Think of the biggest bands in the world.
Now think of your favourite among them.
Most people will have heard their music, maybe even bought, downloaded or streamed it.
Those bands sit proudly at the top or head of what’s known as the long tail, where popularity and demand are massive.
If you and I were to form a Black Crowes/Status Quo tribute band tomorrow and call it the Black Quos, we’d probably sell fewer records and enjoy slightly less success than the Beatles, AC/DC or whichever band you chose.
We’d be somewhere down the tail. Quite a long way down:
Just as the Beatles are at the head of the tail, so too are the biggest films and general, single-word search terms such as ‘travel’, ‘dogs’, ‘flowers’ and ‘photography’.
People search those words in huge numbers but the results that Google throws up will be very general.
And then are long-tail search terms: phrases that are searched by far fewer people, such as ‘flying dog’:
The point is this: the long tail never hits the bottom. The theory goes that everything that’s available is wanted by someone somewhere at some point.
Endless choice creates unlimited demand.
Even a record by the Black Quos. We might not sell more than one every ten years but we would sell that one.
And if we were to produce ten albums that sold in small numbers, theoretically those small numbers would add up to match the quantity of records sold by a more prominent band who live higher up the tail.
In today’s market – the market created by the internet and its unlimited shelf space – creating something for everyone doesn’t work.
The more specific the group of people you’re serving, problem you’re solving or need you’re meeting, the better your chances of success.
When asked who your product/website/service is for, you can’t realistically say, “Everyone”, because it won’t be true. It’s probably not for mums in Merseyside, or tribute bands trying to make it, or dog owners in Barking and Leeds.
- I’ve started a glossary of web-related terms on this page. There’s not much on it at the moment but I’ll add more in time.
- I learned about the long tail in Chris Anderson’s book called, er, The Long Tail, which is available here.*
*affiliate link
