ssling - 5:23 am on Apr 12, 2007 (gmt 0)

imho, the term "long tail" has come to mean different things to different people. drawing on arieng's point no. 3 above, allow me to draw a distinction, and coin a phrase, if i may:

long tail = a multi word extenstion of a common search term (e.g. widgets becomes short green widgets)
broad tail = a distinct but related search term, of any length (e.g. gadgets instead of widgets, where gadget is NOT a close synonym)

long tail wasn't originally defined that way, but that's the way many people use it when discussing search engine queries.

i think long tail, as defined above, is ineffective for PPC advertisers (as a result of Google Greed, see jtara and ronmcd's posts above) in big money markets. perhaps this is a trend that will move to all markets eventually?

btw, much appreciated the other comments and advice above. at the margin, these techniques make a difference in most markets. i suppose the point i'm trying to make is that PPC advertising is evolving, and this is one of the trends to watch.