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| The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More | 
 enlarge | Author: Chris Anderson
Publisher: Hyperion
Category: Book
List Price: $24.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  179 reviews
Sales Rank: 14364
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.4 x 1
ISBN: 1401302378
Dewey Decimal Number: 658.802
EAN: 9781401302375
ASIN: 1401302378
Publication Date: July 11, 2006
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Product Description
What happens when the bottlenecks that stand between supply and demand in our culture go away and everything becomes available to everyone? "The Long Tail" is a powerful new force in our economy: the rise of the niche. As the cost of reaching consumers drops dramatically, our markets are shifting from a one-size-fits-all model of mass appeal to one of unlimited variety for unique tastes. From supermarket shelves to advertising agencies, the ability to offer vast choice is changing everything, and causing us to rethink where our markets lie and how to get to them. Unlimited selection is revealing truths about what consumers want and how they want to get it, from DVDs at Netflix to songs on iTunes to advertising on Google. However, this is not just a virtue of online marketplaces; it is an example of an entirely new economic model for business, one that is just beginning to show its power. After a century of obsessing over the few products at the head of the demand curve, the new economics of distribution allow us to turn our focus to the many more products in the tail, which collectively can create a new market as big as the one we already know. The Long Tail is really about the economics of abundance. New efficiencies in distribution, manufacturing, and marketing are essentially resetting the definition of whats commercially viable across the board. If the 20th century was about hits, the 21st will be equally about niches.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 174 more reviews...
Ties an old familiar statistical graph to current consumer trends July 23, 2006
204 out of 229 found this review helpful
The long tail is the colloquial name for a long-known feature of statistical distributions that is also known as "heavy tails", "power-law tails" or "Pareto tails". In these distributions a high-frequency or high-amplitude population is followed by a low-frequency or low-amplitude population which gradually "tails off". In many cases the infrequent or low-amplitude events--the long tail--can cumulatively outnumber or outweigh the initial portion of the graph, such that in aggregate they comprise the majority. In this book the author explains how due to changing technology it is now not only feasible but desirable in business to cater to the "long tail" of this curve.
The author explains how in traditional retail, you have the 80/20 rule, with 20 percent of the products accounting for 80 percent of the revenue. Online, instead, he sees the "98 percent rule." Where 98 percent of all the possible choices get chosen by someone, and where the 90 percent that is only available online accounts for half the revenue and two-thirds of the profits. He also explains how filters and recommender systems that help people find what they are really looking for are crucial ingredients. Thus, in a nutshell, Anderson's theory is that mass culture is fading, and being replaced by a series of niches. Thus the subtitle of his book, "Why The Future of Business Is Selling Less of More."
The author explains that the three forces of the long tail are:
1. Democratization of the tools of production such as GarageBand for musicians.
2. Minimization of the costs of distribution which in turn minimize the cost of consumption such as wideband internet connections.
3. The connection of consumers to one another to minimize the noise down the tail, such as this Amazon review system.
In this brave new world of niche markets, the author explains the new producers, markets, and tastemakers all of which are largely driven by the technological forces of cheap hardware and increasingly sophisticated recommender systems that tap the on-line purchasing habits of consumers and match individuals with the products that are likely to interest them the most. Anderson goes on to explain the power of Long Tail economics by citing sales and trend data in three media: books (Amazon), music (Rhapsody) and movies (NetFlix). He postulates the seemingly incredible claim that Walmart is in fact elitist, since they are constrained by physical space to offering only the most popular products. This is another basic premise of the book - that until the birth of the Internet physical space constrained retailers to offering only the most popular 20% of items because they represented 80% of the purchasing power.
The author's arguments hold up the best when he examines the entertainment industry. It is obvious that the recording industry is at a loss as to what to do about the fact that their sales are fading fast other than to blame piracy and sue consumers that dare decide that an overpriced vanilla-sounding boy-band CD is not worth the price. You can also see the desperation in the movie industry too, that has resorted to begging people to go to the theaters at the Academy Awards, but continues to mainly output recycled and formulaic products and reaps the expected mundane ticket receipts.
