1. Advertising

Print and online ads are great ways to get your name out there. However, advertising is very costly and oftentimes hard to measure. Many publications engage in swaps or barter agreements which allow you to post an ad in their print publication or website usually in exchange for ad space, access to your customers, or even for services. The terms of the agreement will have to be negotiated with each publication on an individual basis, but this is a great way to save valuable marketing dollars while still getting your name out there to relevant prospects.

With many companies making budget cuts, advertisers are suffering so you may be able to negotiate terms that they normally wouldn't agree to (ie. larger ad space, 2 ads for the price of 1, etc.). Don't pass up this opportunity to form new relationships with relevant industry publications that have a following of qualified buyers/subscribers.

2. Viral Marketing

Your website: Viral marketing is more important during economic slumps than ever. Make sure your website is search engine optimized and displayed high in search results. If it's not, you should start by identifying a few keywords that describe your site and incorporate them into your copy without sounding spammy. This is an art and can be time-consuming, but it's definitely worth it. Also, you want to make sure your website serves as a resource for industry professionals. They will come back often if they see your site as a pool of knowledge. Link to other industry websites and stay current on news and trends.

Blogs: Blogs give you more freedom to speak without interfering with the design of your website. Make sure you update your blog regularly and always use relevant content. Encourage your readers to ask questions and provide feedback by asking questions and conducting polls and surveys. You want to be seen as an authority in your specific area so that people will want to pay you for your products/services. Blog content is also crawled by major search engines so don't forget to link back to your business website.

You should also be posting on other blogs. Post to relevant industry blogs, answer and ask questions and promote your product/service as a solution to common problems.

Social Networking: Networking has always been the key to success in any business. Websites like Linkedin and Facebook make it even easier. You can find others with similar interests and maintain professional relationships. The way you choose to present yourself and your business is up to you, but don't disregard the power of online networking tools such as these. Also, do your research because there are other networking tools out there for business professionals and some for specific industries.

Traditional: In the age of Web 2.0 we can sometimes overlook the traditional forms of viral or word-of-mouth marketing efforts. Attend industry events including conferences, tradeshows, social happy hours, etc. This is a prefect way to unwind with your peers and hand out a few business cards.

3. Direct Marketing

Direct Mail: The data you own is your most valuable asset. You must make sure your data is complete and up to date. Data diminishes at a tremendous rate due to turnover in companies, mergers, relocation, etc. Make sure you update your customer and prospect data regularly and that you are constantly acquiring new data. There are many services available to aid you in data acquisition and data hygiene (Check out DataOverhaul.com).

Email

Email marketing can be very effective when done correctly.

DO keep a list of unsubscribes

DON'T send emails from your personal email address, use a third party email service provider

DO abide by the rules set forth in the CAN-SPAM Act

DON'T annoy your clients/prospects. Only contact them when you have something to say

DO provide them with valuable information about their business, not just "click here to buy"

Telemarketing: It never hurts to utilize a qualified sales professional to close the deal. Unsolicited calls could ruin the chance of any relationship you may have with someone in the future, but you should always try to get permission for phone contact and ask for the best time to call.

These are basic marketing techniques that don't require you to shell out tons of money and will take your business to the next level.

Veterinarian

Most commonly a college degree but what about nurturing tendencies, compassion and an all around caring nature? May be an occasional nose plug and the ability to speak dog.

Short Order Cook

Not glamorous by name or the hair net needed but the end result of each task is almost always appreciated.

Janitor/Custodian

Could you imagine the places we visit without this type of engineering in place? Trash, smells and germs, you get the idea. You have to admire someone that sneaks in after the place is quiet and empty and makes everything shine before the next morning arrives.

Dentist

Careful grades and years of schooling. The wonderful eye contact and face to face time is everything to be desired. For once, someone who actually makes you smile.

Telemarketer

Probably the most disliked occupation holder in the US. You walk into your front door after a long day of work, phone rings. You answer, a short silence that is followed by broken English, “May I speak to the lady of the house”. You reply there is no lady here and hang up. You sit down for dinner, phone rings. You answer again, an automated voice sings “The itsy bitsy spider…”, no reply this time, you jerk the phone out of the wall. I would imagine this job requires patience, a thick skin and a desire to upset your fellow or neighboring American.

It is doubtful that many 7 year olds aspire to be a convenience store cashier or a dish washer in the course of their lives, but the world is more fluid because of the few who do.

