Do you research your competitors? Keeping track of what the competition is doing is an important part of business. If you want to stay ahead of your rivals, this type of research is key. In the past business managers and owners could simply browse the competition’s website and weekly ads. With social media becoming a bigger part of business strategies all the time it may take hours every week to stay up-to-date. Then came Perch.
Perch is a free app for iOS and Android platforms that provides a central place from which you can track your competitor’s social media campaigns. This app allows you to keep tabs on many of the most popular social media business sites including Facebook, Yelp and daily deal sites. You can set up daily or weekly summary emails to save even more time.
Perch was developed by Closely and is powered by Foursquare's location technology. When you first sign up it displays similar companies in your area. You also have the option of adding companies to your watch list.
Is Perch a good idea? Keeping track of the competition makes good business sense and this type of app can save you time. Sounds good to us!
Oasis Partner, Nashville Computer notes that apps like Perch essentially allow one business to spy on another. This could foster a non-competitive environment if businesses just emulate each other. Repetitive practices may negate the benefits these apps offer. However, this is really just an information aggregator. It is freely available on the internet so essentially it just makes a standard business practice easier. This type of app is valuable to many types of businesses but companies that utilize daily deal and review sites can reap inordinate benefits.
What do you think of the moral and business implications of using technology for competition research? We want to hear your thoughts!
This information originally appeared on Nashville Computer's blog.