Venrock is Listening...

David Beisel (with support from Daphne Kwon) just crafted a very concise and informative blog post at AlwaysOn-Network regarding the mass-migration of search engines to Universal Search (aka Unified Search, 3D Search). It could take reams of copy to cover all the issues. David does it well in one post.

(P.S. If you don't know David's company, it's one of the absolute leading Venture Capital firms in the nation, Venrock, founded by John D. Rockefeller. One of our Advisors is Jacques Nichols, a long-time VC who has worked with Venrock in the past, giving them a thumbs-up).

A couple of quick quotes from David:

Marissa Mayer (of Google) mentions on their blog "(Universal Search is a way) to blend content from Images, Maps, Books, Video, and News into our web results."

But the most powerful part of his overview is this:

Many great businesses were built upon leveraging natural search as a distribution mechanism, and I see the shift towards universal search as opening a door for new players to enter what was a marketplace that previously gave unfair advantage to incumbents on a specific keyword term. Much like the situation for natural text search in the late 90's, there is a new land grab for top search placement for these new media formats (like images, podcast, and video).

David, I couldn't agree more.

We serve all size businesses, and have spent significant time in the emerging business markets with ExitPath and ThoughtOffice. I personally have a big heart for startups.

We concur with David: Startups seem to be behind the curve in adoption of Universal Search as a way to get above the noise.

We're finding companies in the $3-$25 million range really "getting it".

Enterprises ($50 million+) understand the costs of driving online traffic, brand and sales. In our experience, these folks immediately grasp the ROI behind Permanent Media Placement vs One-Time marketing efforts.

INVITATION: If you're a startup trying to make sense of Universal Search or your complete online marketing strategy, contact us. As serial entrepreneurs, we've had plenty of experience in this space, and will gladly share our views, gratis.

To your startup success,
Mark Alan Effinger