Market intelligence software gathers publicly available information about companies and individuals from a variety of sources and uses it to create records or combine it with existing CRM data. Contact information, locations, financials, recent news and press releases are typical data sources mined for information and linked to the record. This combined profile provides companies with a more complete view of current and potential customers, identifies market opportunities, and informs decision-making. Market intelligence solutions are most commonly used by planners in marketing and sales departments to establish lists of likely prospects and determine the best means of outreach.
There is notable overlap between market intelligence software and sales intelligence software and/or marketing account intelligence software because several features are similar. For instance, market intelligence is focused on the initial stages of account-based marketing, including identifying prospects and building an accurate picture of relationships between decision-makers. Lead scoring and data quality are also often included in market intelligence software, and integrations with them are common among the rest. However, the ability to alert users to changes and provide basic insights based on existing data is what differentiates market intelligence from other lead capture software.
- To qualify for inclusion in the Market Intelligence category, a product must:
- Collect granular prospect data from sources external to the user company
- Create and/or populate contact records and target lists with gathered data
- Ensure accuracy and quality of information
- Alert users to changes in profile information
- Provide actionable insights about markets and potential leads