I like this idea and I can see how you have arrived at this idea in the context of being involved with CH. In many ways this idea is really a more advanced version of a comments forum in which someone submits their business concept and others attempt to pick it to pieces. There are probably quite a few people within CH who would be very good at this role: that is, helping people with business ideas improve the concept.. It is certainly an area that I hope to work in down the track.

I think you need to flesh out your idea and be a little clearer as to how rival scout will achieve its goals and what the revenue model would be. Need to make it clear why a new small business would hire your services (or provide you RPs) in exchange for your service. You would also have to clearly show that your consultation is by professionals.

Wow, you're quick!

Thanks for your comments. Maybe I should have waited longer before I put this up. I am somewhat caught between suggestions to keep things brief and wanting to explain more about what I have in mind.

But also, I have a lot of ideas about different direction on how this could go, and I'm not sure how much we are expected to have figured things out when we put up the idea.

In addition to real human input, I think some of this could be done relatively automatically -- for instance, something that complements Delexa.

That is, continuing with the example of localized sites, the customer might get a report that compares aspects such as Web traffic, audience description, which areas and which topics each covers, and amount of information on each.

Also, I'm interested in hearing from CH'ers about any priorities of questions they'd like answered in their market research.

like the idea. u should take it to ch.

It's a good idea Maurreen... i think you need to define more to what degree of market research you will provide.

For example, do you envisage purchasing quality surveys from the like's of the Gartner group for example and making this quality information available to the authors (obviously not in it's original form)?

A co-operative digest of surveys would very useful, if the costs of them could be amortized over a large interest group.

Maybe two key questions are:
- what kinds of ideas (what markets are you addressing)?
- what types of competitive analysis are you performing?

Like for internet based businesses you could look at:
- Usability, because sometimes its not the idea, but how its executed. See http://www.theusabil...t/comp_analysis.html
http://www.sitemorse...s.html?id=1254331457
- Marketing, because an product needs to draw buyers. See http://www.cumbrowsk...ive_intelligence.asp
- Product feature sets, positioning. See
http://www.backbonei...press-fasttrack.html

Anyway - just a thought...
-

This would be a cool service. How would the research be done? A human or a algorithm? Most of this kinds of things you are talking about are pretty detailed and the raw data would be hard to extract.

ok how dose this find problems and niche in the market....

Yes me too, i think its a great idea. I can see it being utilised by companies, businesses and individuals like yourself.
And i believe the way search engines work rely on a few key factors.
This makes your strategy of studying the competitor rather than the consumer very 'apt' in this day and age.

Thanks all for your comments and questions. I'll summarize here and elaborate more below.

Doymarn, I'm thinking this would be somewhat more customized, at least until a large client base is built.

Dave, good links. I haven't narrowed this any further than nascent or other small companies, other than probably those with a low budget. I'm thinking of starting the focus on the competitors' Web sites. That would include any products handled through the Web sites, but not off-site promotion.

Andy, I have in mind a few levels of service, with a choice of automation or human.

GL, the way it helps a business find a niche is by finding out what the compeitors are doing and how well or not they are doing it. Then the client can see the gaps.

ROUGH IDEA OF SERVICE LEVELS

1. Basic -- Automated, possibly free trial.

Comparison of a number meta tags, possibly a little more info, on a limited number of sites. Client could either enter a topic or URLs. Client would have opportunity to exclude some automatically picked URLs from the comparison, to help ensure comparison of apples to apples.

2. Midlevel -- All or mostly automated. Would compare all or mostly factors that are common to many Web sites. Possibly some customization.

Comparison factors could include the following, but other suggestions are welcome:
Animation
Blog
Broken links
Contact information
Delicious tags
Font size
Frequency of key words
Help information
Images, number and size
Interactivity
Internal links
Meta tags
Names
Number of pages
Page loading speed (possibly for different browsers)
Text density
Update frequency
Video
White space
Words per sentence

3. Premium -- Some work would likely be done automatically, but human work would be integral.

Discussion with client before and after, possibly during. The consultant would check out sites and deliver oral, graphic and written narrative analysis. Comparison could include all of the above, plus factors specific to the client.

SWIMSUIT EXAMPLE

As far as how this helps a business find a niche ...

Let's say I want to sell swimsuits. So I compare relatively generic factors listed above.

Then I also see who's selling what kind of swimsuits, and how are they doing it.

For instance -- one-piece, two-piece or tankini? Competitive, serious recreation, leisure? To show off the body or to compensate for less than ideal figures? For men or women or kids? What brands and fabrics, colors and sizes? What accessories? Who specializes, and who offers breadth?

How easy is it to order? How easy is it to browse or to search? How much does it cost and how soon can I get it?

