Directed from the executive suite. Software does not in and of itself yield intelligence. The CI market is hot, and numerous software houses are producing products for the intelligence marketplace. Software has become an important weapon in the CI arsenal, but it does not truly analyze. It collects, contrasts, and compares.
True analysis is a process of people reviewing and making sense of the information.
Seeing outside yourself. Companies that successfully apply competitive intelligence gain an ability to see outside themselves. A news story. Newspaper or television reports are very broad and are not timely enough for managers concerned with specific competitors and competitive issues. If a manager first learns of an industry event from a newspaper or magazine report, chances are others in the industry already learned of the news through other channels.