We continue to see a shift from active search to passive discovery as smartphone usage itself grows. That’s especially true with local search, given that portability, location awareness and use case are more conducive to push-based content.

The ways in which this overall concept continue to evolve (and implications for advertisers) was the theme of a presentation I gave last week at Mobile Marketer’s FirstLook conference in New York. It’s being driven further by adjacent topics like mobile payments and push notifications.

One important area of this discussion is Google Now: the search giant’s most important and under-recognized initiative. It gets some recognition but not commensurate with the level to which it will determine Google’s ability to play in this discovery-based mobile world.

I plan to make my entire presentation (slides and voiceover) available here this week. In the meantime, you can read Mobile Marketer’s own coverage of the presentation. I’ve pasted a teaser and embedded video below, and the rest of the article can be read on Mobile Marketer.

NEW YORK – An analyst at Mobile Marketer’s Mobile FirstLook: Strategy 2015 conference said he expects Google Now to step up its use of targeted push notifications as search becomes more mobile application- and discovery-based to meet consumer demand for faster, more personal service.

The session, “Search: How Mobile is Redefining Search Across Smartphones and Tablets,” focused on how Google, rethinking its business model in the mobile context, as consumers searching via maps and voice commands, expect results to be instantaneous, local and clickable to a mobile site or phone number.

“Like Google does with a lot of things, I’m convinced Google Now will be more personalizing and pushing, really targeting messaging to users,” said Michael Boland, senior analyst and vice president of content with BIA/Kelsey.

“Google actually does the market a favor by experimenting on the scale it can do,” he said. “But it’s really worth watching for anyone interested in this kind of world of push-based notifications and more mobile signals to really get in front of users in more intuitive ways.”

Read the rest.