One of the most challenging aspects of competitive intelligence research is getting a grasp of a subject that we are unfamiliar with. Many of us have dealt with clients who have given an online research mandate that is out of our scope of expertise however; it is matter of how much time that we are willing to dedicate to the task.
Google has created another application that may help out online researchers in a big way.
Google Squared is a tool that attempts to give some structure to results that are available via a typical search query. Results are presented in a spreadsheet format instead of the conventional listings on numerous pages. This enables researchers to assess results given the scope of the keywords entered in order to get basic facts about the subject that is being researched.
Case Scenario:
A client from the North American car parts sector is interested in expanding into Europe. In order to make an informed decision on whether or not to go ahead with the market expansion, an industry profile is needed for Europe.
Solution:
Google Squared permits users to enter the subject into a search interface to begin building the square (or spreadsheet). The interface is shown in Figure 1 with the keywords, “European automobile industry”:
Figure 1: Google Squared Search Interface
Once users click on “Square it”, Google will provide another input interface in which users must put their additional keywords (or items) to put some context to the search to continue building the square. As seen in Figure 2, keywords such as “sales”, “trends”, “growth” and “competitors” are entered to obtain information for the elements of the industry profile.
Figure 2: Building A Google Square For “European Automobile Industry”
The square is finally created as users click on “Square it” as illustrated below in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Google Square For “European Automobile Industry”
The square is composed of the following elements:
- Item Name (Keywords)
- Image
- Description
- Price (If associated with paid content source)
The square can be modified to eliminate irrelevant content and sorted. Figure 4 is a screen shot of the square sorted alphabetically and highlighted in yellow, data regarding sales growth.
Figure 4: Sorted Squared To Find Sales Growth Data
Click On Image To Enlarge
When the “Description” cell of the square is clicked on, a box with web results will appear (as seen in Figure 4) when users can actually access hyperlinks to the web pages with the information.
The final product of any Google Squared search query can be shared with others, exported in a .csv file or a Google Spreadsheet and saved to a Google Account.
Google Squared is available at www.google.com/squared
Interested in using different online search tools to be an efficient researcher? Attend Intelegia’s seminar, “Effective Online Research Strategies“
