by Ed Pierce, Founder, ITA Fleet Communications

The Sales Funnel is a proven representation of progress in the world of sales, and it is a common illustrative of the sales pipeline for management. However, the funnel has been useful among marketers in depicting the advancement of marketing opportunities, too.

Curiously, there has been scant consideration of a Sales & Marketing Funnel beyond the basic four elements of customer relationship building — Attention, Interest, Desire, and Action. Yet, in the world of B2B, it takes a combination of interacting sales and marketing tactics to drive sales. Together, sales and marketing are how B2B business is won!

READ MORE, and see a great graphic of how the Sales & Marketing Funnel works!

By Keith Trumbull, VP of Material Handling Equipment, Element Fleet Management

Did you know that, on average, there are 100 fatalities and between 80,000 and 90,000 injuries per year resulting from the unsafe operation of forklifts? Training plays a critical role in accident prevention and the safety of everyone involved in material handling equipment management. One of the more common pieces of material handling equipment that a manager will oversee is a forklift. Preventing forklift accidents saves lives, reduces costs and maximizes productivity.

In order to help monitor the use of machines and minimize the dangers, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) covers forklifts under the “Powered Industrial Truck” regulation. Last year alone, federal and state OSHA inspectors conducted 83,380 workplace inspections that resulted in over 2,000 citations for serious forklift violations. These violations typically carry a fine ranging from $500 to $7,000 each – a fee no company or operator wants to pay. However, in the retail and transportation/warehousing sectors, forklifts are the second most frequently cited area.

READ MORE to learn how can you steer clear of these violations, therefore avoiding fines and injuries to employees operating or working in a facility with forklifts.

One of the San Francisco Bay Area’s fastest growing landscape companies, Earthtech Landscape, provides professional grounds management services. With field offices serving 7 counties, it’s locally owned and managed and offers a range of landscape services, including commercial landscape maintenance, landscape construction, irrigation & water management, and complete tree care, pruning, and removal.

Earthtech was ready for the benefits of GPS fleet tracking – like knowing precisely where every rolling asset is located at every moment, and monitoring driver behaviors like speeding and hard braking, to the end of improving safety and saving on fuel costs. The solution they found cost only 70 cents per day, per vehicle: Azuga G2TM tracking units under-the-dashboard of its vehicles, installed in just minutes.

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Denmark is about to gain the largest fleet of electric cars available for lease in Europe, thanks to a deal between Nissan and Avis.

The rental company will purchase 401 Nissan e-NV200 electric vans, and 60 Nissan Leaf electric cars. That will supplement an existing contingent of Leaf electric cars, and bring the total number of electric vehicles in the Avis Denmark fleet to 861.

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In 2013, Apple introduced something called “iOS in the Car”, an infotainment system that could run on dashboards, mimicking the screens of our beloved iPhones. Early last year — nearly 14 months ago — Apple renamed the product CarPlay and said that it would become available on Ferrari, Mercedes-Benz, and Volvo models within days.

As AutoNews reports, however, reports of CarPlay’s arrival have been greatly exaggerated. To date, it’s only been made available on two Ferrari models, one costing about $200,000, the other, $300,000.

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With fuel prices down by as much as 30% from their 2014 peak, millions of Americans have been migrating to pickups and SUVs and abandoning compact passenger cars and alternative fuel vehicles. That’s leading some industry executives to question whether the federal government should re-think the 54.5 mpg Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFE, standard set to take effect in 2025.

Such a move would be a critical mistake, warns Margo Oge, a former official with the EPA who helped put together the compromise fuel economy rules and who has been dubbed by some “the Queen of Cleaner Cars.” If anything, she says, the tough mandate targeted for a decade from now doesn’t go nearly far enough.

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Audi is making a new fuel for internal combustion engines that has the potential to make a big dent when it comes to climate change – that’s because the synthetic diesel is made from just water and carbon dioxide.

The company’s pilot plant, which is operated by German startup Sunfire in Dresden, produced its first batches of the “e-diesel” this month. German Federal Minister of Education and Research Johanna Wanka put a few liters of the fuel in her work car, an Audi A8, to commemorate the accomplishment.

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ARI just announced the launch of ARI SustainableWorks, a consulting service designed to help organizations configure best-in-class fleets supported by clean, efficient and cost-effective fleet solutions.

The new service is designed to help clients develop and implement forward-thinking sustainable strategies that are tailored to each fleet’s unique objectives, needs and operating characteristics. A team of industry-leading consultants is at the core of this new service, which is dedicated to helping fleets to optimize operations by reducing total cost of ownership and enhancing environmental performance.

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The city of Boston has been quietly running its own internal Zipcar service for city employees for the past three years that cuts back on the need for government-owned cars.

“We don’t want vehicles sitting; that helps nobody,” said Matt Bradley, a public works employee who helps oversee FleetHub. “There’s environmental advantages, there’s also advantages cost-wise. We don’t have to maintain as many vehicles.”

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Automakers have gone to great lengths in recent years to make it more difficult to steal a car. Some owners, however, are going to great lengths to make it easy again.

According to the National Insurance Crime Bureau, or NICB, at least $750 million worth of vehicles were stolen between 2012 and 2014 because motorists left the keys inside. And NICB President Joe Wehrle says, “I’m sure the numbers are probably higher,” but owners aren’t likely to admit the fact when they file a police report or insurance claim.

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