Until recently, I've got to believe that the only time that the term "The Searchers" was ever spoken in business meetings was if during a break, someone asked - 'what's your favorite John Wayne movie?'  Now of course, Searchers dominate marketing discussions and it's not about the Duke.
 
The Internet has turned the business world's marketing process upside-down. Instead of just spending marketing dollars to create company brand interest and awareness, we also spend to make sure searchers (prospective buyers) find us - and not necessarily by introducing them to our brand name, corporate image or value proposition. Rather, the goal of our new spending is to get prospective buyers to navigate to a website that for them is an anonymous company . . . ours!  Yes, all that money is spent to associate generic product and service terms to us. From the buyer's perspective they put their search bet down, they spin the wheel and it lands them on say, 55 Black. What a world - as the wicked witch said, what a world. 
 
If we believe that it is now a buyer's market, we must adapt and focus on driving prospective new buyers to our websites by investing in search engine optimization (SEO) - the buzz-term that is all the rage. All other marketing initiatives pale by comparison - at least when it comes to achieving market share growth and new market penetration.  So, where does the branding and value proposition begin? At your website, of course.  The SEO investment got them to your website, now it must go to work and keep them there long enough to complete their mission. Our websites must work successfully to win new buyers over as repeat customers who frequently come back to be well-served and who buy more.