However, I think that the author overlooks two points. First, people crave some kind of common conversation with their fellow man. If we are all broken up into groups of a dozen each that all have the same politics, like the same music, and watch the same movies, then the community at large is duller for it. Take "American Idol" for example. It is obvious that this is not a hit show because America thinks that the winner is going to be the next Elvis Presley. In fact, the winners usually represent the plain vanilla output that has brought the recording industry to its knees in the first place. Can you see someone as gritty as Joe Cocker ever winning this contest? It is the audience participation and the feeling that you are part of the outcome that is the appeal. Also, people flocked to the very successful Harry Potter movies and the Lord of the Rings trilogy just as much because everyone else was going and taking their kids to see them and thus they were part of society's "common conversation" as they were because of the quality of the films. The second point that the author overlooks is that the monopolies whose death he cheers due to the "long tail" are simply being replaced by other monopolies. Who else but large businesses with the resources to mine the hugely diverse "long tail" shall prosper in the long term? A case in point is that the author himself keeps coming back to the same companies when he talks about "long tail" success stories.
In summary, although this book is a bit repetitive at times, it makes some good points. The author does a good job of tying the old familiar "long tail" statistical graph to the rapid change in purchasing habits over the last ten years, which is something that nobody else had succeeded in doing until he articulated the trend.
 Good Theory... But Then What? August 3, 2006
134 out of 147 found this review helpful
Well, timing is everything... and isn't always fair. Had I not just completed reading Jeffrey & Bryan Eisenberg's "Waiting For Your Cat to Bark?" before picking up "The Long Tail," I would probably have given this book 4 stars.
Chris Anderson has done a very good job of showing us the new "economics of abundance," or the connection of supply and demand thru technology and the Internet.
Question: What happens when everything in the world becomes available to everyone?
Answer: A market that never dies... markets for every niche, and vice-versa.
The Long Tail.
Using corporate examples like Google, eBay, iTunes and Netflix, Anderson lends an interesting perspective on how these companies have grabbed the Long Tail theory (consciously or unconsciously) and used it as the foundation for their staggering success. For customers of these companies, being online means unlimited "shelf space" - access to hundreds of thousands of bits of information, products and services they'd never been exposed to otherwise.
But how does the ordinary businessperson experience the success of the eBays of the world? Here, Anderson falls short. He states his "secret" to The Long Tail:
1.Make everything available
2.Help me find it
It's the "help me find it" part that Anderson ignores. In fact, it's the end of the book... you're left hanging, thinking, "So how in hell am I supposed to help people find me?"
Taken for what it is - a good presentation of a present-day theory (and one that was adequately covered in the original article in Wired magazine), the book is fine. But to really understand what it takes to make the Long Tail theory work for you, you must get a copy of "Waiting for Your Cat to Bark." It's in-depth coverage on not only how our economy works today, but understanding how people buy, how to understand what they're looking for and what you need to do to create persuasion magic not only on your website but in all your marketing materials.
This is not a time for "build it and they will come." Understanding an economy is only the first step. The real question is - what are you going to do about it to make yourself an integral part of the Long Tail?
It's too bad "The Long Tail" and "Waiting For Your Cat to Bark" can't be sold in a box set - they were made for each other.
 Word-of-Mouth Marketing July 13, 2006
33 out of 58 found this review helpful
In many ways, Chris Anderson's "The Long Tail" is a tale of post-modernity meeting marketing. In our current post-modern culture, choice is everything because experience is everything. And, peer recommendation is everything because believing other people's stories (their narrative of their experience) is everything.
This rather pedantic sociological analysis aside, Anderson's subtitle explains well his premise: "Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More." Or, as one wag cutely and curtly summarizes, "niches are riches." In other words, not everyone can be rich and famous. However, with the explosion of technology, everyone can find their passion and promote it successfully to a livable extent.
