Tip of the Month from MEB

Mary Ellen Bates - Tip of the Month:

December 2004: Is This On the Record?
Strategic and competitive intelligence research used to be conducted through searches of the fee-based online services, interviews with current and former employees of a company, skulking around the target company's exhibit booth at an industry conference, and digging through public records.

Interestingly, a lot of strategic information can now be gleaned from a simple web search -- no dumpster-diving required. And I'll preface the rest of this article by noting that it is up to you and your organization to decide what your tolerance is for this type of research.

Try typing 'company name' AND 'company confidential' (or AND 'internal use') in any of the major search engines. Wow. You'll get similarly interesting results if you search for 'price list' or 'salary' along with the company name. "