From Search to Sale: yesterday, today, and tomorrow (2 of 3)

.today (part 2)
From the brand perspective: 100,000 customers a day, about 4,000 an hour, what do you do?

The proliferation of the Web today has created very strange dynamics: consumers show up at manufacturer Web sites to find out more or initiate commerce. When consumers go to a retailer's site to make a purchase, the retailer's web-based product page is the modern functional equivalent to a "package."

So the retailer has become the packager and the manufacturer is forced to merchandise and become a larger part of the purchase process from search to sale.

This shift, created purely by online consumer behavior, has resulted in significant challenges. Retailers creating the primary form of 'packaging' at the point of sale is critically dangerous. Retailers are primarily motivated by closing sales, period. In the long term Brands invest in positioning, differentiation, messaging, and the definition and representation of their brand or brands.

With regards to Manufacturer Web site traffic, a Brand is no more innately capable of merchandising goods to consumers and closing sales (those activities that were granted to retailers to create expertise) than retailers at creating product differentiation and brand essence. Brands need to learn new tricks, hire new expertise, and learn to think like retailers. And retailers need to be conscious of clearly communicating brand-created differentiation and essence. Without these respective foci, differentiation will be lost and commoditization and erosion of meaningful consumer choice will ensue.

But could there be yet a stranger even more blurred world? YES!, the world of tomorrow...