Today’s Byte is for anyone who needs to know about a business for a job interview, for a competitive advantage, to make an investment choice, or any other reason. The Internet is a great place to learn more about a company. Here is a short course on how to start competitive intelligence online:

1. Look for the company web site using a search engine such as Google. Use the company, product or service name. From the web site you can generally learn:
” The company purpose
” History, location, and staff members
” Future plans through press releases, letters from the president or investor notes
” You might even get a customer list from a clients or testimonials page

2. Look for recent news and press releases on Google News. Google News is better for press releases than news.

3. Check your local newspaper (especially if the company is local) and/or local library for access to local newspapers to so a search for more news on the company.

4. Check out stock information (if it’s a public company). You can start at Yahoo Finance or jump right into the Securities and Exchange Commission site, EDGAR.

5. See what regular people are saying about your company by doing a search with one of the following tools:
Look at the newsgroups: http://groups.google.com/
Look at blogs & RSS feeds: http://www.faganfinder.com/blogs/
Look at who links to them: http://www.lilnkpopularity.com

Check out these sources and you should have a pretty good view of the company in question.