Ask before telling and learn before selling. Michael Brown is our “Business to Business By Phone Expert”. When it comes to using the phone to generate, nurture and qualify leads, there’s nobody better than Michael. With all the developments lately in B2B marketing, telemarketing still has a prominent position and I want to highlight that. So I sat down with Michael and asked him what’s new in telemarketing. Mac: Michael – tell me what you’ve been up to. What’s the latest and greatest in the world of B2B telemarketing? Cold callers call to pitch. Okay, Michael. hear where you’re going with this. MORE >>

by Jesse Noyes | Tweet this In olden days, when you wanted to drum up interest for your product or business, you could take an ad out in the paper, write a jingle for the radio or buy commercials on TV. The Internet changed the value proposition of mass media marketing. With the advent of email marketing , video marketing, blogging and social media marketing, businesses have a myriad of affordable options to build audience and engagement. But online displays ads still play a vital role in building a wider audience. Together they deliver 8 Rules for Running Online Display Ads. Ben Kunz. Reddit. MORE >>

A recent article on LifeHacker talks about tips to get faster email responses. They talk about: Write shorter emails. Write fewer emails. Ask for a response. Start with a deadline. Only email one person at a time. Those are good, but I’d like to expand a bit on them and also put it in the perspective of a marketing manager. Five Email Productivity Tips for Marketing Managers. Make subject lines work for you: Use subject lines with deadlines and action verb in order to help people spot your email easily in their inbox and to get them to act. Bonus tip: Transform your email into an action item! MORE >>

Much of marketing today is all about using new technologies to drive better decisions, more effective campaigns and more efficient customer support.  Technology is becoming critical for marketers to remaining competitive. . Yet new technologies rise up every day and cut across many areas of the marketing supply chain such as content, media, analytics, CRM, marketing automation, social media, reporting,  etc. So how does a marketer decide which technologies to test and use to grow their business? Cheryl Burgess is the Managing Partner at Blue Focus Marketing. Current example of Google+.  MORE >>

In my last two posts, I suggested strategies and tools for bootstrapping your small business sales and marketing efforts.  One of the most important recommendations is that you need to experiment with different “marketing channels” to find out which ones are the most effective at generating new customers for your business. But how is “effectiveness” defined?  For most marketers, it is Return on Investment (ROI) or how much money you made from each customer vs. the money you spent to get them.  4 people responded and 2 people became customers paying you $1000 each, generating a $300 profit each.  MORE >>