by D-Source

Created on: January 25, 2009   Last Updated: February 13, 2009

In today's economy, it is important to approach Sales and Marketing and Marketing from the most economically feasible perspective. Let's begin with the basics. A strong and reflective Dun & Bradstreet Report is your company's Resume. Many companies are reducing risk by only offering their business to the top companies in any industry. They want to be sure the company they are relying on is not going to file Bankruptcy or go out of business in the middle of a project. Pulling a D&B Industry Report of the top 5 companies in your industry is one of the preferred ways to find these top companies. Your File has to be Reflective and your Scores and Ratings Strong, for your company's name to make these Reports. Once on these reports, your File becomes a Resume. The company with the strongest File usually gets the phone call. The other companies don't know they missed an opportunity. Your D&B File offers a snapshot of all Operations, Capabilities, Number of Employees, Educational Background, Experience, Licenses and Certifications, Suits, Liens, Judgements, History, Corporate Linkage and Scores and Ratings that predict the Likelihood of Sudden Business Failure and Operations Being Interrupted. Investing the money to make your File reflective could be the most cost effective marketing decision you can make.

Also, consider the Industry Reports D&B provides as a source of business leads. It may sound like I am advertising for D&B, but I'm not. This, in my opinion, is Sales and Marketing 101. D&B Industry Reports can offer you an abundance of leads for a small price. I happen to know of one product called Marketing Assist that offers up to 50,000 leads for about $700.00. And they come with an abundance of information. One of the most important marketing tools is information. Contacting a company without any insightful information on what is important to that company, what their successes and failures have been and how they compare in certain key areas to their competitors, is not an affective way to sell your company. In some cases, even detailed financial information is provided in these Reports.

For start up companies, I offer this seemingly overly simple advice. Choose a company name that is not only unique, innovative and catchy, but that begins with one of the first letters of the alphabet. Wait just a minute, don't laugh. Remember, most lists, rather it be the Yellow Pages, On line Lists, many TV and Radio or Sponsorship listings, etc., are

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