What is Corporate Intelligence?

Corporate intelligence is a data-driven process that helps organizations anticipate and react to emerging trends related to their competitors, customers, and the overall digital landscape. 

The world today moves at hyperspeed. Information spreads almost instantly across social channels and media outlets. Trends shift on a dime. The newest innovation can quickly overshadow yesterday’s breakthrough.

Amidst this constantly shifting landscape, enterprise leaders need access to real-time intelligence to make critical decisions and communicate cross-functionally. And it’s not enough to have the latest information; organizations need to have a pulse on what might come next, so they can be ready to act strategically without delay.

That’s what makes corporate intelligence an important differentiator for top organizations.

When we say intelligence, we’re not talking about spy movies or shady espionage. Corporate intelligence is all about leveraging data, AI, and robust expertise to gather the information your organization needs to enhance your reputation and gain a competitive edge.

Corporate Intelligence: By the Numbers

• 57% of executives say that gaining a competitive advantage is a priority (Accenture & GE)

• Data-driven organizations are 23x more likely to acquire customers (McKinsey)

• Using a centralized intelligence platform helps teams locate information 4x faster (Evalueserve)

What is corporate intelligence?

Corporate intelligence is the process of strategically collecting, analyzing, and communicating information to guide high-level decision-making within an organization. This process involves turning disparate data into meaningful insights that help chart the course through uncertain markets and potential roadblocks.

It’s important to remember that corporate intelligence encompasses more than just competitive intelligence. Corporate intelligence can take many forms: tracking competitor product updates, deciphering public and media sentiment, analyzing social media trends, and more.

A robust corporate intelligence strategy allows several outward-facing business functions — corporate strategy, marketing, communications, and PR — to operate with the information they need to be successful. Risk intelligence teams are responsible for communicating insights with the rest of the organization to help unify the enterprise around strategic goals. Corporate intelligence can also inform how R&D teams develop new solutions, finance departments plan for the future, and information security teams protect their organization. 

Corporate intelligence is closely related to narrative intelligence, a strategic solution organizations leverage to detect, decipher, and defend their reputation from online narratives. Keep reading to discover the key differences between these concepts.

PeakMetrics offers a best-in-class AI-powered narrative intelligence solution. Click here to learn how global brands use PeakMetrics to power their intelligence strategy.

 

How does corporate intelligence work?

The corporate intelligence process often involves three key steps:

1. Information gathering

Think of all the information sources that exist today: mainstream social media, emerging social channels, online news, earnings reports, TV broadcasts, etc. 

Manually sifting through all of the noise is neither productive nor practical. Top organizations will augment their information-gathering efforts with AI and machine learning-enabled solutions. These systems can handle the manual aspects of detecting emerging narratives, saving time for communications professionals to focus on strategy.

2. Analysis and contextualization

Gathering data is powerful. Analyzing this data to identify patterns, trends, and potential risks and opportunities helps decipher the smoke from the fire. It also provides data-driven insights that can help add credibility when communicating across functions within the organization. 

This is another area where AI and ML can enhance the capabilities of comms professionals. Comms leaders can bring their intuition and media literacy to the table. Artificial intelligence tools take a data science lens to narrative identification. Together, these approaches help corporations more deftly identify the trends they should be paying attention to.

3. Response

One could argue that this is the most essential part of the corporate intelligence process. Accessing and contextualizing information is great, but it’s not impactful unless your leadership team takes action in a strategic way.

If a competitor accidentally leaks details about a product launch, should your R&D team re-arrange your product roadmap to beat them to market? Should a bubbling news narrative containing misinformation be swiftly addressed with takedown notices? Action, as always, is key.

The power of corporate intelligence comes from the strategic actions it unlocks.

Why is corporate intelligence important?

Corporate intelligence helps businesses mitigate external threats, address damaging narratives before they become crises, and capitalize on growth opportunities. Organizations operate best when they’re aligned around the same information, and corporate intelligence helps achieve this goal. In a world where information flows at hyperspeed, proactive corporate intelligence gives organizations the tools they need to make strategic decisions at the moment they need to.

The importance of corporate intelligence comes down to a few key factors:

Risk management

Risk comes in many forms for large enterprises: brand reputation threats, unforeseen market disruptions, sudden competitor shifts, etc. An effective corporate intelligence strategy can mitigate all of these risk forms. Proactively monitoring the online discourse and identifying potential risks early on can help organizations take strategic action to manage narrative and marketplace threats.

Data-driven decision-making

This stat from McKinsey bears repeating; data-driven organizations are 23x more likely to acquire new customers. 

Leadership teams should certainly lean on their experience and intuition — but they shouldn’t solely rely on these pillars. Companies that use AI and ML to automate large-scale data gathering and analysis help ensure a more thorough understanding of the market, their customers, and their competitors. AI and ML help mitigate human biases; decisions backed by data are often easier to justify and bring improved odds for positive results. 

Proactive reputation management

63% of a company’s market value can be attributed to its reputation. It’s one of your company’s most influential assets, and it should be maintained and protected at all times.

The proliferation of information on social media underscores the importance of monitoring online conversations, understanding customer sentiment, and detecting harmful narratives before they spin out of control. 

