Email has been socialized, according to the CEO of Da Li Social, Liana Evans. Small business marketing now cannot rely on direct marketing alone and must integrate social media and other things into a campaign to be successful. Evans said segmentation can be very useful for companies to help figure out where to go online.

"Some of these [email] services allow you to segment your email lists by way of how subscribers are socially engaged," Evans said. "For example, if you were running a specific campaign just on Facebook, you could send out a very targeted email campaign to subscribers on your list that also uses Facebook with that same email address."

Evans said analytics through things such as CRM software has become more important than ever so that marketers can see just where to go and what to do with regard to where to send email. She also notes that businesses shouldn't just limit emails to text, but and should add video, social media links and images to help draw attention.

Frank Falcone, co-founder and executive program director of the Centre for CRM Excellence, tells the Globe and Mail that companies using integration and social media need to assess return on investment differently by looking at how many people are talking about the company, what the tone is and what kind of share of the conversation a given company is getting. These can all be telling stats for small business marketing professionals.

Business-to-business companies often have more trouble adopting to new technology, but when it comes to reaching customers via smartphones, these companies may need to get their marketing emails on track for better sales. Michelle Boockoff-Bajdek, VP-client acquisition and marketing at Quaero, said mobile emails must be different than normal emails to be effective.

"Mobile doesn't have to be daunting, nor do you have to settle for suboptimal open rates on your email communications," she said on BtoBOnline. "Think mobile with every campaign you develop and every communication you send out. Your customers will thank you by opening and responding to your email, thus leading to better, more productive dialogues."

To reach customers on their smartphones, she said B2B companies need to make emails easier to read, send emails during off-hours to help get the subscriber's attention and have unique content that will hold a reader's interest no matter the size of the screen.

Email Monday said B2B emails on smartphones have about a 3 percent open rate, whereas marketing emails sent by retail companies to smartphones hits at about 20 percent. B2B may want to take a cue from what retail is doing to improve rates and draw more interest.

While marketing automation and CRM software are great for small business marketing, there are also many free tools out there that many companies don't even think about using. Walter Dailey, a small business marketing consultant and speaker with Dailey Sound Vector Media, said on Fox Business that having cheap but creative ideas is a great way to generate profitable returns.

Dailey said businesses can improve their marketing effectiveness by following a few key tips: 1) include contact information in email signatures; 2) always keep businesses card on hand; and 3) send out minor upgrades to subscribers to keep customers on their toes and don't be afraid to send out minor upgrades to subscribers.

"In the marketing world, it’s quite easy to lull customers to sleep by doing the same things over and over," Dailey said. "Try to freshen things up a bit. Now this doesn’t necessitate the reinvention of the wheel – just a subtle shift. For example, swap out the images in a graphic layout, tweak the language of a radio ad or alter the color scheme on a brochure."

Another great way for small business marketing professionals to get some free publicity is social media. The website said companies should pick one thing they do very well and stick with it on social media until they feel comfortable moving on. This will help build a good base of perspective clients.

Many small business marketing professionals have started to get into social media marketing, and a new survey by Lopez Research and The Software Industry Association is evidence of the trend, as it found 90 percent of more than 100 North American marketing executives use social media websites.

"Social media has clearly become a widely used tool among B2B marketers and few doubt that it is helping their business," said Rhianna Collier, vice president of SIIA's Software Division. "But our survey also shows that marketers may not be dedicating the resources necessary to get the results they want from social media marketing. It is remarkable to see that, despite their strong belief in the power of social media, over one-third of marketers are engaged in it for only five hours or fewer every week."

Even with the amount of people using social media marketing, 54.5 percent of respondents said their marketing team spends less than 10 hours per week on social media. About 35 percent said they only spend between one and five hours per week on social media marketing.

Maribel Lopez, founder of Lopez Research, writes on Forbes that she believes B2B and small business marketing professionals will invest further in social media and mobile marketing over the next few years.

Business email marketing is extremely important for small businesses, but it needs content to thrive. Lisa Barone writes on Small Business Trends that the goal of content is to convert customers into the sales pipeline and keep other customers loyal. Captivating content has big payoffs, she says, including making customers trust in a business and creating awareness.

"The biggest benefit content marketing has to offer to a small business is awareness," Barone said. "After all, a customer can’t make a purchase from your brand if they don’t know about you. And content is a great way to make that initial introduction."

Other things content marketing can do for a business is create trust among customers, generate leads, shorten the sales cycle for both prospective customers and returning customers and lead to an upsell. Barone said using content marketing helps make the picture clear for people. If done correctly, it allows marketers to tell a more compelling story.

Amanda Maksymiw writes on ClickZ that content marketing should be detailed, specific, comprehensive and thorough. Things to avoid in content marketing include broken links, grammatical errors and typos in marketing emails.

Pinterest, an online bulletin board, has been gaining popularity as of late. Small business marketing professionals may want to take a look at this website to see if it can help their online presence, according to Stephanie Rabiner from FindLaw.com. She writes on Reuters that the website has 7 million unique visitors and is growing.

"The first step is to create a Pinterest account and start following users who show interest in products similar to those you sell," Rabiner said. "Also look for people in your geographic region. At that point, start pinning. Pin photos (with links) of unique items sold in your store and website. Add things relevant to your community and customers. Re-pin other posts."

She said small businesses have the potential to gain a big following on the website, especially if they have information, pictures or other media that others believe is worth sharing with friends and family.

Ed Gandia said on Social Media Examiner that small business marketing professionals should let people see the "real you." This can help create sharable content that so many small businesses search for.

Although professionals who usually work exclusively with marketing emails may be frightened by social media and text message marketing, Barb Cote writes on Business 2 Community that the technology should not be feared and instead should be embraced.

"Email is definitely not dead, but the rules have and will continue to change," Cote said. "Just like the recent glut of programs on TV where humans are fighting to survive invasions of zombies, vampires, aliens, and robots with their incredible supernatural powers, you should 'power up' your email program for greater success."

Cote suggests three "weapons" for powering up an email program: Being respectful of subscribers' right to opt in and out; staying relevant to keep people interested; and having good, readable content that subscribers can easily understand and enjoy.

Traditional marketing emails are still useful tools, with a Nielsen poll reporting that 80 percent of consumers find reading marketing emails on a mobile device is more difficult than on a PC. Small business marketing professionals should start incorporating new technology, but be sure to stick with what works.