One way to think of the Long Tail is as the unserved majority. Amazon has a huge collection of books and music it can sell, and this enables it to serve the needs of afficionados of obscure 1960s bluegrass bands as well as it serves the needs of Britney Spears teenyboppers. But breadth isn’t enough to serve the numerical majority of people with niche interests.
One way to think of the Long Tail is as the unserved majority. Amazon has a huge collection of books and music it can sell, and this enables it to serve the needs of afficionados of obscure 1960s bluegrass bands as well as it serves the needs of Britney Spears teenyboppers.
But breadth isn’t enough to serve the numerical majority of people with niche interests. The reason Amazon’s milking the long tail so well is that they help people navigate the long tail: their recommendations and user reviews tell you that if you liked The Dillards then you might also be interested in Paul Siebel. By collecting purchase histories, recommendations, and reviews, Amazon has depth as well as breadth.
This is a general rule, as far as I can tell. To be successful with the long tail, you have to incorporate the wisdom of the users. Google opened the web up by recognizing links as implicit recommendations. The iTunes Music Store has a “Listeners also bought” section, though this isn’t always great. (Apparently people who buy The Dillards also buy Concrete Blonde, but I wouldn’t guarantee that people who like The Dillards also like Concrete Blonde)
Does it work the other way? Is Wikipedia a long tail enterprise? Am I Hot Or Not?
–Nat