Currently, sharp business analysts place importance upon identifying and tracking emerging trends. This activity serves a variety of goals. For example, it frequently helps enterprises position their brands more competitively to appeal to consumers within specific marketplaces. Just consider a few of the most significant advantages furnished by an enhanced capability to ascertain and monitor emerging trends:
The Explosion of Knowledge
In this century, human beings enjoy access to a rapidly ballooning body of information. Never before in recorded history have people experienced such a wealth of educational resources. Researchers around the world daily report discoveries capable of stimulating new (and sometimes previously incomprehensible)inquiries. These innovations inspire the development of new product features with some frequency.
For example, consider that the concept of a cost-effective Internet-connected mobile phone struck many people as a fictional flight of fancy just twenty years ago. This type of agile technology initially seemed drawn from science fiction in the view of consumers raised in the era of large, standalone mainframe computers. Yet within a single decade, smartphones permeated virtually every demographic segment of the U.S. population. Similarly, inventions like 3D-Printers, drones, and self-driving automobiles continue to inspire rapid changes in daily life. Any single one of these new technologies might have appeared revolutionary in the past. Modern society encounters new, mind-bending products on a frequent basis.
Tap Into New Trends Quickly
Marketing teams today discover tangible advantages in embracing new technologies and trends more quickly than competitors. The first company to design and market a useful product upgrade may cultivate rich rewards. Similarly, detecting changing consumer purchasing patterns may offer a competitive edge for companies in this fast-paced milieu.
Online enterprises sometimes obtain remarkable success simply by capitalizing on current trends. Discerning changes in a timely manner does require effort, however. The explosion of information makes trend spotting challenging sometimes.
Detect Threats Faster
Indeed, the ability to appreciate trends remains as important as ever for commercial survival. Experts suggest business disruptions occur when well established market leaders fail to adjust their models to transformations within the society and the market. No one envies the fate of Kodak or Blockbuster in business school case studies today.
By monitoring trending developments carefully in their interest zones, managers enjoy an improved opportunity to make essential course corrections or product improvements in a timely manner. They may pivot smoothly to address a perceived deficiency in a product line, or to secure their online market share against a suddenly emerging challenge from a competitor. Timely trend identification proves essential to these efforts.
Understanding Emerging Trends
Pinpointing emerging trends quickly assists enterprises of all sizes today. However, this capability won’t necessarily offer real benefits in the absence of accurate analytical platforms and tools. Savvy entrepreneurs appreciate the vital importance of also understanding the information they capture about consumer behavior and sales trends. They must devise useful, applicable strategies in response to changing marketplace conditions. Enterprises require this extra capability in order to meet the challenges of emerging trends in an effective, nimble way.
For this reason, it makes sense to combine trend identification with powerful data analytical tools. Platforms like NetBase Technologies and Quid Technology function together symbiotically to help customers detect and evaluate important emerging trends within their industries. Using both programs furnishes a practical way to obtain more valuable business intelligence online.
Wayne Probert is a senior reporter at Zobuz, covering state and national politics, and he is a grantee with the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Before joining Zobuz, he worked as a freelance journalist in Kentucky, having been published by dozens of outlets including NPR, the Center for Media.