Here I have outlined some factors in knowing when to move and what to look for:

1. If you have been telemarketing and have found that your human resources officer is looking for a supervisor, that is a good indication that you can get away form the phones, so to speak. You will still have to manage phone calls but at least you can answer them on your time as opposed to having to a large quantity of repetitive calls. So keep an eye out for job notices and try to get transferred.
2. If you are familiar with customer complaints and tired of the quality control, which grades you unfairly, that may be a good indication that you are ready for something else. You might look into something at the level of quality control, which is essentially putting the shoe on the other foot. But if this is the only way

To move up the corporate ladder than it might be a wise choice.

1. If you are have already acquired a talent for knowing how to generate sales and have had experience on the floor, then you could also approach your employer regarding a marketing assistance job. They would be pleased to have a keen employee and one who has a proven sales track record with clients on the phone and has been able to work into accounts and solve customer complaints on his own. This is the making of a marketing assistant.
2. Look out for courses offered at your local employment centre or through the community. The Jewish community in Montreal offers seminars geared to fill in the holes left behind because you never learned Excel and need it to make spreadsheets for a cultural organization. Sometimes the seminars are on developing leadership skills and that could serve you well in marketing because then you might be managing a sales team that will have to have your input on how to approach the client.
3. If you see that the company is offering you a chance to change your shift in your favor, it is probably because you have gained seniority. Use the seniority as leverage to gently persuade your manager that your talents might be put to better use working in another department since you have already acquired certain skills.
4. Likewise if the company is going to downsize try to accommodate the change by putting in a request for a transfer to a different department. If you have learned a little IT management along the way and like working with computers here might be a chance to work in another environment. If it you had software development training use that to get yourself into a web page department. All this is good especially if you have been in sales and want to get out of that.
5. Look at job boards and university bulletin boards that keep up to changing trends in the market place regarding employment. You might even speak to a guidance councilor there to find out what employers have recently canvassed at the school so that you have a hot lead to work on.

1. Some telemarketing companies put you through extensive testing procedures to see if you could pass their grades before they put you out on the floor. I liken this to academic studies. They may get a very good indication of a person's ability to perform but if the level of passing is a ninety and you pull an 88 average, does that mean the employer should wipe you off their employment list?
   This is a form of harassment that causes unnecessary stress when the employee has not even set foot on the sales floor. He may have had difficulty surfing for customer information and had a slow start but why should that be a barometer to how he will perform on the floor when he will become more familiar with surfing the sponsored sites and get information out to the client. Potential employees should explain their objection to being tested and then possibly rejected before the training occurs to avoid the stress.
2. Another telemarketing company would advertise training for two weeks when actually training was not more than an hour and the agent was left to his own devices before having a chance to listen into calls three days later. Once the agent was hired, by the way, what appeared to be fourteen dollars an hour during the training period would go down to ten if the person had to be absent
   Here potential employees should check out the pay parameters before employment to see if the offer in the ad matches the reality of the job place. He may use this to bargain over the pay especially if there is a yearly salary involved.
3. The trainer may have a haphazard way of training, accusing the agent of being argumentative and discrediting the owner. If the trainer is looking for excuses to throw the agent out, like accusing him of arguing with the potential client when there was only a singular rebuttal then he is doing very well. Of course the agent should listen politely to his superior to avoid any friction. The agent listened to the manager himself, who used rebuttals, himself in reference to promoting web hosting by saying that hard copy phone books were becoming less popular than on-line web assistance. Evidently the manager's rebuttal was not argumentative but the agent's was.
   This situation is a bit tricky. If the potential agent sees that the trainer is looking for bogus accusations or talks a mile a minute to explain web hosting and then accuses the agent of creating discord when he has not even completed his training to test different rebuttal techniques, then the agent should not start altogether. The manager's extra quick pace is a clear indication of his dislike to be fair to newcomers who are unfamiliar with his program. Training has to require listening in and fair monitoring not exaggerated comments that are totally untrue such as accusations of leaving too much dead space between spoken lines on the part of the agent. The telemarketer that is going to succeed has to talk incisively without creating doubt in the potential buyer. Some people are born with the ability to talk smoothly while others need to acquire this.
4. Agents should also look at the work conditions before even coming on board. If the manager smokes in his office, open to the telemarketers, that is against the law and should be reported to the local labor commission. Other conditions would have to be continually exposed to stereo music that interferes with your ability to hear the customer.
   Here the agent should have understood that if he minds breathing in secondary smoke in the managers office, he is going to breathe in a lot more once he starts working. He is going to have to concentrate on the potential sale and not on the surrounding noise or smoke if he will make any headway.
5. Years ago I had the disadvantage of not knowing how to prospect the internet for potential clients. This problem can still exist for new employees especially when being hired by companies that pressure you into hitting top paying accounts. Other agents coming from marketing backgrounds had had some experience and were able to get good accounts to begin with but if you were not wise, you could spend vital time with small accounts that would not purchase regularly because of their lower turnover.
   Here the prospective agent should gain as much experience surfing the internet for business accounts especially if the potential employer expects you to deepen accounts early.

