Qualman was born and grew up outside of Detroit, Michigan in Rochester Hills. He attended Michigan State University receiving a BA in Marketing. While at Michigan State (1990-1994) he was named Academic All-Big 10 for Basketball. Qualman also holds an MBA from the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas (1999).

He is currently the Global Vice President of Digital Marketing for EF Education headquartered in Lucerne, Switzerland and a Professor of Digital Marketing for Hult International Business School's Masters program. Prior to joining EF Education and Hult, Qualman worked in online marketing and eBusiness functions at Cadillac & Pontiac (1994-97), AT&T (1998-2000), Yahoo (2000-03), EarthLink (2003-05) and Travelzoo (Head of Marketing 2005-08).

Qualman was a featured speaker at BookExpo America 2009, presenting to those in attendance on how social media is transforming the way people live and do business. Qualman also was the keynote speaker at Europe's Fiber To The Home (FTTH) Council Meeting in Lisbon, alongside the Prime Minister of Portugal Jose Socrates. The 2009 FTTH keynote speaker was Don Tapscott.

Qualman has been highlighted in Mashable, BusinessWeek , The New York Times, Forbes, and The Huffington PostHe has also been interviewed on radio and television discussing his view on digital trends.