Does the site have a virtual dressing room or a size chart? How good is it?

Do the pictures do a good job of showing the choices?

When I answer those types of questions, I will have a better idea of my competitors' strengths and weaknesses.

When I learn what my competition is not doing or not doing well, then I will know where I have opportunity to do better.

I'm thinking of having a contest to promote and test this idea. This is what I have mind:

1. Other CHers could make nominations for a week for an idea or business that I would do research for.

2. Voting would take place over a week.

3. If no one gets at least 50 percent of the vote, there would be a run-off among the top contenders (their share of the vote would total 50 percent).

4. I would do research for the winner. I could compare three factors across nine rivals, or nine factors of three rivals.

What do you think?

on my relative short 16 yrs of marketing experience, i suggest you name it as http://www.SWOT.com than Rival Scout.

Honestly it has sound fundamental service need in the capitalist "to each his throat" driven market.

Thanks, Saigon.

Although what I have in mind could be used as part of SWOT analysis(strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats), it would be different and narrower.

Rival Scout would be focused on the competition. For example, it would pay little or no attention to the client's current strengths and weaknesses.

What bugs me about this is that this is an essential part of building a business. The entrepreneur should do this own his own. It's like paying someone to write your business plan... a big NO-NO!

But hey... if there are people who would pay then I guess there's space for it! I'm curious to see the results of your research.

I'm posting an idea soon that has some convergence to what you are proposing. I had it some time ago but got a bit disillusioned with it.. I'll post to see what others think...

Speaking of "SWOT" and "advance comments" why not indeed structure comments on ideas in terms of Strengths, Weaknesses, Threats, Opportunities and others (comments that are not captured by the SWOT categories). This should be posted in the forum, anyway.

On the idea: Im wondering how can a niche be found without considering the dynamics of the external and internal environment of an enterprise. Spotting the weakness of a rival is relative not only to one's strenghts but also to the over all industry climate. It doesnt matter whether my rival's ice cream is not sweet as mine if we both are selling it on a rainy day. So I guess the idea of "niche definition" has to work on certain assumptions beyond just my strengths and my rival's weaknesses.

Very promising idea! I believe when this is realized (with the cobwebs cleared) this will drastically cut the learning curve of aspiring entrepreneurs here and outside CH.

Thanks, Cycko.

Your thoughts about comments on ideas have merit. I'll try to follow up in the forums.

About your thoughts on niche definition, I don't completely understand. Is your point essentially that the industry as a whole needs to be considered before starting a business?

Maureen my current competitors which i know pretty well are . Wink, Spock and zoominfo..

you can read about them here..

http://www.techcrunc...f-the-people-search/

Hi Maureen,

You said in reply to Saigon the solution is narrower (than the entire SWOT approach). Why limit? It seems that Rival Scout falls only in the domain of SO (strength-opportunity) strategic options. Why not cover also the ST, WO and WT options? Few weeks ago we (5 Davao based Chers) have a roundtable discussion/brainstorming. We came up with some ideas including a crowd-sourced SWOT Search and Matching Engine. We are looking forward to the completion of your project scope statement in the business wiki and we will gladly share the insights relevant to the final version of Rival Scout.

Cheers!

Cycko

Rizal,

Thank you, that's a big help.

I read the Tech Crunch article begun examining Wink, Spock and Zoominfo. Of the three, it appears that Zoominfo is the only one that ranks Web popularity.

But I'm also looking at a few others to see how similar they are Hypesphere.

-----

Cycko,

Thank you for your encouragement.

About why limit Rival Scout -- mainly because I know how to research companies. I am not knowledgeable about SWOT. Your idea is very intriguing, but I don't fully understand it.

I will share with you once I have something to share. :)

Tangentially, it would help if CH could do more to connect related things. I've seen several ideas or businesses that are or could be very complementary to each other.

Also, you are in the Philippines? I was born at Clark AFB, but I left when I was about 2.

thanks Maureen.. I would also like to know how you are gonna approach this for me. and how detailed the info is gonna be to me? if you have a structure on word document that you could hand to me. and if you are gonna prepare the whole project and send it to my email later on?

thanks for your help

Rizal,

Yes, I'll send the result of my work privately to you, through Cambrian House private messages or your regular e-mail address if you prefer.

About how detailed it will be -- I can't give a concrete answer to that yet. The idea I had in mind before you won is not the best fit for Hypesphere, because Hypesphere is already very different and because you are further along in your business.

So for my work to be meaningful for you, the discussion between us is more important. This is partly to avoid repeating work you've already done.

