WOM: The Community of the Long Tail
by Tim Wolters December 29, 2007
The individual today has more influence than perhaps any other time in history on the success or failure of a company and it’s products. Blogs are playing a critical role in our ability to communicate our thoughts and preferences to those interested. Twitter is making instant information ubiquitous 160 characters at a time. Mass marketing is quickly losing relevance to the sea of information. According to recent stats released at Blog World Expo
- over 12 million American adults currently maintain a blog
- over 57 million Americans read blogs
- blog readers average 23 hours online each week
With such massive potential reach and connectivity of the blogosphere, the internet has finally become the global village. In the same way that word quickly spreads around a small village about how great or terrible a vendor is, word of mouth spreads rapidly on the internet in these connected communities. I’ve seen this so many times now it’s like an act of violence in a Quentin Tarantino movie : Dell burning laptop, Edwards haircut, Guitar Hero Rocks, and on and on and on. Yes, it is the community of the long tail. Communities naturally form around topics that people are passionate about. These passions bleed across each other however, and connect disparate communities together. On average, the bloggers we track participate in 25 different communities. These bridges expand the network providing serendipitous interconnectivity and are crucial to the viral spread of messages.
