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Search marketing – that amazing ability that the Internet brings to us to allow the smallest entrepreneur, advocate or person selling anything, to be found, continues its powerful advance in our society. 

I am very glad.

I wrote already about John Battelle’s book “The Search” and his use of the phrase “database of intentions” to describe what Google and other search engines both offer and garner.” That phrase keeps working on me as I think about what is happening in the marketplace today.

We are able to now match ‘intentions’ with amazing acuracy, across the country, across the world, and across town.

Think about it: I ‘intend’ to sell my car. I know its strengths and weaknesses. I also know its value. Someone else ‘intends’ to buy a car, with a value in mind similar to that of my car. They also ‘intend’ to get a car with similar strengths as mine offers. If I am honest and transparent in my post, I also communicate its weaknesses and the person on the other end decides if they are sufficient to thwart the other matchup of ‘intentions.’  A deal is made and sealed. It may well have cost me little or nothing. The buyer had access to an amazing array of information, both from me and thousands of others.

There was a lot of help in matching up the ‘intentions,’ thanks to the incredible power of the “Databases of intentions,” the search companies.

Compare that to traditional small marketing. I want to sell my car. About my only choice to do so myself previously was to buy a limited space small classified ad in a newspaper or shopper. I cannot describe much due to the cost of the space. The available people to buy, those with possibly-matching ‘intentions’, are far fewer. They have to scan hundreds of used car ads to find out if there is a possible match. It was a much different, and poorer, marketplace.

Multiply this effect by tens of thousands of industries, hundreds of millions of people and many  billions of dollars. You get an idea of what the power of “SEARCH” and the matching of intentions has and will have in our business world.

And as the databases get better – the people learn to use them more efficiently, both buyers and sellers – our economy is becoming a much more efficient fullfiller of intentions.

It is happening at lighting speed.

Nothing like saying you are going to write again and then staying mum for two weeks.

I guess that is the world of blogging. The amazing thing is that people keep coming back to read – according to my stats and my user- location finder (yes I can sort of see where you are! scary, eh?)      :-)

[ It is a fun guessing game to guess who might be reading, and hard to resist. Sort of like putting the ear to the train tracks to listen for ringing in the rails, though. Can't stay there too long and one might not really want to know what is coming!]

So easy to divert. But back to my theme – business and life.

I think about it every day. Starting a new job – at Nutramax Laboratories as Internet Marketing Manager – helps keep the thoughts fresh as well. (It is also much of the reason I have not had time to write – a lot of new stuff to learn).  But it is amazing, no matter how large or small a business is – it still boils down to one thing: It is about people. And life.

Well – let me amend that. It is also about animals – as I am learning at Nutramax. Many of our products are for pets, horses and other wonderful living beings. Let’s just say “Life.”  Business really is about life. 

As we continue to explore the new marketing possibilities of the Internet, mobile, digital communications and whatever else is out there on the horizon, I can’t get away from the fact that the most fascinating part of it all is the way people (and pets) are connecting with each other – across continents. It is absolutely fascinating. I guess that is what always drew me to the Internet, from the beginning, because I am a people person. I had pen-pals in Europe when I was in 5th grade (yes back when people actually wrote with a pen and sent letters).

But now it is not just about meeting people and talking to people all over the globe; it is actually possible to make money doing it! Businesses are discovering that as never before. In fact, it seems that just during the  year, a great number of business people I have talked to have come to the realization that this is not a sideline thing any more, but will soon be the predominant way most companies do business. 

And to some the realization is also dawning that there are new rules and new paradigms involved in what that business looks like. As I have pointed out in precious posts – that more closely resembles a middle-eastern bazaar than it does a crisp bank lobby. People all over the place, laughing, shouting, crying, yelling and many just watching. That about sums up the Internet marketplace. It also sums up “Life.”

Can that be so bad? To do business in a totally, technologically-new way that is really much like an old-fashioned way that goes back to the dawn of history?

Dunno.

But I love it.

Of course, I have a penchant for drama.

It is time to start writing again. 

The posts have been scattered and a little shot-gunny,  aiming all over the place – but I’d like to focus now back on where I started this series – dealing with Business and Life.  I’d especially like to get back to the theme of the entrepreneur – the smaller business, and the changes going on in our culture about how people interact and conduct business.

There are a lot of unfinished posts to finish up like the page about my background , the “take on what is going on‘ and others.  There is also a lot more to explore concerning the place of search, collaboration and networking online with regard to the entrepreneurial and open business spirit we promote.

But above all I would like to write again, and often, about the sense of freedom that comes when people follow their dreams, produce good stuff and offer it to a needy world, however cynical and jaded that world may be. To me that is what life is all about.

I am reminded of what a poor farmer with a large family once said, in the heartland of America. When asked a question by a self-important and slightly disrespectful questioner “Well, what do you GROW on that farm?” he spoke the stunning answer – “We grow people, son.” 

This makes a lot of sense to a kid like me who grew up reading stories of Abe LIncoln learning to read, write and think by the shallow light of a candle. I could always imagine him poring over  The Bible, Shakespeare and Blackstone’s Law again and again in a prairie lean-to and later in a small barely-surviving country store.

As one who travels several times a week through a city filled with marble monuments and symbols of hope and vision, many of them decorated with the inspiring words penned by that same country boy who later became president, I can think of nothing better to do in life than to “grow people.”

And it is not an easy thing to do.

But behind all the talk here about communications, entrepreneurship, new media and new opportunities - that is the heart of this blog.