Item: AlphaSense
Rating: 8
Author: Sarah Pitman, MBA

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

As a competitive intelligence analyst, I need to be able to access near real-time data about the activities of competitors, what is happening in the market, and what issues need to be tracked that could potentially impact our market. Alphasense helps me stay on top of key market trends as well as news that mentions competitors. I use Alphasense on a weekly basis due to the quality of information. I also use Alphasense to read analyst reviews and earnings calls. Alphasense highlights sentiment, which makes it much easier to quickly understand a large amount of information and also makes it easier to send to higher-level executives since sentiment is marked up already.

Pros and Cons

Key market trends- I input a topic name and get information related to the topic.
Competitor filings- Alphasense is able to get all the regulatory documents quickly.
Earnings calls- Alphasense now provides transcripts, which is incredibly helpful when I can't attend the earnings call live.

The dashboard changed its layout recently which makes it hard to relearn.
There are local websites that repost news articles. Alphasense frequently misses posts about competitor activities when news sites mention a competitor.
If there were some sort of effort to track competitor ads (visuals), that would be extremely helpful.

Return on Investment

Crucial data found in a much more timely manner.
Accuracy of data is much more trustworthy coming from analyst reports.
Ability to notice patterns on key topics due to the way information is aggregated.

Usability

I don't like how the layout was changed. It's less intuitive, though it looks nicer. Im confused where all my data went. I've had issues creating notes. Once, a note completely disappeared. We also found an inaccuracy about Vivint's financial performance (likely due to the fact that Vivint Solar and Vivint Smart home were two separate companies before Vivint Smart Home was acquired by NRG). I still have to use local sources to find relevant articles because Alphasense doesnt link to local, new sources. Alpha sense is a lot better now that I don't have to follow a boolean search, but when we had to use the booliean format, it was very difficult.

AlphaSense Market Intelligence

I use Alphasense weekly due to its real-time nature. It helps me provide weekly headlines to send out across the company.

Alternatives Considered

Crayon Intel Pro and Klue

Klue doesnt populate information from the past. Having past data in AlphaSense is invaluable. Both Crayon and Klue have limitations on the number of competitors you can track. Not having this limitation on Alphasense is also invaluable.

Key Insights

Do you think AlphaSense delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with AlphaSense's feature set?

Yes

Did AlphaSense live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of AlphaSense go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy AlphaSense again?

Yes

Other Software Used

Meltwater

Likelihood to Recommend

Alphasense is great for tracking subjects revolving around a topic. Also incredibly useful when I have to do a deep dive about a competitor in a field that is adajacent to the one I work in. Analyst reports are fantastic and worth the additional cost. Less helpful when it comes to things like tracking marketing efforts (search and display ads, social media campaigns, direct mail, radio/tv commercials). I have to use alternate sources for that. Also, I utilize linkedin to see public job postings of competitors because that potentially has a lot of useful and public data for understanding my competitors next actions Not appropriate for tracking pricing due to the way pricing is hidden from competitors and price is based on service address

Accuracy of data and real-time insights drive the value of this product.

Overall Satisfaction with AlphaSense