Confessions of a Long Tail Prosthelytizer

Posted: December 31st, 2008 | Author: Chance Barnett | Filed under: Marketing Strategy, Search Marketing | Tags: , , , | View Comments

How many times have you used the term “Long Tail”?

Some new data has come out around whether the Long Tail Theory proposed by Chris Anderson of Wired Magazine holds water.

Or if it’s just been another buzz phrase consultants, strategists, advisors, and those paid for activities not too closely tied with revenue generation have enjoyed espousing and collecting fees for.

Doing some thinking recently, and looking back, I’m realizing that I’ve used the phrase “Long Tail” in reference to something that isn’t exactly what the theory was really about.

In short, having been so squarely focused on direct response and internet marketing (display, search, email) over the last 6 years… I realize that I’m not a believer in the Long Tail Theory as it applies to Business Models.

I’m a user of the phrase “long tail” to communicate something else important about marketing, and especially Search Marketing.

What I recognize is that the long tail, from the perspective of marketing and advertising, simply contains a great set of exact words and phrases through which to attract potential customers, and to use in crafting personal and relevant communications in order to get a desired outcome.

So, when set against a business model,  the long tail IS valuable, in the sense that there are real humans the tail is representing… and the cost of reaching these versus others in the Head is not only equal, but often LESS EXPENSIVE.

The beauty of the Tail as a marketer is that we can use it AND the Head and test to find how and where we can compete in ALL TERMS that relate to our market as well. Head or Tail. It doesn’t matter – although search volume and competition are 2 of the first considerations Search Marketers look for.

As Seth Godin said and named a book after, “All Marketers Are Liars”

I find this to be most true when anyone in marketing or advertising tells you that they know exactly what will work best for your business.

If they were honest, and good at what they do, then they would tell you that they have ideas of what could work… but they’ll never know until they test a few different things, and do a few iterations to improve and learn.

The same goes for whether the Tail of search marketing terms, or the Head, is the area that’s the best to target and go after- you never know until you test.

Therefore, I see the “long tail” as simple a source of information and data for us through which to target and acquire a broader set of users. Not to solely depend on.

Traditionally, the Head terms (highly popular that have the purchasing of millions behind them) are intensely competitive from the standpoint of Search Marketing, and therefore expensive to try and compete in on a keyword level.

By competing across the smaller tail of keywords, and having some targeting and success/revenue from these at a lower cost… companies can get their act together (know the value of an average visitor or subscriber or customer) and then gradually afford to compete in the more highly competitive (expensive to compete) areas and place bids on the higher minimum bid keywords.

The long tail of search marketing is alive and well. As a snarky bit of proof, I know many marketers who’s success in long tail terms have bought them cars fancy enough to make them feel confident approaching women they otherwise wouldn’t.