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It's natural to start thinking about your career in the beginning of a New Year—a time for resolution, reflection and rebirth. To help you focus on taking your marketing career to the next level, here are five key elements of a successful strategy.

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The US started the ball rolling over a year ago with CAN-SPAM, followed closely by the EU directives implementation. This article, presented in two parts, looks at the Australian Spam Act, which came into force in April of this year. Here's how the Act is structured and how it's already making significant progress in the ongoing battle against spam.

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A basic role for a marketing researcher is that of intermediary between the producer of a product and the marketplace. The marketing researcher facilitates the flow of information from the market or customer to the producer of the good or service. Such a situation, with three major players—the producer, the customer and the market researcher—often sets the stage for conflicts of interest which can give rise to ethical problems. Given the inevitability of ethical dilemmas in marketing research, well-established ethical guidelines are critical.

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Imagine your marketplace is a field of banana trees. Your marketing people are those who nurture and pick the bananas. Bananas are harvested when they are green, and they turn yellow as they ripen. Roughly 95% of your leads are like harvested green bananas. Here's how to ripen all those green bananas before you pick them.

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This week, add your two pesos to the dilemma: If you're a service business or sell a more complex product, is it still possibly to take advantage of the holiday shopping season? Also this week, read your answers to last week's problem: What is the best approach or message for marketing technical services and solutions?

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At a time when Marketing and IT must closely collaborate in order to cope with a rising swell of consumer data, both groups still engage in needless bickering, neither side willing to put aside historical grudges. Without a common understanding of the role of technology in customer management, and a path to get there, progress toward true CRM will continue to be thwarted.

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There was a time, not long ago, when companies could generate new business by simply listening to and following the advice of their investors and business advisers. To remain successful today, however, companies must collaborate directly with their most important stakeholders—paying customers.

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More and more companies around the world understand the importance of really knowing how their customers and prospects view their organizations. They also realize that viewpoints can change quickly. So how do you keep informed of your customers' opinions? How do you know they're continually satisfied? How do you know that they value your company? Or that they feel appreciated? Gathering this data objectively, accurately and quickly can be difficult. Yet it's critical in today's competitive marketplace.

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These days, businesses are increasingly using a full range of communication methods including email, Web and fax to enhance relationships with existing customers, as well as a low-cost means of acquiring new ones. Now an emerging communication mode, text messaging—or Short Message Service (SMS)—provides an additional and interesting opportunity for companies and organizations to differentiate themselves.

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E-marketing is about substance over show, logic over emotion, text over graphics. In fact: good Web marketers follow the Google motto: be useful.

CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: Writing

In today's competitive enterprise technology marketplace, the customer success story can be the tipping point for turning a prospect into a customer. Of course, the success story begins with a happy customer. But are you focusing on the right customers? Are you writing the best stories? Can your sales team and its prospects find the most relevant stories on your Web site?

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Custom publishing is a proven branding and messaging strategy that can be an important part of an integrated marketing campaign. But this communications approach—whether "sponsored" supplements, newsletters or magazines—can also play a role in a strategic PR initiative.

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We all know, buy and experience brands that have a great heritage. For some of us, it is Mercedes, Philips or Disney. For others, it is McDonalds, Heineken or Gucci. What makes these brands great, what they all have in common, is that they have had the time to build a meaningful and relevant past—a heritage. What's your brand's heritage?

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Are you losing truckloads of dollars simply because you don't get the customer to consume what they've ordered? Can't entice them to move beyond the sale? What's missing in your marketing?

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Ethical marketers all over the world worry about US spam-related laws, because they are not always clearly written or easy to understand. This week: What can marketers do to ensure compliance with anti-spam legislation? Also this week, read your answers to last week's dilemma: What's the best way to evaluate business opportunities?

CONTENT TYPE: Article | TOPIC: Writing

If you're running a Web site, you are an accidental publisher. And publishing is as much about what you don't publish as what you do. Resist the call of the warehouse and the illusory promise that technology will solve all your problems. Content is your asset. The less of it you publish, the more it grows in value.

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Over a period of six years, an established high-tech company has seen five reincarnations of its global marketing organization. With each new senior marketing executive has come a new interpretation of the company's mission and vision, followed by new attempts to tune market positioning and overhaul sales tools. Such organizational instability sabotages the company's market messaging. The company expends inordinate amounts of time and money on repeatedly reinventing itself—while confusing its industry, customers and employees. Sound uncomfortably familiar?

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Most businesspeople intuitively know that the key to successful marketing is having a marketing plan—a blueprint for action. But many companies operate without one, focusing instead on the issues of the moment without committing to a long-term strategy. A marketing plan does not need to be complex, but it does require several elements to be effective.

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Marketing complex products and services is a challenge. This week, add your two cents to: What methods work well for marketing technical services and solutions? Also this week, read your answers to last week's dilemma: What do you do when you are stuck with a no-name moniker and no brand?

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It's the fourth quarter of the fiscal year. Let the finger-pointing begin! In truth, the key to accurate lead-conversion ROI calculations is "self-honesty." While every company has the right to create its own definition of "R" to compare with "I," it is critical to look back at the justification that was used to support lead-generation activities prior to funding.