Non-Local Niche Markets

From Zanecorpwiki

In his 2006 book The Long Tail, Chris Anderson lays out a theory by the same name that proposes that the Internet has dramatically expanded the volume of niche sales. We're selling more of less is the new mantra.

The existence and increasing importance of the long tail are more or less accepted. In 2006, Anderson was documenting something that already existed.

But what's new about the long tail? Small business isn't new, but the scale of small business is. Before the Internet, small business was always local. The locality could be geographic or local to a network of some sort such as close associates. The non-local niche markets are definitively non-local.

Locality changes the game. The relationship between small business and customer is typically intimate in nature. For local business, this intimacy is expressed in standard, well recognized ways. The question for non-local business is how to express intimacy and culture from a distance.

Obviously, the hip happening sites do this with slick graphics and edgy text... or cheap graphics and prosaic prose... a look and feel that fits. This requires insight and a touch, but it's straightforward enough.

What's more interesting is the development of new automated systems. The Netflix recommendation algorithm is a prime example. It pushes--in a useful way--the long tail.

The review, tagging, commentary, and recommendations on sites like Amazon do lots of things, but one of those things is to harness the niche to sell for the niche.