The great thing about marketing is that there's always loads of new ideas coming down the pike. For some, there might even be more possibilities than they know what to do with…but not direct marketers. We know what to do: Test anything that makes the remotest sense, and see if it works.

In business-to-business, what's working, what's not and what is unproven but has promise?

With all the hype surrounding Web 2.0, skeptics might be quick to write it off. But I'm glad to report that some of these applications are already delivering real value for B-to-B marketers.

• New sources of prospecting information

  A number of interesting new databases have emerged recently, including some composed of self-reported data from businesspeople. The leading players are Jigsaw, which reports having 7 million complete records; Spoke, which claims 35 million business contacts; and the new kid, Salesconx, still in its alpha stage.

  Jigsaw started as a business-card swapping service, where sales and marketing people could trade or buy contacts. Spoke seeks to marry networking tools with contact info, and allow people to hook up within the site. Another newcomer to the scene is ZoomInfo, which takes a different but fascinating approach. It harvests businesspeoples' names, addresses and titles from corporate Web sites and makes that data available to marketers. Of course, all these databases are compiled — not response — files. But they deserves a look.

• Rich media

  Early experiments with rich media in banner advertising were hampered by their creators' lack of training in DM basics; many ads had snazzy television-like creative but lacked an offer or a call to action. But the snazzy creative is now being done right, and these ads are making their way into the usually stodgy business-to-business world.

  You can cruise around any B-to-B portal today and see all kinds of interesting examples of talking heads on video, peeling pages and dancing figures. Have a look at CMP Media's TechWeb, for one. And Cisco is on the cutting edge with this stuff, having tested a live video presentation embedded within a banner ad last year. This year Cisco has pioneered the use of video to deliver customer testimonials and case studies, posting hundreds every month.

• Social networking

  B-to-B sales and marketing are all about relationships. So it's no surprise that carefully crafted strategies for Web-enabled networking can make a powerful contribution to shortening sales cycles and enhancing customer value. ITtoolbox, for instance, was created by a couple of IT consultants to allow tech professionals to share insights and ideas on hardware and software product problems. Another excellent case of social networking put to good use comes from Ingram Micro. The technology distributor created a networking platform for its channel partners, who can connect to share sales leads, pitch business together and troubleshoot product problems.

While there are some exciting new ideas out there, others have simply failed us.

• E-mail prospecting

  E-mail should be the greatest prospecting medium of all time. But spam killed it. Most B-to-B marketers are achieving lower cost-per-inquiry numbers from direct mail using rental lists than from e-mail files. You only have to look at the decline of B-to-B list rental prices to realize that these files aren't working. According to Worldata's Summer 2007 List Price Index, B-to-B e-mail list prices fell 1.42% between July 2006 and July 2007, while B-to-B controlled-circulation magazine subscriber list rental prices rose 4.26%.

• E-mail deliverability

  Who among us hasn't been frustrated to find that our outbound messages to colleagues get caught in a corporate spam filter? The worst thing is, we only find out about it through random luck or vigorous follow-up. In B-to-B the resulting waste, annoyed customers and loss of business are inestimable. What can we do about it?

  Experts say that the solutions, while not perfect, fall into two categories:

  1. Make sure your e-mail structure and sending processes are as good as they can be.

  2. Work with your technical teams to reach out to administrators in key target corporate domains to establish a relationship and, with luck, improve delivery rates.

• Social networking

  We're talking about sites like Plaxo, Tribe, and Xing. I confess, I am a member of LinkedIn, and I have a page on Facebook. But I'm not sure why. If I were in business development, I would value the chance to use these tools to get to people I want to do business with. But for marketing, I don't see the benefit.

Finally, there are some tactics that are promising but haven't yet earned their keep in B-to-B.

• Online trade shows

  The folks at Unisfair — makers of the online events platform that allows attendees and exhibitors to interact from the comfort of their desks — are very enthusiastic about this subject. Marketing resource site MarketingProfs and the virtual e-commerce trade show eComXpo, among others, have tested the medium and are coming back for more. I hope they're successful, since the benefits in convenience and cost savings are clear. To me, perhaps the best use of this platform is the user-group or client conference, where attendees have a relatively strong desire to attend in the first place.

• Blogs

  The hype here is still deafening How many are there now? Fifty-five million? Eighty million? Who knows? But I suspect that much of the enthusiasm for blogs — at least as a B-to-B marketing tool — is based on ego or a simple desire to be part of the scene.

The only obvious tangible benefits for business marketers are thought leadership and higher search engine rankings. Besides that, one of the best applications I've seen is when a blog is used to collaborate and share ideas — a community activity that helps build relationships. But then, this can be done with tools other than blogs as well.