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AWARE Competitive Intelligence Resources
Recommended Web Sites for CI Research

UNDER CONSTRUCTION - Content below for testing only!


Sites checked: 26 October 2006

Topic Index
UK Newspapers & News Sources
Major European Newspapers & News Sources
Other English Language News Sources (USA, Canada, Australasia, S Africa, and other countrie)
News Aggregators

Global Search Engines

The following are the main global search engines. There are also a number of other older search engines still available that use the databases of the search engines below. For example, Go, Inforseek, Altavista and Alltheweb all use the Yahoo! search functions and database, etc.

  • Google - Currently the most popular search engine - with considerable flexibility for advanced searching, including

Search Directories & Meta-Search engines

As well as the major search engines described above there are many smaller, regional and specialist search services, including some industry specific services (e.g. for searching specific topic or industry areas - law, finance, etc.). Some of these are listed under the relevant sections. The search tools listed here are more general or have features that make them noteworthy.

  • Open Directory - a human edited list of millions or web-sites, where each is vetted and approved as worthy of

Blog, news group and discussion forum searching

Searching blogs, podcasts, discussion forums and news groups can provide crucial information for competitive intelligence. This gives a small selection of tools that can help in this area.

  • Clusty - Clusty's blog search tool.

Invisible Web Searching and other search utilities

Research has shown that the vast majority of web-sites are never indexed by search engines. Many web-pages are now created dynamically from databases and so cannot be found. One approach is to use an invisible/deep web search tool to locate content held in subject or topic databases. The list below gives major invisible web search tools, as well as some tools to learn more about finding information

  • CompletePlanet - search thousands of databases through CompletePlanet

We try and keep all links up-to-date. However sites frequently change or disappear.
Please let us know if you find any dead links, or if you want us to add your site onto this page.

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AWARE News

Publications / Presentations

Arthur Weiss gave a conference paper on specialist search - finding names, numbers and news at the Online Information 2011 Conference as well as an exhibition seminar giving top tips for finding competitive intelligence online for use in primary reserarch. These can be downloaded on our publications pages. Arthur also led two sessions as part of WebSearch Academy at the Internet Librarian International Conference in October 2011 (Planning your Research & Social Media). (See our presentation & papers pages to download these).

2012 events so far confirmed include the Institute of Competitive Intelligence conference in Bad Nauheim, Germany (March 2012) - a workshop on online competitive intelligence, and a practitioner case study looking at how national cultures can influence primary research efficacy.

Several other workshops are planned - in both Europe and Asia. If you are interested in competitive intelligence training and workshops contact us, or visit our training pages. We offer custom training looking at all aspects of marketing & competitive intelligence including evaluating competitor strategies, online research, marketing research, competitor analysis, scenario planning and much more.


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Visit a summarised anthology of AWARE's Twitter feed


 

Books - Co-opertition

Recommended Book

Smart Services
Co-opetition : 1. a revolutionary mindset that redefines competition and cooperation; 2. the game theory strategy that's changing the game of business
Adam M Brandenburger & Barry J Nalebuff
Buy UK £ or US$

Read our review of this book

Michael Porter described this book as "the most important single contribution" in taking his original ideas on ways of achieving competitive advantage forward. The book is easy to read, inexpensive and contains numerous ideas to help reshape and challenge thought processes. The writers develop Porter's 5 forces model, and introduce a sixth force. They emphasise the strategic advantages of co-operation and look at game theory as a way of approaching business strategy.

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For more recommendations visit our book selection.

 

Quick Tip: Questions

Quick Tip

A key competitive intelligence skill is the ability to distinguish what you do know from what you don't know. The effort is then to find out sources for the unknown information - as the great English writer, Dr Samuel Johnson said:

Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves, or we know where we can find information upon it.

Unfortunately even with the knowledge there can be problems. Lewis Branscomb - the US physicist and Harvard management professor once said:

People rarely distinguish among data, information, knowledge, and wisdom. But they are as different from each other and as interlocking as starch molecules, flour, bread, and the flavorful memory of a superb morning croissant.

The aim of competitive & marketing intelligence is to turn data into something that can lead to competitive advantage in the same way that your morning croissant or loaf of bread depends on flour and water interacting to make something that is more than just a mixture of the raw ingredients.

 

Competitive Intelligence Training

Do you need to
know more about
Competitive Intelligence?

We offer in-house Competitive Intelligence Training, customised to your requirements.
Find out about our training services today!


Finding Competitive Intelligence using Online Sources

AWARE consultants are experts at discovering competitor information online and have developed a market-leading course on Finding Competitive Intelligence using Online Sources. This course has been given as an in-house course to numerous companies across industries (IT, publishing, telecoms, chemicals....) and countries, as well as publicly at SCIP annual and European conferences, the London International Online Information Conferences and other similar events.

The workshop has received high praise for its unique approach to finding competitive intelligence on the Internet. The workshop - available as a half-day summary, full day or 2-day in-depth training course with extensive practical online sessions - teaches attendees how to find actionable competitive intelligence rather than just present a list of sources that quickly date. Like all AWARE's in-house training, the course can be customised to focus on industry or competitive area.

For more information on this workshop and how it can help you become a more effective Internet researcher check out our Competitive Intelligence Training and ask us about our courses on finding CI information.

 


Our services in competitive intelligence research, competitor analysis and CI training will help you integrate and use competitive and marketing intelligence in your business, strategic and marketing planning processes. Whether you need research, advice or training, our mission is to support our clients so that they achieve their growth objectives.

For the best UK & European competitive intelligence and competitor analysis services, contact us today.

AWARE Phone numbers: 0845 430 9125 (International: +44 20 8954 9121). Fax: 0845 430 9126 (International: +44 20 8954 2102)

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Last page / site update: Thursday, May 5, 2011

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