Quick and Dirty Competitive Intelligence Online

By Jan Hepola

So often we think only about how the Internet can help us promote our services or products; we forget that the Internet can also provide a wealth of information to help us with business planning and decision-making. You just need to know what you want and where to look for it.

Below I have outlined steps to take and places to look for more information on a company. This can be helpful if you’re scoping out your competition, researching a possible investment, or preparing for a job interview. It’s a short course on how to do competitive intelligence online.

1. Look for a company web site using a search engine such as Google (www.google.com). Use the company, product or service name in your search. From the web site you can generally learn:

The stated company purpose (This can be surprising!)
History, location, and staff members
Future plans through press releases, letters from the president or investor notes
You might even get a customer list from a clients or testimonials page

2. Look for recent news and press releases on Google News (http://news.google.com). Google News publishes many press releases that don’t make it into the popular press so this can be a good way to learn about a company that is off of media radar. Remember, however, that the company has probably written the press release so be ready to distinguish “spin” from information.

3. Check your local newspaper - especially if the company is local – and the local library for access to local newspapers to do a search for more news on the company. Access most of the Minnesota library resources through MnLINK (www.mnlink.org/) or check out the Star Tribune (www.startribune.com/).

4. Check out stock information (if it's a public company). You can start at Yahoo Finance or jump right into the Securities and Exchange Commission site, EDGAR.

5. See what “regular” people are saying about your company by doing a search with one of the following tools:

Look at the newsgroups (http://groups.google.com). Newsgroups are online communities where people post information, questions, and answers. There are literally thousands of them. Perform a search using the company, product or service name. The information is rarely unbiased - be prepared to use your good judgment on who to trust.
Look at blogs & RSS feeds (www.faganfinder.com/blogs). These are tools that people use to self-publish information or columns. Authors tend to be self proclaimed experts on one topic or another. Again it can be interesting to get a view from outside the company – and again the opinions are not necessarily unbiased but it is also not the prescribed company view.
Look at who links to the company site (www.lilnkpopularity.com). Visit the sites that link to the company and see how or why they link to them and what they are saying. This can also be a good way to find companies in the same industry.

Depending on how much information is available and the depth to which you want to learn about a company, the steps above will take 30-60 minutes. That’s not much time to invest when it comes to making a smarter business decision. It’s also not much time to invest to see what you can find out about your own company online.

Ms. Jan Hepola is an E-Business Development Consultant with Minnesota Technology Inc.