The Long Tail

"We equate mass market with quality and demand, when in fact it often just represents familiarity, savvy advertising, and broad if somewhat shallow appeal." In this week's blog report I am writing about an article called The Long Tail. In this article the author goes into great detail about the effect of mainstream marketing and how it is ineffective. The Long Tail is a term used to describe the area of the market that is often ignored by mainstream advertisers. If advertisers focused more on the specialty and niche market they would make as much money, if not more, than the popular market. The specialty market often has more people that look for unique things and do not care for the mainstream items. For example, the music industry has a large fan base for the popular artists but there are just as many people who like random performers. If platforms such as Spotify and Apple Music focused on advertising the lesser known artists they would not lose any money. Another aspect of the long tail is the fact that physical companies simply cannot keep up with all the different fan bases. In a physical store the owners can only keep items in stock that they know will sell. Since the introduction to the internet, online streaming and shopping has made the long tail possible. Online streaming services can support the vast and diverse taste in movies, music, and shows. Physical stores for movies and music are becoming a thing of the past. They simply cannot support the fan base that is represented in the diverse needs in today's world. The long tail is the future of advertising and online streaming/shopping is the lifeblood that supports it.