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Use These Sites for Sales and Marketing Research

Sales and marketing. What's the difference? Marketing is the research, the preparation, the soft sell, the strategy, the artillery. Sales is the boots-on-the ground, face-to-face, close the deal, tactical part—the infantry. I've done both sales and marketing. You'll need to do both, too. Following are a few sites I've found to be excellent resources for sales and marketing:

• EventsEye (www.eventseye.com). This free website lists trade shows, exhibitions, conferences, and business events all over the world. You'll need to know about events in your field, right? Because you'll be attending them to make contacts, market yourself, sell your wares, and find work, right? Just checking.
• Acronym Finder (www.acronymfinder.com). As a culture, we are acronym-crazy. Every industry, including mine, has its own set of acronyms, like a secret code or a secret handshake, with new ones created all the time. Acronym Finder is my secret weapon. This searchable database of more than 4 million acronyms makes me feel that I'm as hip and up to date as everyone else in my field—which is important when I'm trying to market myself or make a sale. Checking this site should be SOP for you from now on.
• ConstantContact (www.constantcontact.com). This online marketing company offers tools for email marketing, social-media marketing, online surveys, event marketing, digital storefronts, and local deals, primarily to small businesses, nonprofit organizations, and membership associations. It boasts more than 500,000 customers. SurveyMonkey (www.surveymonkey.com) is similar, and also very useful.
• StumbleUpon (www.stumbleupon.com). This discovery engine finds and recommends Web content to users. Its features enable users to discover and rate Web pages, photos, and videos that are personalized to their tastes and interests using the principles of peer sourcing and social networking.