From brown-bag lunches to taking the train, people everywhere are looking for ways to tighten the proverbial spending belt. Marketing, which often gets a reputation for flash and gloss, is one of the first places businesses focus on when trying to cut back spending.

Many people see marketing as the “bling-bling department” in the business corridors. In today’s tough economic environment, it’s not surprising that businesses are looking for ways to achieve substantial marketing gains with less marketing spend.

Smart marketers specialize in the more-for-less category of marketing. They have seen time and again that a carefully managed marketing strategy tied to clear revenue goals motivates marketing and sales teams to achieve a very high return on investment.

While flashy campaigns and “gotcha!” ideas will grab attention and fuel brand awareness, fundamental marketing basics still deliver strong and steady returns.

Here are the five most cost-effective and valuable marketing tactics professional services businesses should employ in a difficult economy. Are you looking to limit marketing spend while continuing to fill the sales and candidate pipelines with strong and actionable leads?

Are you eager to take advantage of a less-cluttered marketplace as competitors pull back their marketing efforts due to economic concerns? Now is a moment when you can gain significant marketplace ground. Here are our recommendations for achieving a cost-effective, lead-generating marketing strategy.

1) Back to Basics: List Development, Cold Calls

While cold calling is a sales strategy as old as Grecian urns, its legacy is long because it works extremely well with a strong marketing structure behind it. People often forget that the No. 1 job of marketing is to drive qualified leads to the sales team.

This means your marketing team can and should be working with sales teams to build the best-possible cold-call lists and develop the most effective scripts.

What are the qualities of a prospect list that successfully feed the sales pipeline? It must be targeted, well vetted and current. The targeting comes by identifying “the ideal client” and creating a list of prospects fitting within those criteria (size, location, industry, etc.).

Vetting is the process of ensuring the list consists only of prospects in the right locations, the right industries and at the right professional level. It’s shocking how many businesses work from inadequate and dated cold-call lists that are simply purchased and put straight to work or inherited from other staff members.

The simple process of scrubbing and updating lists will quadruple the effectiveness of any cold-calling campaign.

The effectiveness of cold calling is also dramatically increased by providing sales professionals with scripts. Working in partnership with sales, the marketing team should identify and nullify common objections or concerns heard from prospects and use that knowledge to create smart, informative sales scripts.

Finally, it’s important to send staff to the cold-calling battle with both confidence and enthusiasm. Confidence can be increased through training and rehearsals with co-workers. Stir up enthusiasm with incentives such as awards and contests and by recognizing outstanding efforts.

Be sure to get everyone involved. From new sales staff to the senior-level sales stars, all sales professionals should be a part of cold-calling endeavors.

2) The Digital Gateway: E-Mail Marketing

It’s ubiquitous, it’s easy and it’s right at your fingertips.

E-mail is an excellent way to stay top of mind by staying at the top of your prospect’s inbox with smart and cost-effective e-mail campaigns. Businesses can easily create e-mail-based keep-in-touch programs with interesting and thoughtful business content.

E-mail campaigns can be done in house with a disciplined approach to building a series of communications that share a company’s homegrown thought leadership and value propositions.

Just remember that content is king. If the articles, case studies, white papers or brochures you are sending are dull or uninformative, they will be immediately discarded as junk mail. When marketing by e-mail, always abide by this rule: worthwhile content only.

E-mail marketing campaigns can also be supported or even created and managed by several online direct marketing companies such as VerticalResponse and Constant Contact.

While most businesses and their marketing teams can cost-effectively replicate the creative e-mail tools (such as HTML postcards and newsletter templates), direct marketing firms offer excellent tracking tools that few businesses have in house.

By tracking e-mail campaigns (who responds, how many times each prospect received a communication, etc.), a business gains quick insight into response rates and critical analysis of campaign effectiveness.

On the recruitment side, e-mail is an outstanding way to keep in contact with candidates and to keep them informed of opportunities. Many companies will send out a monthly or weekly listing with a quick hello from the recruiter and summaries of top job openings.

3) Don’t Take My Word For It; Take Theirs With Referrals, Testimonials

Even the most talented salespeople don’t have the enormous power of persuasion that comes with strong customer referrals. No marketing tool is more convincing than a satisfied customer directly recommending your services. A growing and dedicated fan base of supporters will help you attract opportunities and close deals.

Take advantage of the power of referrals by gathering customer and candidate testimonials and putting them in good form (such as case studies and introduction letters). Get the permission of existing clients to list their names and logos on key marketing tools (such as Web sites and brochures).

You can also ask some of your most passionate customers to be put on a referral list that’s shared with prospects who want to speak with current clients. Invite satisfied clients to come to events you are holding where they can share their experiences and successes with others.

Ensure you can use client logos and names from the very start of a relationship by writing the request into your contracts or service agreements. It’s also important to train sales and account management staff to ask their clients to participate in case studies or consider writing a testimonial.

Offer to help structure or write testimonials based on the client’s input in order to remove the burden of delivery from them. The easier you make the referral process for the client, the more willing they are to participate.

When consistently practiced, all of these efforts will result in a valuable and versatile arsenal of endorsements that turn customers into members of your sales force.

4) Step Away From the Desk With Events

Having limited funds doesn’t require limiting fun ways to engage potential clients. Events are a low-pressure and enjoyable way to make strong contacts with prospects and candidates. When budgets are tight, it requires setting up events in creative and cost-effective ways.

For example, businesses can leverage technology to host Webcasts on key industry and marketplace issues. In times of uncertainty, people are often hungry to learn more and share their concerns. A Webcast that shares valuable information and brings experts to the discussion can garner a lot of interest and build a very strong prospect list.

Old-fashioned association and community-based networking is also very cost effective and is a good way to regularly get sales teams in front of numerous prospects. You can also partner with associations to hold or sponsor local events and roundtables. It’s a smart way to build credibility while not taking on the full costs or time required in planning and managing an event.

5) Be the Buzz With PR

While PR may sound pricey, with just a small investment you can alert local and industry press to the good things your business is doing and introduce them to insightful experts on your staff. With a few press releases and a bit of relationship building among key media contacts, a business can generate marketplace buzz that will be noticed by potential and existing clients.

A PR plan for a limited budget focuses on local media, target locations (markets where you are focused on building business) and trade and industry publications.

Events and news that can be shared with the media range from community involvement (such as charity events you participate in or internships you’ve created) to new hires, new partnerships and company milestones. Awards also make for great PR. Be sure to consider applying for various honors for which your business and staff members qualify.

Awards also add distinction and credibility to brochures, company profiles and Web content.

With the growth of the online media environment, the battle for new content is fierce. By building strong media contacts, alerting the press to events and applying for industry and local awards that garner their own PR attention, you can greatly increase your chances of winning key messaging space in the publications and news sources your prospects are reading.

Market Smart By Marketing What You Have

The common thread among these affordable marketing strategies is the practice of leveraging the advantages and tools you already have.

You likely have the fervent support of highly satisfied customers, the local associations and events you belong to and participate in, the existing thought leadership you have that can be e-mailed to prospects and the knowledgeable professionals within your organization who can be resources for the media.

Rich marketing opportunities exist within many of the no-cost and low-cost resources you already have at your fingertips. Now is the time to take inventory, give them some added polish and put them to good sales and marketing use.

Leslie Vickrey is the president and founder of ClearEdge Marketing in Chicago. She can be reached at 312-731-3149 or lvickrey@clearedgemarketing.com.