The media offers a number of job opportunities for the university student or new graduate like graphic work. This may be at photocopy centres where you would have to eventually print brochures which depended on the layouts you set on self-publishing software program. Of course the artist on his own, the better able he will be in working at the high-pressure copy centre especially when other duties like collating, printing and meeting client needs are concerned. Newspaper and online magazine companies are always on the lookout for sales people to fill their advertisement departments. One has to like the environment, which could be dry especially if the employee was hoping to land a writing job there. The newspaper does not have to be national it also be a suburban one.

There are many job agencies looking for computer talent and that depends on where the person's strengths lie. If the person is more of a programmer, he would probably be more comfortable in a technical environment where there is a lot of networking or reinstalling of computers to fit new network configurations. That person has to be able to troubleshoot and be independent. The best way for a person to see what availabilities are in this sector is to visit agencies that specialize in hiring computer help. They will inform the prospective employee if he has the stuff needed to be able to work a giving computer networked company or his energy would best be applied to sales.

Other jobs are available for freelance teachers. Unless the teacher has an educational degree he is likely to have to juggle a number of hours between different schools in order to make a decent business or break even. Teaching is a seasonal deal with a large decline in enrolment during summer months and slow periods during the year. Recently I was informed that whereas people used to enrol in September, they hold off into late fall. The best thing to do for the prospective freelancer is to balance this type of employment with something more stable so that monthly earning remain relatively even throughout the year.

Every day, I sign into the phone and computer system for my job, electronically from home. I am a home agent, and work in my office, taking sales calls for a large magazine publishing house. Customers call in to buy magazines, then for a variety of reasons, are unhappy with payment terms or other issues, such as returns. They then have nobody else to take their frustration out on, so you are their most convenient target.

As a matter of fact, you are the target for just about anything. Heavy breathers, prank phone callers, hecklers, and more will call in. And we smile and talk to each and every person with respect and dignity, even if they don't do the same for you. It's a matter of going with the flow and realizing that the customer may be having a bad day, or is mad at the promotion, but he is not at you personally.

When confronted with a customer who is purposely being mean, my response is to let them rant then continue trying to answer his question. By being persistent, calm and mellow; the customer rants alone. Eventually he gets tired enough to give up and either listen or get off the phone. Many of us home agents talk to each other by instant message over the internet. It helps us to keep our sanity, and morale going during tough times. We compare notes on people who were really nice or really difficult and learn from each others' experiences. It makes the day go by faster and reminds us that it's only a job and not to get stressed out by it.

If a customer is in distress, there are times when it is our duty to help them in whatever way that we can. I have a list of phone numbers to refer people to for things like domestic violence or food assistance hot lines. Working with the public, we do our best to please and help them. Some just need a friendly ear to talk to. Though each call I take is monitored, I take the time to talk to anyone who is having trouble. Many of my co-workers do to. It is our way of appreciating our customers. They are the reason that we have our jobs and put food on our tables. It is our job to be there for them.

Being a phone customer service agent isn't for everyone. If you enjoy talking to people, figuring out problems and helping those who need it, then this job may be for you. After three years, it has helped me to pay for college and allowed me to work from the comfort of home. Gone are the days of buying coffee from a vending machine or listening to loud co-workers in the next cubicle. Life is good, especially after hearing how tough some of my customers' lives are, it makes me appreciate my relatively stress-free routine all the more.

In telemarketing you need qualified leads. You need a target market. You need a list and script.

There are different forms of telemarketing, including business to business and business to customer.

Perhaps the best form of telemarketing where customers call you. That is, you include your company's telephone number in catalogs, emails, faxes, classified ads, display ads, websites, and if these customers are interested, then they call you.

When these customers call you you must include their information in your database. These are also qualified leads, since you know they have an interest in your company and/or your products.

So when thinking of telemarketing, try to find a method where customers call you. You already know the customers are interested in your company and/or your products. So you already have your qualified leads, your target market.

Design your catalogs, your website, write your emails, your faxes, your classified ads and display ads to encourage your customers to call you and ask for further information about your company, your products, and most importantly encourage them to buy your products--the best form of telemarketing. So you don't just get a lead, you get a sale.