The Truth About Leads, has been selected as one of ten finalists in the 2011 Top Sales & Marketing Book category. I wrote this book because I felt the truth had to be told about how the gap between marketing and sales causes a relatively poor return on marketing investments and low close rates. The book discusses both best practice strategic approaches and specific tactics to correctly target markets, qualify sales-ready opportunities and nurture long-term leads.   

As much as I enjoyed writing the book, it’s been even more rewarding to see and hear about its impact. A number of sales and marketing executives have shared how valuable the content is and how it has helped them.

Now in its second printing, The Truth About Leads, is available at Amazon in paperback and Kindle editions, at Barnes & Noble for NOOK, and at iTunes for iBooks.

And the article, Coaxing Long-Term Leads to the Finish Line, is a finalist in the 2011 Top Sales & Marketing Articles category. Published by CRM Buyer, the article made it into the round of finalists by winning a monthly “best article” competition this year.

This article examines how focusing only on short-term leads wastes investments in lead generation programs and ignores the revenue to be gained by consistently nurturing long-term leads until they are ready to buy. Best practice lead nurturing can exponentially grow the return on original qualification programs with only an incremental investment in handling long-term opportunities.

Voting is now open at TopSalesAwards.com and runs until December 9. Everyone is eligible to vote daily, and one-time registration takes just a few seconds. Winners will be recognized at an online awards ceremony on Tuesday, December 15, at 12 noon ET.

If you have just a minute, I’d like to ask you to click on the link above to vote. Thank you very much for your support!

By Dan McDade