Amazon Boosts Prime Membership During Holiday Runup

Amazon

Amazon has announced that the 2017 holiday season was its “biggest” ever.

According to news from CNBC, Amazon said on Tuesday that customers shopped on its website at “record levels” throughout November and December. Over the course of one week, more than 4 million people became Prime members or started a free trial, sending its membership count to new highs.

The company also said shopping on its mobile app increased nearly 70 percent this holiday season, with millions of tech gadgets ordered through it.

Some of the bestselling items included the Instant Pot multi-cooker, WowWee Fingerlings toys, the Fitbit Charge 2 fitness tracker, a 23andMe DNA test and robot vacuums for cleaning around the house.

Amazon’s Alexa also did well over the holiday season, with the company revealing it sold “tens of millions” of devices powered by its smart voice assistant.

The top purchases made through “voice shopping” were the Echo Dot and Fire TV Stick with Alexa Voice Remote. Amazon’s Alexa app also topped the App Store charts for Apple’s iPhone, most likely because people were setting up their new devices.

The inexpensive Echo Dot was the top-selling product on Amazon across all categories, and the newer Echo Spot and Echo Buttons also sold out. In addition, twice as many Fire TV Sticks (the less-sophisticated version) were purchased this year.

“The more that Amazon cannot just get its Echo devices out there, but [also] get its Alexa technology embedded in a variety of things, including cars, that’ll be the long-term win,” said RBC Analyst Mark Mahaney.

Amazon is again expected to grab more than 50 percent of new digital sales this holiday season.