We’re joined by a few of our informed friends from the Field who’ve identified items that are emerging and those to keep an eye on in the coming year. Here are the headlines:

• Innovation will come from unexpected places.
• B2B may finally break through in social media.
• Online education is the new advertising.
• Turf and silos continue to discourage “intrapreneurship.”
• New sources of revenue are embedded in your files.
• Your salespeople are your primary customers.
• On the other hand, do you really need that salesperson?
• Doing more with less is here to stay.

For what’s behind any or all of these headlines, read on!

1. Innovation will come from unexpected places.

Keep your antennae up, and see if you can identify trends as they develop. Here are two we’ve already seen or heard about this year:

• What does a $2,500 car (the Tata Nano), local power generation and microlending all have in common? They’re examples of what Amos Tuck (Dartmouth) Professor Vijay Govindarajan has coined “reverse innovation.” It’s innovation that begins in developing countries and migrates to the developed world. Watch offshore. More is on the way.
• From adversity come breakthrough possibilities. Twitter (which sounded frivolous only a year ago) has become instrumental in identifying Haiti-relief hot spots in real time. Uses of emerging technology abound in the palm of your hand, whether inspired by adversity or not.

2. B2B may finally break through in social media.

Many B2B executives keep social media on the burner as a defensive move because they don’t want to miss out. Others see it as hype. Most we’ve heard from appear to consider networking through social media a drain on energy and soft costs to the detriment of other opportunities. Until it isn’t. Many of our friends also believe, intuitively, that this could be the year that a social-networking breakthrough appears that has a real businesses benefit. As it emerges, we’ll keep you posted.

3. Online education is the new advertising.

Back in the Mad Men days, advertising was synonymous with hype. More adjectives than nouns and verbs. Today, the world is transparent and there are no more fools. Quite the contrary: everyone’s a student, eager to learn more about a product or service. That’s why the best promotion starts with education. It’s the key not only to making the sale but also to caring for and retaining the customer. It may be your “marketing” budget, but leave room in it for online education.

4. Turf and silos continue to discourage “intrapreneurship.”

Encouraging employees to take risks has become a cliché. Empowering them to do so has not. From our vantage point, turf, silos and status quo continue to get in the way of management’s best intention to promote innovation and out-of-the-box thinking and behavior. We think these companies should adapt a one-two punch:

• First, groups need to reach out horizontally, to engage other groups with shared interest.
• Then they need to convert that interest into shared goals – not 50/50, but 100/100, or if three parties are involved 100/100/100.

Latitude encourages innovation. Then, complete shared ownership spawns the behavior that begets results.

5. New sources of revenue are embedded in your files.

One of your most valuable assets doesn’t even appear on your balance sheet. It’s the relationships you have with your existing customers. They’ve bought from you at least once. Why not again? And again?

More than ever, we’re hearing about how companies are “working their files” to offer their customers not just extensions to product and service, but entirely new and unexpected offerings. If you have a relationship and, even better, a reliable ongoing billing mechanism, get creative about what else they can buy from you. Another observable dynamic: Thinking about better ways to serve current customers often brings new customers in the door as well.

6. Your salespeople are customers too.

We’ve done a lot of work for companies whose salespeople (wholesalers, e.g.) sell to salespeople (e.g. retail agents, brokers and advisors). Many of these companies do a great job of helping their customer-salespeople sell more effectively and build their practices – through marketing programs, training and sales ideas.

But what are they doing for their own salespeople? Some of the more progressive companies are treating their first line of salespeople (their own) as the customer. Which means they’re investing in building their practices – through the same kind of creative marketing, training and sales ideas that they’re investing in their customers’ salespeople. The lesson: Treat your own people as the customer. Make them want to perform by pulling (not pushing) them along the pathway to success.

7. On the other hand, do you really need that salesperson at all?

Last year, we saw increasing encroachment on the personalized sale through disintermediation. One survey of small business owners revealed that the majority of them would prefer to buy their firm’s health insurance online if it meant saving them 15% on their premium (in other words, saving 75% on the commission). No wonder; that’s a huge savings. As prices rise, technology improves, and customers become more informed through online education, look for higher-priced, sophisticated products to be offered without the assistance of a real-live salesperson – and the healthy commission that comes with her.

8. Doing more with less is here to stay. It’s tempting to pin belt-tightening on the current economic downdraft. But this time, doing more with less isn’t cyclical; it’s the way it’s going to be.

• First, your customers are getting what they need for less – from their foreign and domestic suppliers, and maybe from you.
• Second, nothing is being initiated that can’t be measured. That tends to winnow out the nice-to-do projects in favor of those resulting in outcomes with dollar signs attached.
• Third, there’s a redoubled emphasis on customer retention. As the cost of adding new customers continues to climb, squeezing incremental revenue from existing customers is looking even more attractive.

We want to hear from you about what you’re seeing and what to expect in 2010.

Our thanks to our friends in the Field who contributed to this month’s FieldNotes:
Kip Colligan, Kipany Productions
Denis Jakuc, Writer/Brand Strategist
Ann Marshman, The Leader’s Council
Gary Peterson, Michael Allen Company