Communication, lest we forget, is a two-way street: I tell you and you get it, first time; you tell me and I provide just what you want. Understanding is central to this, but much marketing and sales material appears to be designed to show off the genius of the producer, rather than to create that understanding make a sale.

The media world doesn’t change very often, but when it does the change tends to be major. We are in such a change now, thanks to the explosion of use of social networking media and it is apparent that a lot of businesses are off the pace. Since the fifth anniversary of Facebook earlier this year there has been a lot of talk about the extent of use of social networking sites (plenty of it bemoaning that there’s too much). The classic comment is that students live their lives on them. But it goes far further than students. Use of sites goes across all social groups, income groups and age ranges. If you think that this is restricted to the youth market you’re wrong. Bear in mind, too, that those very students will soon be your business customers.

Ebenezer Scrooge is probably Dickens' most familiar character. He has worked his way into the language as the archetypal skinflint. Everybody knows his phrase bah, humbug.

Is this going to be the Scrooge Christmas? Most recessions see one at least and last year managed to avoid being entirely to Ebenezer's taste. Or are we going to say the hell with it, eat drink and be merry? Should business be a bit more Scrooge-like? That's a difficult call, because, if we want discretionary business spending to rise - and we do - clamping the wallet shut is hardly contributing to revival. But at the same time, a close eye on costs impacts on the bottom line fastest. Like I say, a tough call.

I don't pretend that committing to a day at the NEC is necessarily easy - clients come first. That said, Printwear & Promotion 2010 (see details below) includes a Sunday in its schedule so you don't have to miss a trading day. Still, it's easy to come up with half a dozen matters that look more pressing. I think that's missing a big trick.

Spending a marketing budget is easy - there are infinite options available, but many have a salesman's promise and little else going for them. Getting the balance right between the various techniques is where the success comes from.

What is this thing called "the brand"? Why do marketing gurus treat it as the icon of selling, investing it with something akin to religious significance? Surely a brand is just a name and a logo with (typically) a big advertising budget shoving behind it? If so, wasn't Shakespeare right, and a rose would, indeed, smell as sweet by another name? Or, if the Bard's word has no sort of marketing relevance, should everyone be aiming to develop a brand?

Telephone selling has a largely poor reputation thanks, in particular, to the standards applied by the large operators who are working on behalf of other businesses. But it is still an essential part of business-to-business selling and we all need to do it.

Competition is good for business. This is a statement ingrained in everybody's mindset and substantially it's true. At the same time, all businesses like a situation where a customer automatically chooses to buy from them and doesn't bother going through competitive quotes. This happens for lots of good reasons - previous excellence of quality, service, price, reliability and a host of other factors.

Ronald Reagan famously told a meddling congress: "Don't just do something, sit there." Especially when times get tough there's a tendency to wish this on the Chancellor at budget time. The law of unintended consequences is one that governments - and the treasury in particular - have an infallible habit of passing, so many people would prefer leaving things to the invisible hand of the market. 

How would you fancy a share of £16 billion worth of expenditure on goods and services? Yes, I thought so and, by the way, that was billion, the one with nine zeros. £16 billion is the expenditure budget of the MoD, just one government department - albeit a big one. Total government expenditure for the coming year is estimated at the eye-popping figure of £175 billion. Since you're paying for that, shouldn't you be aiming to see some of it in your business bank account?

Ignore it all we like, there is definitely an elephant in the room. Although at the back end of 2008, the printwear industry reported uniformly upbeat expectations for 2009, there most definitely is a recession in progress. It may well be that this industry will be one that doesn't suffer, indeed, one that thrives in the tough times coming. That will certainly apply to some. This is the third recession of my personal experience and in the two preceding there were winners as well as losers. The question is: what can you do to ensure you're in the former group?

Squeezing every ounce of business out of every lead, doing your absolute utmost to close in every sales presentation has to be the most cost-effective way to improve the profitability of your business. One way to achieve this is to make your sales team more effective, to train them to a higher standard.