Friday, April 11, 2008

Long Tail Drives Product Creation

When it comes to designing belt buckles and other products for eBay sales, I think the key to making sales is having a product with a good narrow focus. I want a shopper to see one of my items and be amazed that someone even took the time to create the product.
I have had a couple of different accordion-themed belt buckles for sale...a Black Accordion over Red Candy Burst design and an Accordion Idol design.

Today I received requests for variation on both of these buckles. One guy wanted the Accordion Idol design but with a push-button instrument. The other request was for a Cajun Accordion over a green candy burst. It took about an hour each to work up these:

So I spend an hour on each one and make 10 bucks on each. Not really a productive use of my time. Except that I now have two additional products to offer for sale to other accordion players. And these two new designs were driven by actual consumer input.
This I think is the secret to producing items that will sell. Because, truth be told, I don't know beans about accordions.

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