If we are thinking logically, search is search and social is social. But sentiments from those on the marketing frontlines might make us wonder about how these two mediums stack up one-to-one, and what might happen in the future as users spend more time on social and no longer have the need to hop over to those search engines to find something.

So, let’s look at some of those key frontline sentiments to get the picture:

• 82% of businesses believe that consumers will find brands using social media rather than traditional search engines.
• 70% of brands sell products directly via social media.
• 74% of organisations stated that social media will become consumers’ preferred means of customer service this year.

In other words, we could be witnessing a threat to search from the social ecosystem as a whole. Assuming, that is, that in the future users could get the vast majority of their requirements met in that social ecosystem. Watch this space.