Join us for a free eWorkshop on December 12th @ 1pm ET to get a full briefing on the results of the employee engagement study referenced in this post.

Sales complains that the tradeshow, web, or other leads they get are junk. Marketing says that Sales doesn't call the quality leads they produce. Sound familiar? The basis for this common rift is a poor lead generation, qualification, scoring, and nurturing program. Read this Executive Summary to learn how to qualify, score, and nurture leads that aren't quite ready to be handed off to sales for closing.

Fortune 500 companies have recognized significant benefits by successfully promoting civic virtues such as Sustainability, Community, Sponsorship, Charity, and Environment. Although benefits like improved brand integrity are intangible, they can have a long-term success. Increase brand value by developing a communication plan for the organization's social values.

The decision to bid on a contract has profound implications on reputation, profitability, and the allocation of scarce resources. In many cases, these critical decisions are made following an informal assessment, resulting in low-margin or resource-intensive work being performed with associated large opportunity costs. Implementing a formalized decision-making process will help ensure that key considerations have not been ignored.

All organizations claim to have "core competencies" but few actually benchmark their capabilities to track and measure improvements over time. Take the time to evaluate your business from a high-level, and commit to continuous improvement. Use Demand Metric's Core Competencies Assessment to set a baseline for your organization, and work to improve your score before your next self-assessment.

Effectively developing and communicating high-level business strategy is essential for organizations looking to achieve market leadership. Additionally, creating a results-oriented culture requires a comprehensive management system. Use Demand Metric's downloadable Balanced Scorecard Strategy Map tool as a basis for implementing a proven business performance management methodology.

Strategic planning is a great way to identify which initiatives can add the most value to your organization. The next step is to prioritize initiatives with a systematic method. Use our downloadable Priority Index Tool to guide you through the prioritization process, and help you drill down on the value added for each proposed initiative.

Risk assessment is an area of concern for all senior executives, but many mid-sized enterprises do not have the skills, processes, or tools to effectively mitigate risks. Instead of reactively 'fire-fighting' and dealing with issues as they arise, consider adding simple risk assessment & analysis exercises to your project planning process.

One of the best ways a business can get ahead of competition is through social media. Although a social media strategy guide is not necessarily required for this, it is one of the best ways for a company to get started.

When a business first gets started with social media, it may not think too much about its strategy. Many companies ask themselves, how hard can social media be? Set up a page, start posting, invite people you know, and before very long the company will have all kinds of people interested in it. Right?

Whether your company is established or is just starting out, there is no denying that social media should be an important part of your marketing strategy. However, implementing a social media marketing strategy can at times be difficult.

It is important to have employees assigned to this particular department who are able to understand or have the capability to learn what is needed before you begin your social media implementation.