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Blog #5 of #5 in our Peter Ostrow Guest Blog Series

Here, There, and Everywhere: 21^st Century Selling Comes of Age

Answer this question:  is your sales team inside or outside?  If you hesitate before mentally responding, you’re in good company.  

Over the years, my Sales Effectiveness research has seen a steady blurring of these traditional job roles, as work/life balance employment trends, ever-cooler handheld devices, and lightning-fast connectivity have dramatically changed the landscape of B2B selling.  Traditionally, enterprises employed low-cost or entry-level staff to smile-and-dial their way toward qualifying leads for the field, and showered their high-flying outside reps with all the goodies that accrued to coffee-drinking closers.  The line between the personas was clear, although proactive sales leaders were wise enough to build a dues-paying, promotional path between them for the strongest inside sellers to graduate to the field. 

Blog #4 of 5 in our Peter Ostrow guest blog series

Which Half of YOUR Marketing Budget is Working?

It's time to retire the classic mantra of ROI-hungry CMOs: “I know that half of my marketing dollars are effective, just not which half." 

Today's savvy B2B marketers have plenty of tools at their disposal to overcome this traditional lack of visibility, which legitimately plagued their communications and business development efforts for generations. While the next Super Bowl will undoubtedly set new records for mass media advertising costs, few CMO budgets are spent nowadays on anything but laser-focused, personalized marketing content that approaches one-to-one messaging as closely as possible.  

Oracle Marketing Cloud Interact 2014 took place in San Francisco earlier this month. From sessions covering modern marketing best practices, to training sessions from marketing leaders, exciting keynote lineup and private shows, Interact 2014 proved to be a great event for B2C and B2B marketers. Courtney Buchanan, a writer for the New School Marketing blog, covered the event’s happenings while picking up on valuable tips from Oracle Marketing Cloud attendees. Let’s take a look at the latest insights and best practices Courtney gathered from top professionals at the event. 

In her article, 4 Tips for Data-driven Glory: Insights from Interact 2014, Courtney addresses the importance of making sense of customer data to drive personalized experiences and, ultimately, bottom line impact. Below is a list of Courtney’s top 4 ways marketers can make use of data to get the most results from their marketing campaigns.