Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1324 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-03
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Synopsis
What happens when there is almost unlimited choice? When everything becomes available to everyone? And when the combined value of the millions of items that only sell in small quantities equals or even exceeds the value of a handful of best-sellers? In this ground-breaking book, Chris Anderson shows that the future of business does not lie in hits - the high-volume end of a traditional demand curve - but in what used to be regarded as misses - the endlessly long tail of that same curve. As our world is transformed by the Internet and the near infinite choice it offers consumers, so traditional business models are being overturned and new truths revealed about what consumers want and how they want to get it. Chris Anderson first explored the Long Tail in an article in "Wired" magazine that has become one of the most influential business essays of our time. Now, in this eagerly anticipated book, he takes a closer look at the new economics of the Internet age, showing where business is going and exploring the huge opportunities that exist: for new producers, new e-tailers, and new tastemakers.

He demonstrates how long tail economics apply to industries ranging from the toy business to advertising to kitchen appliances. He sets down the rules for operating in a long tail economy. And he provides a glimpse of a future that's already here.

From the Publisher
The new economics of culture and commerce

From the Back Cover
With his brilliant theory of the Long Tail - a powerful new economic force in a world where the internet allows access to almost unlimited choice - Chris Anderson has identified an important truth about our economy and culture: that the future does not lie in hits - the high-volume end of a traditional demand curve - but in what used to be regarded as misses - the curve's endlessly long tail.

In this expanded and updated edition, published for the first time in paperback, he examines how niche interests, which make up the millions of misses, have come together in a global network, stimulating innovation on an unprecedented scale. The result, he argues, is a cultural richness in which enthusiasms previously dismissed as `minority' thrive and everybody everywhere can find something to their taste.

`A smart, timely and oddly inspiring book.' - Time Out

'It's the Big Idea of 2006.' - GQ

`The Long Tail is an eloquent exposition of a simple idea, but one that has huge ramifications for our media and culture if followed to its logical conclusions.' - Guardian Media

'Each year produces a book that captures the Zeitgeist... This year Chris Anderson's The Long Tail has helped to reinterpret our world.' - The Times

`…snappily argued and thought-provoking.' - New Yorker

Customer Reviews

Simple, Smart Premise No Longer Ignored
"The Long Tail: How Endless Choice Is Creating Unlimited Demand" by Chris Anderson claims that thar's gold in them thar hills. He tells us it is not a few big chunks we want, but many small nuggets.

Modern examples are Amazon.com and NetFlix, both of which sell plenty of Harry Potter products and the like. They also (or rent, as is with NetFlix) lots of less popular products. They hit the niche market hard. That's the gold.

The long tail is the curve's far end. At the top of the curve is Harry Potter, for example, along with other New York Times Bestsellers. These products certainly represent a significant amount of sales. However, so do the accumulated number of books and movies which might sell only a few copies a year. Add those up, and there is serious profit. While the tail in the curve is not high, it is long. One copy of, say. The Love, a Hungarian film, and one copy of The Very Best of Ralph Stanley, a bluegrass CD, might not sound like much, but the tail is long. Those, with thousands of other products sold each month, would make their seller very happy.

My own business is built on a long tail method. The market for Hungarian products is not like the Billboard Top 40. It is like the Billboard Bottom 20,000, if there were such a thing. It works.

Anderson's principles can be applied by small businesses like mine, and massive Fortune 500s looking to reach where few are reaching. The markets are there, and, by considering Anderson's ideas, so is the process.

I fully recommend "The Long Tail: How Endless Choice Is Creating Unlimited Demand" by Chris Anderson.

Anthony Trendl
editor, HungarianBookstore.com

a bold and refreshing view on business
Chris Anderson explains what could be seen as one of the most important new concepts in marketing these days. The book is very well written, and the message is carried all the way through. The last 80 pages or so feels like a slight repetition of the first part, but not enough that it should take away from the value of the book.

Anyone involved in web applications, or marketing and sales in general should read this.

ideas for ethical marketing
Anderson first coined the term The Long Tail back in an article for Wired magazine in 2004. The essential point he was making was that in a digital world of the likes of amazon.com, netflix and youtube the collective revenue publishers and e-commerce players make from the sales of the 10,000s of back stock is actually higher than the revenue they make out of the handful of mega hits each year. Anderson's key point was the economies of scale, distribution through the net, and low cost of downloading means that in certain markets- like books, films, music the idea of the market needs to be re-defined into thousands of mini niches, with the opinion formers who set fashion and define cool no longer the broadcasters of TV and national press but individual bloggers and writers who each contribute to defining the identity of each niche. Now linking this to green or ethical may seem tangential but in fact it isn't, ethical consumerism is actually a series of niches, from the healthy shopper who buys organic because it is perceived as more nutritious, to the raw diet vegan, those who put global social justice above and support fairtrade to those who think that no organic goods, fairtade or not, should be flown. The ethical consumer market is actually a mass of niches, with each individual's ethics and lifestyle informing their choices, and information and education constantly defining and refining each individuals' habits. The key lesson I got from this book is that a new green economy could utilise the power of the net by providing united distribution networks that link the myriad of small producers, service providers and information /education sources. The cross referencing nature of databases means that the full range of ethical services and products can be defined by the individual as they choose their key motivators- giving local services to one, fairtrade to others, those products and services produced by co-ops to yet others.