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3 weeks ago | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
A Microsoft study found that people spend 15% of the workday checking email— that’s about six hours a week squinting at their inboxes. While many want that number to be lower, the truth is that email is still a valuable communication tool. When I opt into an email list, it’s because I anticipate something of value in return: expert insights, a story or case study, a free trial, or an event invitation. Brands have a small window of opportunity to show their value in your inbox.
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1 month ago | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
When you hear the word agent, what do you think of? A real estate agent, an insurance agent, or even an FBI agent? Far beyond an assistant following rote instructions, an agent has the power and ability to make things happen on your behalf. Wouldn’t it be great if we had technology that could carry out independent tasks and take work off your plate? Autonomous agents are rapidly becoming a reality, capable of completing tasks for humans ranging from mundane to complex.
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2 months ago | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
Like many professionals, I face a deluge of sales messages every day. It’s easy to tune out emails, display ads, and LinkedIn messages. But a phone call? Love it or hate it, it captures my attention. I set out to discover if B2B telemarketing is dead in 2025, or if it’s due for a comeback. I talked to sales experts and dug into data to find out whether cold calling still has a place in the modern sales strategy.
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2 months ago | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
Every time I talk to other small business owners or hop on LinkedIn, I hear the same refrain. It’s getting harder to find new customers. I’m not sure what marketing mix will work this year. It’s a tough time to be a startup or small business — 81% of small business owners say they’re worried about how the economy will affect their business. As a small business owner, I can attest that it’s hard to invest your hard-earned revenue and time into marketing.
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Feb 14, 2025 | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
As the owner of a content business, I need to make accurate project estimates. If a project takes longer than estimated, I’ll end up with frustrated clients and a backlog of other projects. I could also miss out on potential repeat business and referrals. To make a realistic estimate, it’s not only my own time management and capacity that I need to consider. Hiccups like sickness, lengthy internal reviews, and mismatched expectations can derail a project.
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Dec 19, 2024 | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
In marketing, where I’ve spent my career, my mission is to nudge customers to buy. But sometimes marketers focus so much on the funnel that they forget about making a great experience. When retail customer experience (CX) is poor, customers may walk away. But when you create a memorable experience, you’ll earn a brand advocate and repeat business. 81% of customers say a positive customer service experience increases the chance they’ll make another purchase, so CX impacts your bottom line.
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Dec 16, 2024 | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
Over the past three years, I’ve written over 200 marketing content pieces from blog posts to guides to landing pages. Over that time, I’ve witnessed more and more brands investing not just in new content, but in content optimization. It makes sense why content marketing teams are optimizing their content. Brands that produce hundreds of pieces of content each year suddenly find themselves with a library of thousands of outdated blog posts that erode brand trust and drag down their SEO.
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Dec 10, 2024 | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
Imagine if you could pinpoint when you’ll have the cash flow to hire another employee, or how a supply chain disruption would affect your business. As a small business owner, I’m not a financial expert and I can’t predict the future. What I can’t learn or do myself, I automate. That’s how I started using AI for financial forecasting. While AI in finance is useful for entrepreneurs, it’s helping companies of all sizes make more accurate predictions and better, data-based decisions.
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Nov 5, 2024 | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
Sir Richard Branson famously said, “All you have in business is your reputation.” A reputation at its core is trust. How much do your customers trust you? Trust in brands is going down across the board. Only 30% of consumers highly trust the companies they do business with. Trust is rare and valuable — if you can keep it. When you’re facing a crisis, your reputation is most vulnerable.
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Nov 5, 2024 | 
blog.hubspot.com | Mandy Bray
In 2022, Lyft’s earning release went out with a high-profile typo in it. Volatile after-hours trading ensued, sending investors and media into a frenzy. Instead of staying silent or sending out a curt correction, Lyft CEO David Risher took to the phones to call the media himself and set the record straight. Not only did this endear him to the public and swing the media coverage back in Lyft’s favor, but it gave him a platform to talk about Lyft’s positive financial performance that quarter.
