I like the theory behind Chris Anderson's book The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business is Selling Less of More, and as marketers you should consider it, too. It basically says that businesses in the new economy will thrive on selling a larger catalog of products to niche markets (for example, the success of Netflix). The book came out about a year ago, has been on the business bestseller list, and has been reported upon, quoted and bantied about in marketing and advertising circles since. Anderson has been expanding on the success of the theory through numerous speaking engagements on the conference circuit--perhaps too many? I saw Anderson's presentation at AMA's Mplanet conference in December--just about six months after the book came out--and already some attendees were saying they'd seen the presentation before. To Anderson's credit and engaging presentation skills, the said attendees still went and saw it again.

As someone who takes a birds' eye view of the marketing industry, Anderson has been popping up absolutely everywhere, and, for me, it's to the point where I see his name on a conference listing and think "oh, not AGAIN." So I say, this guy needs a break. If you haven't read the book or seen him present, go buy it or catch him at any of the big summer conferences (he'll be at AdTech in August). After that I think it is time to let him go write another book (on his blog he says he's working on one)--or just rest on his laurels a bit and do his day job as the editor of Wired.

So how about it? Are you one of the thousands that have you seen Anderson's presentation or read his book? What do you think?