Monday, April 27, 2009

What Would Google Do? The Long Tail

The following information is based two incredible books I found just a few weeks ago. The first title is What Would Google Do? By Jeff Jarvis and came out in 2009.
Why is this book so significant? What Jarvis has done is reverse engineer Google from the present back to when it began in 1998. The number of breakthroughs, marketing advances and changes instituted by Google are truly astounding!
Some of these are as follows:
1) The world and Google have moved or will move away from mass marketing toward niche marketing. This is further explained in another key book and resource called The Long Tail by Chris Anderson. (Both books will literally allow to “crystal ball” the future as well as where things are going in the present.) Niche marketing can be explained by understanding how online communities, such as blogs, are forming with those of similar interests. Mass marketing is working less and less due to greater fragmentation or niches within the market. This concept is very important to know and understand within any business as the rules are rapidly changing.
2) Blogging is making much of society and business more transparent in that we are receiving news and information from many sources vs. just 25 years ago when it was newspapers, certain magazines and only four television networks. These additional sources have exploded and opened up numerous outlets of information. It is the equivalent of any of the major news sources having literally thousands of fact checkers behind each story so they better be accurate!
An example, Dan Rather of CBS, doomed his career when he held to a story on President Bush and his National Guard records. The false records appeared, not with a 1970’s typewriter, but a word processor that came out years later. The bloggers got involved, fact-checked this and showed why CBS’ story was based on inaccurate information. Had Rather realized the extent of this new media called blogging, he would have quickly revised his position on this, apologized for the misinformation and changed course. Unfortunately for Rather, he was caught in an earlier era and vastly underestimated the truth-checking bloggers.
These are just two examples of how the new economy and 21st century are blowing away the industrial model of society. Only by understanding these changes will you be able to move ahead in the world and in your life! I highly recommend these books.
They are a necessary addition to any entrepreneur or business person’s resources.

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