distributors, for more information concerning the sales of their titles.

How do I promote my titles at Amazon.com?

At Amazon.com, it's up to you to make your titles stand out on our virtual shelves. You have the opportunity, using descriptive content and images, to personally hand-sell your titles to customers and persuade them to purchase. Following are the most important pieces of information you can add to your product detail page.

All Products:

- Cover Art: People do judge a book by its cover! We've found that showing a picture of your product's cover on its detail page is its most influential selling point.
- A Description: It's important to let people know what your product is about. This is your chance to hook them with a compelling description (this can be from your catalogue, cover, or any other synopsis you may have).
- Review Excerpts: Readers want to know what others are saying about your product. If the critics are raving, let potential customers know!

Books:

- Search Inside!: This feature provides customers with the unique opportunity to browse through books just as they might when shopping at a physical bookstore. For more information please click here

Descriptive content may be added through our Online Book Content Forms. Please click on the relevant product:

- Books
- Music
- Video
- DVD

Do you sell advertising on your site?

At this time, we do not sell banner advertising on our site. However, for information on Co-op promotional opportunities, please visit our Coop page.

The best way to promote your book is to add descriptive content and images (as described above) to your book's detail page.

How can I make it easier for customers to find my product?

To ensure maximum title searchability in our store, it is important that your product listing has complete and correct title, author/artist/actor and subject information. When a general keyword search is performed on site, our search engine will search for those words in the title, author/artist, and subject fields of products on our site. Then, our search engine posts the results in order based on availability, popularity, and relevance.

In addition, we offer our customers numerous search tools to aid them in their hunt. It often depends on the type of search being conducted and the search terms that are entered that will determine where in the search results list an item will appear.

How can I link my Web page to Amazon.com?

Check out our Associates program! You'll receive a referral fee based on Amazon.com book sales you refer from your own Web pages. We become your order processing and fulfillment centre.

We take the orders on our Web site using our proven software and secure servers. We supply, package, and ship the products. We bill the customer. We handle all customer service. We send you detailed weekly activity reports. We work with thousands of individuals, special-interest groups, magazines, publishers, labels, studios who use Amazon.com to fulfill their visitors' product orders. Sign up online?!

If you promote your products online and don't wish to become an Associate, you may link to our catalogue using this URL:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0000000000

The zeroes should be replaced with the 10-digit ISBN (omitting hyphens) or ASIN (listed on the product detail page beginning with a B)

How do I remove an old or out-of-print listing from the Amazon.com catalogue?

As you may know, we offer customers the opportunity to locate out-of-print books and other products no longer available through our Marketplace feature. It is our aim to list a wide selection of titles for our customers' reference and convenience, so it is not our practice to remove a listing even when it is out of print.

If the case is such that a new edition is replacing the edition we list in our store, you'll need to help us get the new version online. Please consult the following pages for instructions on how to add new titles to our Store:

- Books
- Music
- DVD & Video

Please understand that we are currently posting both new and old versions of any given publication. It should be clear to customers to buy the available edition, and we realize the OP version may prove distracting. Rest assured we are working on ways to improve the display of new and old editions on our site.

Do you screen the reviews from publishers/labels/studios, customers, authors/artists/actors, or other sources used on your site?

In order to help customers make informed buying decisions, we are interested in offering a variety of opinion of the items on our site.

Publishers/labels/studios and authors/arists/actors provide the primary descriptive content and review excerpts that appear on site for their titles.

For some titles on site, we post Amazon.com signed editorial reviews. These appear at the discretion of our Editorial Team.

Finally, we allow our customers to air their honest thoughts about books they have read, music they have listened too and DVDs they have watched through our Customer Reviews feature.

We do exert some editorial control over our reviews. Profane or spurious comments are promptly removed. Our intention is to make the review forum a place for commentary and feedback, so discussions that fall out of this broad parameter are removed from the Web site. If you feel that a customer review falls outside of our guidelines, please contact us at community-help@amazon.com.

How do I fix typographical errors on my Amazon.com product detail pages?

Please click on the links below for details on how to send your corrections to us:

Books Music DVD/Video

Why are some titles discounted while others are not?

Our decision to discount products is made internally and based on a number of strategic considerations which can vary over time. As it stands now, we offer discounts on hundreds of thousands of selected titles. However we cannot confirm when, if ever, a title will be discounted or how long a title once discounted will remain so.

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