21A – Reading Reflection No. 2

The book I chose was The Long Tail by Chris Anderson
1) What was the general theme or argument of the book?
The book is about a business strategy that says business can sell low volumes of hard to find items to many customers. This is done in place of selling large numbers of a reduced number popular items. 
2) How did the book, in your opinion, connect with and enhance what you are learning in ENT 3003?
The book definitely gave me a great alternative strategy to the normal strategy. If I ever begin my own business, I will have to consider the ideas that Mr. Anderson brought up in his book. It provides a new perspective that could be very beneficial to my business. 
3) If you had to design an exercise for this class, based on the book you read, what would that exercise involve?
If I had to create an exercise, I would ask students to come up with their own business strategy. 
4) What was your biggest surprise or 'aha' moment when reading the book? In other words, what did you learn that differed most from your expectations?

I was surprised to learn that consumers are shifting from mass produced items to more artisan items. I figured that more people were trending towards cheaper products. I now know that I can make my own things and be successful in the end.

Comments

  1. Abby TuckerApril 3, 2020 at 10:36 AM

    Hi Michael,
    I did not read that book, but I enjoyed reading your review. The strategy it presents seems very counterintuitive, but after explanation I see how it could work! Thinking over the strategy, I can think of examples of businesses who do this now, especially in industries like art and collector's items. I definitely value artisan items more than something I know is a replica that millions of other people have.

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  2. Darren LiebegottApril 4, 2020 at 1:19 PM

    Hi Michael,
    It is interesting that people are moving towards more unique products. I think many people are tired of following the mainstream ideas of these larger corporations, and that self-identification is important to consumers, even in their purchases. This book sounds interesting regarding the way that we think about customer segmentation and marketing. Most people look at marketing as finding the largest group of customers to sell to at the highest margin, whereas this book takes a closer look at segmentation as a whole. Very interesting ideas here.

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  3. Robert BaumanApril 6, 2020 at 10:12 AM

    Greetings Mike,

    Good job on your blog post! Would you recommend this book? I considered reading this one but ended up reading How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big by Scott Adams instead. It looks like you took away some good knowledge from the book, but your class exercise is a little lacking. We already work on business strategy with our business idea, is there any other important things that are talked about you could implement as an exercise? Overall, you definitely read the book and did a decent job summarizing. Good work!

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