Competitive advantage

Customers nowadays have more options than ever before. Building a strong brand means beating your competitors to the punch, highlighting your differentiation, and positioning yourself to capitalize on market opportunities.

A deep understanding of your market and your rivals can help guide your corporate intelligence strategy. Corporate intelligence can unearth valuable insights into competitor strategies, emerging industry trends, and customer sentiment. Armed with this knowledge, leaders can tailor business decisions to stay ahead of the curve.

PeakMetrics’ narrative intelligence solution seamlessly integrates with your existing data pipeline. Using narrative ML, PeakMetrics helps you transform chaotic mentions into actionable response plans and executive-ready reports. 

Eliminate manual data processing delays, equip your team to anticipate threats before they bubble up, and capitalize on trends before they slip away.

 

Corporate intelligence vs. narrative intelligence

Corporate intelligence is a specific application of narrative intelligence that usually pertains to large enterprises and corporations.

As we’ve mentioned, narrative intelligence is the strategic solution organizations use to detect, decipher, and defend their reputation from online narratives. It focuses primarily on emerging storylines within the digital discourse — and the responses required to shape those narratives.

Corporate intelligence specifically applies to the enterprise use case. It involves using narrative intelligence strategies for the distinct purpose of furthering business goals.

Narrative intelligence software can be a fundamental tool for existing corporate intelligence teams at the enterprise level.

Intelligence in action: 3 corporate intelligence examples

Brands leverage corporate intelligence nearly every day. Here are three examples of corporate intelligence as a driving force behind real-world business achievements:

 Corporate Intelligence Examples:

• Fiserv anticipates the consequences of COVID

• Target and Walmart launch competing promotions

• Urban disrupts the clothing retail market

Fiserv prepares for a global pandemic

Fiserv’s dedicated geo-political analysis team leveraged corporate intelligence to better prepare the global financial services technology company for the COVID pandemic.

In January 2020, the team analyzed emerging media reports and historical trends related to other outbreaks to predict the severity of the incoming pandemic. Fiserv recommended against executive travel and invested in protective equipment early to help mitigate risks and prepare for the remote work transition.

This scenario represents two key aspects of corporate intelligence: sentiment analysis of trending storylines and data-driven historical trend analysis.

Target and Walmart wrangle with Amazon Prime Day

Prime Day began in 2015 as a one-day sale for Prime members that celebrated Amazon’s 20th anniversary. It became a massive revenue-generating and brand-building opportunity for Amazon. 

Competitors such as Target and Walmart couldn’t sit around for long. Both big-box retailers have recently announced their own summer sales to compete with Prime Day. These brands surveyed customers and identified opportunities to reign in some of the summer sales market share. Rather than put on identical sales, Target and Walmart created longer events that didn’t require a membership, differentiating their promotions from Amazon.

Customer sentiment is essential to a strong corporate analysis strategy, as exhibited by Target and Walmart.

Urban strikes gold with new clothing subscription service.

In 2019, Urban – the clothing company behind brands such as Urban Outfitters and Anthropologie – launched Nuuly, a clothing subscription service. Fast forward five years and Nuuly boasts nearly 200,000 customers. By tapping into their customer base’s desire for sustainable clothing solutions and constant variety, Nuuly has been partially responsible for disrupting the traditional clothing retail model.

“​​Launching a clothing rental subscription service might seem like a bit of an unusual move for a company known for experiential retail concepts,” Urban admits on its website. Thanks to robust corporate intelligence — including monitoring customer preferences and market trends — the experiment is paying off so far.

The future of corporate intelligence

Advanced analytics and AI-powered tools are transforming the way companies gather and interpret information for strategic advantage. 

We’re in an era of data abundance. Enterprises are inundated with information from diverse sources, making it increasingly challenging to extract meaningful insights. This is where AI can help. By harnessing the power of AI, organizations can synthesize large amounts of data into actionable intelligence. As models continue to evolve, predictive analytics will get sharper, helping organizations identify patterns to forecast risks and opportunities.

But what happens when these tools become abundant? If every organization has access to AI-powered corporate intelligence tools, the differentiator will again shift back to the human side. Companies that use AI purposefully to augment their existing expertise will be best positioned for success.

How PeakMetrics empowers corporate intelligence for enterprises

To maintain a best-in-class corporate intelligence strategy, you’ll need the right tools and partners.

PeakMetrics — the narrative intelligence solution designed to help organizations proactively detect, decipher, and defend against online threats — is built for enterprises like yours. Our platform and supporting team will enable you to:

• Access always-on intelligence: Access our always-on intelligence feed to proactively monitor online conversations and anticipate reputational risks before they escalate.
• Gauge audience sentiment and emerging threats: Tap into customer perceptions, social conversations, and more to tailor your company messaging accordingly.
• Get ahead of market trends: Identify rising sentiments and consumer preferences to stay ahead of the curve on future opportunities.
• Craft executive-level communication plans: Consult with PeakMetrics experts, who will help you craft and guide effective response plans.
• Communicate Cross-Functionally: Pull the data and insights you need to align your organization around common goals.

Corporate intelligence can be a key differentiator for your business. Make sure you’re taking advantage with the right tools and resources.

[Request a demo to see how PeakMetrics can power your corporate intelligence team.