Tried and true tactics are starting to lose their luster. According to a survey of 700 marketing professionals by MarketingSherpa, of the 15 most common B2B marketing tactics used today, none is reported to be producing huge results for the majority. B2B customers seem to be tuning out several marketing messages. Business owners nationwide are struggling with this challenge.

So what works now? No single approach is working for the majority of people, but the good news is three tactics do seem to yield positive results: public relations, word-of-mouth activities, and email and postal mail to in-house lists.

Public Relations

Public relations can come in a variety of marketing tactics. For instance, cause-related marketing, or marketing related to non-profit and for profit organizations coming together to form a marketing partnership, is an effective way to build awareness. Whether you're marketing to consumers or businesses, connecting your company and its efforts to a worthy cause is an effective way to communicate your company's values while doing the right thing.

Word-of-Mouth Activities

A survey published by BIGresearch found that more than 80 percent of small-business owners ranked word of mouth as either "very important" or "important" in swaying their purchasing decisions. Almost 90 percent said they sought advice from others before buying "regularly" or "occasionally." Word-of-mouth activities such as handling customer complaints in an efficient manner that satisfies the customer is a great way to build your reputation. Make sure that your employees are fully trained so that you can head off any customer service problems before they start. People will tout your bad graces before touting your good ones. Try to eliminate any reason for them to tout your bad graces! You can't eliminate all of them, but trying to certainly won't hurt you!

Mail: Virtual and Snail

It's bad news for list rental firms: both off-line and online mailings to in-house files are working better than their rental lists. Now is the time to add a registration form to the main page of your Web site to create your own opt-in e-mail list and bring your in-house mailing list up-to-date for postal campaigns.

If you want to use an e-mail campaign but don't have your own in-house list, one idea is to advertise in e-newsletters that go to the house lists of organizations that reach your target audience. Make sure to include your Web site address so that when respondents click through to your Web site they can sign up to receive information directly from you.

If you use newsletter printing services, whoever your printer is might be able to connect you with other businesses with products related to yours that you could swap newsletter ad space with.

For more information, you can visit this page on newsletter printing