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Three Competitive Intelligence Software Myths Busted

Автоматический перевод

www.clearci.com/blog/bid/183212/three-competitive-intelligence-software-myths-busted

- Lightning never strikes the same place twice.
- Swallowed chewing gum takes seven years to digest.
- Bulls get enraged by the color red.

Plenty of these and other myths get circulated all the time because of a lack of understanding or confusion about the subject at hand. The same issues apply when competitive intelligence software or market research comes up, as there are plenty of misconceptions about how it works or is used for competitor analysis.

clearCi wants to bust the biggest CI software myths and reveal the facts behind each claim. Check out these three myths below:

Myth: CI Software Is Just a Search Engine

Fact: Using competitive intelligence software is more than just using Google in two ways...

First, CI software allows you to create a search query into one or many data sources of your choice, but not the entire web. This is an advantage for knowledge workers who know exactly what type of information they want to find or monitor for changes. Even one Google search returns thousands or millions of results, so it’s not the most productive or efficient way to find data for competitor analysis.

And second, competitive intelligence software automates these search queries and reports the changes made (if any), so you wouldn’t have to visit each website to look for updates every day. This alone is humanly impossible without some sort of market research tool or competitive intelligence software.

While it’s okay to use Google for fleeting thoughts and questions, competitive intelligence software is for those who want more refined research methods that actually combat information overload. Think of CI software as your own personal search engine, reporting relevant data from reliable sources. It’s really a completely different experience for conducting market research and competitor analysis. (For a brief demo of clearCi’s competitive intelligence software, click here.)


Myth: CI Software Is the Only Way to Gather Data

Fact: Intelligence gathering is more than browsing secondary sources.

Every CI professional knows this. There is primary and secondary intelligence. But it seems competitive intelligence software is branded as the only way to source data and conduct a competitor analysis. While you can find many more insights through conversations and investigations, other tactics must be done in order truly understand a merger, a potential product launch, or any other concern affecting the company. In other words, if you follow or specialize in markets, industries, customers, or even product intelligence, CI software does the trick nicely.

CI software is the best way to gather online data from social media, competitor websites, databases, job boards, patent searches, and other sources. It automates the process of hunting and storing data, and makes it easier to share among your team or decision makers by simply logging into the software.

Myth: CI Software Replaces Traditional Analysis

Fact: No tool will ever replace the best option for analysis - the brain.

Along with some competitive intelligence techniques, you should be the one making assumptions and recommendations after competitive intelligence software has collected enough secondary information.

Competitive intelligence software aids competitor analysis when more context is needed about a particular topic of concern. Imagine learning from a press release that one of your competitors acquired a small company offering a similar product your company launched three months ago. This information alone is not enough to warrant an action, but when putting the pieces together during analysis, competitive intelligence software can help you find related data that paints a bigger picture. The bigger picture could mean a strategic alliance was formed to outpace your go-to-market strategies.

CI software and competitor analysis both have their own purpose in competitive intelligence, and the best results happen when they can operate side-by-side with your brain in the driver’s seat.

These are just a few myths that surround competitive intelligence software, and may continue to do so until enough facts are dispersed to reveal the true capabilities of CI software.