FreePint for Professional Services
Jinfo Blog

By Jan Sykes

Abstract

Knowledge workers in professional services firms demand access to late-breaking news about clients, competitors, and market activity. With news now coming at us from every direction, it is an opportune time to search for better ways to filter out the most relevant news stories and deliver them to any device at the point of need.

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Rethinking Delivery of News - Role of Information Managers

Managers of information and knowledge centres in professional services firms provide immense value to their employers and colleagues. They adapt new technologies and new resources to enhance productivity of users whilst managing budgets prudently, as well as a providing a host of other value-adds...

The process of evaluating emerging technologies and content offerings may slow down for periods but it never ceases completely. How do we alter our strategy and our portfolio of resources when some content becomes a commodity? This question is at the heart of FreePint's current Topic Series, "News, and Other Commodities".

Updating User Needs

Our recent research (FreePint's 8th Annual Survey on News Needs and Preferences) along with frequent conversations with clients in the professional services sector reveals that there are myriad dimensions to analyse when reviewing any commodity content, and news in particular, once considered an essential enterprise premium resource.

Some early movers are looking to disrupt that paradigm by seeking answers to questions like these:

• Where do users actually look for news?

• Do users view general news services as more valuable for alerting than for deep historical research, or do they need both?

• Are there subject-specific content resources that include news more targeted to their work?

• Do we need to incorporate internal information resources?

• What services or software tools might help us organise content from different sources for various user groups?

• What are cost and labour implications to the organisation?

At FreePint, we are having insightful discussions with customers who are weighing alternatives to news aggregation services, including crafting their own platforms. If one of your New Year's resolutions is to take a fresh look at news delivery, the articles and reports below will provide a framework from which to start.

And if you want to take a look at your relationships with colleagues in other departments, IT in particular, then our first Research Focus of 2016, "Strategic Alignment of IS and IT", is sure to be of interest. 

Find Out More

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Our Content is the broad platform through which we publish research-based insights. Community provides the environment to discuss them with peers. Consulting tailors the insight to your needs. Find the right FreePint Subscription level to meet your needs.

Recent Subscription Content of particular interest to our customers in professional services firms:

Articles

• Market Landscape of Aggregation Platforms
• Curating Commodity Information
• Laying the Groundwork for Real Change in Stakeholder Attitudes
• How to Develop Strong Relationships between Buyers and Suppliers
• Market Landscape - Media Monitoring
• Avention, OneSource, iSell - What's New, or What's Familiar?
• Making a Big Switch, Changing Supplier
• Is a Subscription-Based Company Information Service Still Worth the Fee?

Reports

• FreePint Research into Private Company Information 2015
• FreePint Survey into Web Usage Policies
• Product Review of Alacra Premium
• Product Review of Factiva
• Next Steps in Content Usage

Webinars - recordings available to view for anyone with a FreePint Subscription

• Needs Analysis for Commodity Content
• DIY Content Aggregation: Benefits & Costs of Managing Your Own Platform
• What We Learned about Usage
• Recommit to Risk Management: A Strategic Value Information Practitioners Can Deliver

Webinars - upcoming

•  IS and IT Make Sense of the "Digital Workplace", 12th January 2016
• Successful Relationships Between IS and IT: Tips from the Pros, 9th February 2016
• Shifting the Worldview around IS/IT Relationships: A First Step to Alignment, 8th March 2016

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