The following is a repost of an article I wrote for the MiniTrends blog.
———————
Automated alerts can help you stay competitive with real-time data about very specific subjects, technologies, authors, and/or companies. Customizing state-of-the-art reports and automated alerts based on client-specified criteria is an essential element of my business, but there are some out-of-the-box resources you may find useful.
Automated alerts can reduce your scanning time by notifying you about newly published information. For example, Google Alerts monitors a large portion of the web. Of course, you may not agree with Google’s version of “relevant,” and you‘ll still spend valuable time scanning and sorting.
Fortunately, there are many other automated alerts. It will be essential to set each one up to deliver quality information and avoid overload.
Technical Alerts deliver bibliographic information regarding newly published research papers, dissertations, and conference proceedings—if they meet your specified criteria. The data for these alerts originate from databases such as Compendex, one of the largest in the scientific field, currently indexing 1,031 journals from around the world. These alerts use bibliographic information to provide tailored results.
Patent Alerts are keyed to patent and patent application information worldwide. For example, many companies like to know when a key competitor files patent applications or receives a granted patent.
RSS Alerts are different from RSS Readers because they allow you to “mine” the RSS streams of your choice for keywords that you consider important.
Web Page Alerts are simple in concept, but they are handy since they monitor a specific URL for changes. Anytime the page changes, you will receive a notification, and that notification will allow you to view the new page changes highlighted. These alerts are especially valuable for monitoring product announcements from competitors, really long governmental pages, or working groups.
Table of Contents (TOC) Alerts send you the TOC information for specific publications, typically weeks or months before the publication date. These alerts are valuable not only for their speed but also because you can quickly glance through each TOC and purchase only appealing publications. (And save money on subscriptions and/or memberships.)
Social Alerts monitor sites like Facebook, blogs, and Twitter for keywords.
Government Alerts help keep you apprised of recently published research sponsored by the Federal Government and announcements of new bid solicitations.
Business and Market Alerts are great because companies constantly market themselves by making product announcements. Further, most market research companies will announce their newest reports covering specific industries or companies.
Trademark Alerts allow monitoring of specific company’s applications, monitoring your own trademarks for potential infringement, or monitoring for key terms that you define.
Domain Alerts monitor new domain name registrations so that you can learn about new and potentially problematic names.
Many companies find that the best way to control their time and expenses with Alerts is to hire an intermediary with access to the services that charge money and knows how to set them up properly.
Photo credit: Tokyoship (Wikimedia)
Leave a Comment