Of course, in some ways this is not much different from ancient "modernity." For instance, it has long been the practice in publishing that the top few authors receive the vast majority of promotion from publishers. The only difference now is that the starving author or artist might actually find enough takers to feed her or his family.
What's the "take home" for the average Jane or Joe entrepreneur? Location, location, location. That is, get the message about your message (be it a book, a song, a new business, etc.) out to the right people. And who are the right people?--your target audience. Know who wants your message and know how to reach them. And, know how to encourage them to tell their friends about your product. Word of mouth truly does work in post-modern niche marketing. Forget spending the big bucks on professional marketing--leave that to the big boys. Save your money by focusing on the "pass it on" principle"--one satisfied customer telling other hungry potential customers about what you have to offer.
Back to Anderson, he takes this rather simple message and both creatively and statistically relates it to our current culture. Of course, he is the head of the long tail, but the rest of us at least can find hope to be somehow connected to the body.
Reviewer: Bob Kellemen, Ph.D., is the author of "Soul Physicians," "Spiritual Friends," and "Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care and Spiritual Direction."
 Too much Socialism and Google/Apple Advertising July 24, 2006
31 out of 49 found this review helpful
I was excited when I first got this book. As I began to read it though I discovered many problems with the conclusions Anderson was making. For example, he made Google out to be an ingenious search engine, capable of retrieving exactly what people want using "Wisdom of the Crowd". And in most cases this "Wisdom" was given out of a sense of purpose and not for profit. Reality could not be further from the truth. I find Google to be increasingly less useful. Made-For-Adsense websites dominate the top search results of everything which contain nothing more than link farms, useless link directories, and of course Google advertisements made to make Google and the Adsense partner rich at the expense of small business owners on the Long Tail. In fact there was so much indirect praise for Google I began to wonder if Anderson was somehow making a commission through Adsense.
Then there's Wikipedia. The body of knowledge where whoever is the most persistent wins, including high school and college students with nothing better else to do. Hardly a crowd wisdom I'm interested in. Anderson seems to believe crowds are smarter than individuals. While crowds might be better at predicting crowd behavior they certainly don't solve any significant problems.
The references to and quotes from Karl Marx were never ending.
I could keep going but I won't. If you generally lean towards classical economics or you think America is better off not being a true democracy because you don't want the "crowd wisdom" ruining what's good, then you probably won't like the book. You probably won't even finish reading it. I couldn't.
For fad surfers only July 7, 2006
29 out of 58 found this review helpful
This book looked interesting from its reviews, but boy was it a disappointment. Read a few pages, and you know that the writer is a testosterone driven journalist, jargon, hype, buzz explode off the pages, wild claims, amazing statistics. Anderson is yet another wordsmith who has woven pop culture, pop sociology and pop marketing into an apocolyptic vision.
"Almost everything sells at least once a month" says Anderson...Huh? "The internet makes it cheap to reach more people"...Gee wizz. "infinite demand"...what? "Dramatically faster"...Duh!
Anderson is someone who doesn't let facts and figures get in the way of a good story.
Fact: innovation still takes 8 years to reach 50% of its peak level, whether it's broadband, internet, personal PCs, mobile technology whatever.
Fiction: diffusion of innovation is accelerating.
Fact: illusion of speed grows the closer you get to the details.
Fact: resourcing a business in the early stages of innovation curve requires you to keep doubling your resources every few months (that's because of the shape of the curve, not the market accelerating). This creates an illusion of acceleration.
So how should you respond to this book as a business person? Putting the inaccurate claims aside, it shows that fashion accessories, books and music, plus recycling of garage and loft contents, are taking place on the Internet more often, and that people are spending more leisure time searching for this stuff, and watching less TV as a consequence. So media companies are worried.
But if you want a serious book about innovation and portfolios, on making money from these trends, look elsewhere.
Suggested reading:
- Portfolio Management for New Products (ISBN: 0738205141)
- Marketing and the Bottom Line (ISBN: 0273661949)
- Marketing Payback (ISBN: 0273688847)
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