In July of 2006, Elation Marketing Inc changed its name to Drive Business Development™ in order to better reflect the focus of the company and the unique customer acquisition and business development services we provide.
Prior to the name change, Elation Marketing Inc. evolved out of a company called ShopCloseBuy.com that President and founder, Michael W. Peterson started in February of 2002. The purpose of the company was to help solve the most common problem small businesses face – how to win and keep new customers. The original focus was to help independent restaurants, specialty retailers and entertainment venues acquire and keep new customers through an innovative cooperative marketing method that ShopCloseBuy developed. (US Patent Pending).
By its third year in business, the majority of ShopCloseBuy’s revenue and profits had shifted from B2C clients to B2B clients. ShopCloseBuy remained to service clients that sold B2C. And a separate corporation, Elation Marketing, was formed to service clients that sold B2B. The highest-growth segment of our business and our core area of expertise is New Business Development and customer acquisition.
The principals behind Elation Marketing and ShopCloseBuy previously worked together at TechRepublic, a highly-acclaimed, 2 million member online community (now a division of CNET) and IT-Radar, a business-to-business (B2B) eMarket for IT services that was acquired by TechRepublic.
Today our clients benefit from our collective decades of experience in Sales, Marketing, Customer Acquisition, New Business Development and Technology.
About the Founder, Michael W. Peterson
Michael is an innovator in the field of New Business Development and Customer Acquisition. He has 15 years of Sales Management, Process Management, Business Development and Strategic Partnership experience. He has always been the person tasked with figuring out how to drive the most sales into the shortest period of time with the least expense. In 2001 he developed a unique customer acquisition and retention process called the “Method for the Establishment of Cooperative Marketing Groups.” (US Patent Pending)
Michael was featured in the book, “Maximum Marketing, Minimum Dollars – The 50 Best Things You Can Do To Grow Your Small Business,” by Kim T. Gordon, one of the country‘s foremost experts on small-business marketing. Other press includes articles in the Twin Cities Business Journal, Minneapolis Star Tribune, and Entrepreneur Magazine.
