One executive’s competitive intelligence portal “wish list”
Since it’s the holiday season, we are focusing this month’s blog post on a topic long associated with this time of year: the wish list. We’re not talking about the “what I want from Santa” kind of wish list. Rather, we’re talking about what competitive intelligence professionals wish their knowledge management systems provided.
The head of global strategy and insights for a multi-billion-dollar beverage manufacturer recently shared her wish list with us. While not long, it comprises a wide range of advanced functionality that isn’t easy to find in one solution.
Her priorities for a competitive intelligence portal are driven by the fact that, as she put it, “Research is a vital asset of the organization.” That’s because her company operates in a highly competitive industry. In order to establish and maintain leadership, it’s essential to keep a close eye on customers’ attitudes, changing tastes, competitors’ actions, evolving technology, and many other factors that may impact the business.
In short, there are many topics and issues to track, and numerous authoritative sources of information, both internal and external, from which to draw. But such market research and competitive intelligence content is only useful when it can be applied broadly throughout the organization to make better business decisions, which leads to our executive’s second driver: “Information should be democratized.” By this she means it cannot be closely held by her small team of competitive intelligence professionals; it’s inefficient and ineffective for a few people to be gatekeepers for tens of thousands.
“People come to us all the time to ask ‘where is such and such?’” she says with more than a hint of exasperation. Simply directing people to information is not adding value to the organization. Instead, market research and competitive intelligence information must be readily and widely discoverable by, and instantly accessible to, employees in the organization’s lines of business and operating units – whatever their roles and responsibilities, wherever they are – who need it to inform their decision making. “Information everywhere” is this executive’s stated goal.
When we hear wish lists like this, it becomes readily apparent that Northern Light’s SinglePoint knowledge management portal platform has much to offer:
- Rich content options – SinglePoint clients can populate their market research or competitive intelligence portal with primary internal market research, licensed secondary market research, business news from authoritative online sources, conference abstracts, government and industry databases, and more.
- AI-enabled search – SinglePoint can automatically synthesize, refine, and present critical information distilled from large collections of market intelligence content within a SinglePoint knowledge management portal, changing the search process profoundly.
- Information distribution ecosystem – SinglePoint offers a range of mechanisms for people who prefer to have information about topics of interest fed to them, including dashboards, newsletters, and email alerts.
Don’t expect any of this to come out of Santa’s bag, but during the holiday season (or anytime) competitive intelligence professionals can put a significant dent in their knowledge management wish list by sending a letter (or e-mail) to Northern Light.
To learn how a SinglePoint portal can satisfy your knowledge management wish list, contact Northern Light.