They only sit about five miles apart physically. One's in Palo Alto, the other's in Mountain View. But when it comes to how R&D is integrated into an organization's strategy, there is significantly more distance between Xerox's PARC and Google.

The Internet is the monolith spurring the evolution (de-evolution?) of English. We see it spread across the digital landscape, and take hold IRL (in real life), as words and symbols (@, #) have taken on entirely new. Even the venerable Oxford Dictionary looks to the Internet for "selfie," its word of the Year 2013. These evolutions represent opportunities in search and social to reach out with a message that is tailored to your consumer. Fail to evolve at the pace of online language, and you'll quickly become a nub.

Data is ubiquitous, and that is true pretty much everywhere. It was certainly true at the Search Insider Summit, where every panel and presentation talked about data. And not just any data -- this was "Big Data." But what exactly is Big Data -- just more data? Or is there a fundamental shift happening here?

First it was the bear pooping in the woods. Then it was the tree falling in the forest. Now we have the deer buzzing in the valley. Where will it end? Who knows? Probably down by the bay. Indeed, there was a distinct buzz in the (thin) air of Deer Valley, Utah this week as search geeks the world over flocked to the Search Insider Summit. As I've done for each of the past 15 shows, I logged all the buzzwords being bandied about. Here's the 20 that were dropped harder than a CEO on icy Main Street.

In the world of search marketing, no 2013 milestone sparked as much interest, speculation, and even fear as Google's debut of Enhanced Campaigns. Now that we've had nearly five months since the July launch, let's take a look at if -- and how -- four commonly expected forecasts have actually played out on the front lines.

In the past two decades or so, a lot of marketers talked about gaining a 360-degree view of their customers. I'm not exactly sure what this means, so I looked it up. Apparently, for most marketers, it means having a comprehensive record of every touch point a customer has had with a company. Originally, it was the promise of CRM vendors, where anyone in an organization, at any time, can pull up a complete customer history. So far, so good. But like many phrases, it's been appropriated by marketers and its meaning has become blurred.

It's the end of 2013 as we know it, so without further ado, here are my sage predictions for what SEM will look like in 2014. The predictions are ranked in order of likelihood of occurring, so they get wackier as you go!

The Pramos are remarkable places: grasslands that sit above the tree lines in the Andes, some 10,000 feet above sea level. They just happen to be the place on earth where evolution happens the fastest. In biology, evolution is measured by the rate of mutation. In the business world, mutation equates to innovation. So if we accept that corporate evolution is a good thing, and we want to increase our mutation/innovation rate, then it makes sense to seek our own organizational "Pramos."

Last year, I finally succeeded in emerging from my post-Turkey-Day tryptophan stupor to take advantage of the sales surrounding Thanksgiving, and it was decadent. Seems I wasn't the only one rejoining the holiday shopping kickoff. According to Experian's "Magical Insights for the Savvy Holiday Marketer" report, there was significant year-over-year growth in online traffic on Thanksgiving Day and Cyber Monday. Some shoppers may go direct from one retailer website to another, but search gets the biggest half of the wishbone: it's the number one form of navigation for transactions and research, with the usual suspects (G, Y and Bing) driving …

Tracking activity between desktops and mobile devices is finally a reality. Google announced it would begin showing advertisers paid search conversions that begin on one device, like a smartphone, and end on another, like a laptop. Microsoft followed with plans to build its own tracking system across devices. New companies, like Drawbridge and Tapad, have also developed proprietary technologies that retarget desktop users with ads on mobile devices. Cross-device tracking will open up incredible advertising opportunities on mobile devices. But are advertisers ready? Here are just a few mobile trends advertisers can expect from a cross-device tracking world.