I just upgraded our home stereo system. My original surround sound system included Klipsch Towers, a center speaker, and a passive surround sound rear speaker with a Yamaha tuner from the 90s. It was loud, proud, and probably contributed to cracks in our foundation, but it wasn't optimal for today's TV and movies. Instead, it was like using a sledgehammer to crack an egg.

Now we have a Sonos Smart Speaker system. The sound bar makes my old center channel speaker sound like an AM radio. There is no need for big front speakers, just surrounds for movies. The subwoofer makes the bass sound as good or better than those big Klipsch speakers.

The technology is impressive. It all hooks up with just one wire (an HDMI cable). The system is set up and tuned to your room via a phone app. The whole system turns off and on when you turn on the TV or stream tunes from your iPhone and Apple Music. Kim was ROCKING OUT to Pink Floyd, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Prince, and the sound was amazing without having to be as loud as the old system.

P.S. The entire system costs less than just one of those big Klipsch speakers from back in the day.

While the 1990s technology worked through the 2000s, it's 2025 and “These Times are a Changing.”

1990 Communication

When I bought that system, it was the BOMB. I'd built and owned a commercial recording studio back in the 1990s. We focused on corporate training, radio commercials, and audio for video. Most of the work was for paid advertising on radio and TV, and the end product was delivered on reels.

When we moved from cutting reel-to-reel tape to editing audio to digital audio recording, it was a big step forward. Because it was cutting-edge, the cost also went up: A 300 meg hard drive (the size of one complex Photoshop file today) was $3000.

Today, you just upload an MP3.

We can see a similar evolution in marketing methodologies. Trying to promote a business back then was very different from what it is today.

In the 1990s, the top media were newspapers, magazines, radio, TV, and direct mail. Now, companies tend to use email, websites, and paid advertising as the primary methods of finding and communicating with customers.

The trick is to learn from the old marketing methodologies while also staying current with the new.

Newspapers vs Magazines

There are (were) many differences between newspapers and magazines in the 1990s and today.

Back then, newspapers were in black and white, while magazines were in color. Newspapers mainly were daily and came in local and national flavors. Magazines were mostly monthly and were national yet targeted to a specific audience.

Newspapers used short stories to report what happened yesterday. If you missed a story you were interested in, you could tune into ABC, CBS, NBC, or PBS and catch the evening news. After that, the news became old and lacked any relevance for today or tomorrow. And with sections for news, sports, businesses, and such, newspapers tried to be everything to everyone.

Magazines were more article-based and were more relevant for longer. You could walk into a doctor's office and find multiple magazines' latest and back issues, appealing to women, men, kids, business people, hobbyists, sports fans, and more.

The content was more targeted, and the articles drilled down to even more specific people. You would often find magazines in that office where specific articles were ripped out of the magazine because they resonated with someone too cheap to buy a copy themselves (or it was out of print).

It's pretty clear that newspapers were disposable, and magazines had a longer shelf life.

Article Niche Marketing

Since magazines tend to niche down, they talk to only a subset of the audience. Then, that magazine will often have niches within the niche.

For example, I wrote for a technology magazine in the 1990s and early 2000s. The magazine appealed to media production companies and the people who use them. That could include video production, audio products, production techniques, case studies, equipment reviews, etc.

My audience was a subset that included smaller commercial recording studios. That was a technology niche drilled down to the audio niche and then to another niche of small businesses. My articles were never found on the cover, but I had heard from many in my cohort who read and loved them.

When you write blogs, people want to learn something. You have to be clear about your niche and what they would find educational and interesting. I assume you are reading this because it does just that. If that's true for you, email me and let me know at techsupport@b2binteractivemarketing.com.

Article marketing leads to article emails, which are short, have one subject, and include a teaser to encourage people to read the full article.

What Kind of Content Are You Producing?

Interestingly, we tend to call emails newsletters when they are sent as broadcast emails. That is the last thing that people want in their inbox.

When you send news, it's assumed to be old. When you send a digest of news, you send a list of old news. Plus, you ask the person to choose what old news interests them. Some people may like this, but I can assure you (from data and tests) that email newsletters have a much lower open and click-through rate than an article-type email. Generally, this type of email has a 5-15% open rate and a 3-5% click-through rate.

An article email is a short, one-topic email that teases a blog or other content on your website. Generally, they are written to give the user the main key point of a blog post and then entice them to click through to read the full article. Not every article will interest every email subscriber, but you can achieve 25-40% open rates and 5-10% click-through rates.

Closing Thought

Like in the 1990s, technology can work and be relevant today, but in 2025, technology will be better, faster, smarter (computerized), and often less expensive.

Today, with marketing, we have a few real options that worked in 1990. You can still do TV, Radio, and Snail Mail, but most people are paying attention to their phones and computers in business. That means that email, text, social media, and ads on Google, Facebook, and LinkedIn are really the primary way to reach your audience.

That means that email and text (one-to-one communication) are the best way to segment and niche your audience. The other options are more spray and pray. LinkedIn is the only ad platform that allows you to niche down in a way that my article did back then.

Sometimes, you just have to retire your old tech and methodologies and invest in more recent and practical tech and methodologies to reach your niche audiences. Some of you will do it kicking and screaming like I did… “But it's still working; it's not broken.”

I am looking forward to watching old movies like Star Wars, Indiana Jones, and others to discover what audio design elements I was missing by clinging to the past. Like Toy Story… “To INFINITY, and BEYOND!”

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Comment below and share your thoughts, ideas, or questions about business-to-business sales and marketing today! Do you have a sales or marketing communications strategy that works for you? What tips or techniques can you share that work for you and your business?

To learn more about this and other topics on B2b Sales & Marketing, visit our podcast website at The Bacon Podcast.