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Cross-posted from SearchSense:

Mat Morrson of digital marketing consultancy Ryan Morrison & MacMillan has published a post on its blog entitled “5 things you never knew about search” which quotes our very own David St John Tradewell liberally.

For the full run-down read the original article, but the five things are headlined:

1. It’s not about search, it’s about find.
2. Search businesses are service companies. They are only as good as the technology they employ.
3. Show me the money. (“If you can’t put a value on a transaction, you can’t optimise your search.”)
4. Good search businesses can’t afford to have all their staff in London offices.
5. Something makes people search….

I’d certainly agree emphatically with the first and last points especially.

But I’d go further, adding my own impressions as a brand communications specialist who has spent a few months in the world of search marketing now.

Often people see search marketing simply as a transaction-based or lead generation business. It is very, very good that, but it is also becoming more: search should be viewed as media, and search marketing as a part of brand communications as well as a powerful customer delivery tool.

Search is the most powerful application for making sense of the exponentially growing complexity of the online networked world.

Product information and pricing are only part of the story of how people are using the web, and search, in their daily lives, about how they navigate and make sense and use of online networks.

People are using the web (and therefore search) more than ever and their sophistication in its use, their demands of it, are growing more complex too. It’s an intimate, sometimes unwittingly so, relationship that many have with their search engines, and search marketing must evolve alongside that.

: : I’d also add to point two that search businesses are also only as good as the people they employ.  Technology is massively important, but not more important than people who can put it to best use, read and action data to best effect, plan and execute strategies to succeed, find  the best ways to market online with search.