This is roughly what I have in mind, please let me know what you think, either here or privately:

1. Look further to see how much any other sites have in common with Hypesphere and discuss the results with you.

2A. If we conclude that Zoominfo or any single site is the closest competitor, focus on that. Check out a limited number of fields (interest spheres) and report on the results -- mainly perceived accuracy, also maybe depth and breadth. (I might need help from you or the crowd as far as who should rate well in different topics.) Report on ease of use. I can also look into other factors, such as their media coverage, traffic and site data, internationalization and accessibility.

2B. If we conclude that multiple sites or companies should be examined, I would do less work on any given site. My research would be more shallow but broader. For instance, I could work on nine statistics for three sites each.

Any which way, we could discuss at any time.

I realize some of that is vague, but I hope it is helpful. I'll also send this to you privately. You can respond by either method.

Hi Maureen,

Clark AirBase? Oh, part of you is Filipino! :-) Sorry it seems im out of scope. Just got carried away by my interest on your brilliant idea.

On your collaboration with Rizal, hope both of you will share as much info as it can be, to the crowd. We'd like to have a preview of how the idea is implemented.

Btw, Rizal is the surname of the Philippine National Hero.

i

I think the thing that could really launch this as a killer app would be by using the wisdom of crowds to generate your results. How? I don't know - that's up to you! But I also think the scope could be broadened... Anyone can look up stats on their competitors, I don't necessarily need a company for that. What else can you offer? Maybe using the WOC to plot the Strategy Canvas and/or the 4 Actions Framework (from Blue Ocean Strategy)? Something like that could be really useful in finding a competitive edge. (It makes your job of figuring out how to do that phenomenally difficult!)

Just throwing out some ideas in a random brainstorming fashion, hope they're useful!

Donh, thanks for your comments.

Well, maybe this won't be a killer app. The "Strategy Canvas and 4 Actions Framework" are foreign to me. That might be a good idea for someone else. I'm trying to work in an area that I know something about.

Yes, anyone can look up stats. But people and companies pay all the time for stuff they can do, but for various reasons choose not to do.

Rival Scout would make it easier and quicker to find information, leaving the business owners more time to do whatever it is they do best and most profitably.

Possible RP Pricing Plan
Copied from:
http://www.cambrianh...sion/1407/#post-9222

Here is an initial rough outline of possible RP price levels.

But maybe this should be examined for each client and its potential profitability. Please let me know what you think.

OBJECTIVE WORK

1 RP for 10 data items.

For example, that would be getting the same statistic for 10 sites or companies, or getting 10 stats for one site.

SUBJECTIVE WORK

The client only pays if satisfied, but only a limited amount of work would be done that way.

1 RP -- Suggest competitors to consider.
2 RP -- Short synopsis of competitor. One to three paragraphs.
3 RP -- Less-short analysis of one or more competitors, individually or collectively. Three to 10 paragraphs.

More-detailed analysis would come later in the evolution of Rival Scout.

PROMOTIONAL AND SHARING DISCOUNT

Half-price for any work allowed to be shared publicly.

hows it going with this?

What's the end product?

Let's say I have an idea that I might want to turn into an invention. I have some idea how long it will take to make up the design and prototype, and roughly how much it will cost to produce. I don't really have any ideas who my competitors are, and finding them might be problematic because it's a "brand new thing"(tm).

Will you provide a listing of possible competitors?

Will you be able to tell me how much I could or should sell for?

Will you be able to tell me if it's so destabilizing I'll get mysteriously "disappeared"?

I think I like it, but don't completely understand it yet.

Thanks for all your comments.

Donh --
I have looked more into your suggestions. Now that I have a better understanding of what you meant, it seems like something that Rival Scout could offer in time.

Spungey --

Finding your current or potential compeition would be a large part of Rival Scout. But the caveats are that Rival Scout would initially focus on
Web sites and that it would probably have to evolve for a while before it could handle really obscure things.

I didn't plant to tell people what their prices should be, but to find their competitors' prices, so the one could lead to the other.

If your idea is destabilizing, we will give you an estimated time of arrival for the black helicopters and jack-booted thugs (just kidding!).

Rizal --

I'm not sure how it's going. :)

I went ahead and started the business because someone asked about using the service. I made an initial pricing plan and am waiting to hear back.

And I'm recruiting people to join the business, if anyone is interested. But it seems like there was a technical glitch.

I'm sorry I wasn't able to find out anything new for you. I think Hypesphere is further along than I expect most of Rival Scout's clients to be, at least initially.

no its all good. i appreciate the help i got. let me know if you have something new to contribute .. thank you very much for the write up you did...

hope it will go well with this venture- i c alot of potential

can you try to research my Jubril's who's who-for kids?

though i have a whole horde classmate researching..i guess its about time to get some REAL help from this crowdsource thingy!

Thanks, Thunderbear.

Did you see my pricing plan above? Does that fit in your budget?

Is this still alive ?