The Born-Again Desk Researcher

Quite a lot, we hope. Whether or not you've adopted the vocabulary, googling is the best thing since sliced bread. Here are some things you've thought of already, and at least one you haven't:
>> use Google to find phone numbers - whether for business, eg search for 'contact ACNielsen', or for personal use, eg 'veterinary sevenoaks'. This has superceded Yell for me, to be honest, although if Google fails Yell's a good back-up [www.yell.co.uk]
>> it also works in reverse - to identify area codes type them in with a space at the end and preferably 'tel:' in front. For example, type in 'tel 01293' ... look at the first few results... it's got to be Crawley.
>> for abbreviations / acronyms, technical terms ... try searching for

them on their own, and if no good add 'definition' up front
the new(ish) image search is excellent and can be used to enhance presentations
>> make yourself a mini-library of desk
research links pertinent to your
specialist sectors, using Google as a
starting point - search terms like
'motoring industry portal' or 'financial
online directory' actually get useful
results you may want to come back
to if you work in these areas regularly. If this one sounds a bit like a 'Top Tip' from Viz comic, our apologies - we've used it and it's worked for us.
>> for spellings, and even grammar -
search for the word as you think it's spelt - if you get it wrong you'll probably see 'did you mean...?'

- but beware Web misspellings - the
correct spelling of a word may produce 1.5 million results, but an incorrect one may still produce 43,000 - compare the numbers! OK so there's spellcheck for this, but Google can give you context too. For example, we receive lots of job ads that read 'salary dependant on experience' - Word doesn't spot this at all, whereas Google turns up 995 results, and 3,150 for the correct 'salary dependent on experience'. Glorious! Very democratic, since you'll end up siding with the majority, although in a few cases you'll end up being as wrong as they are. A bit like 'Ask the Audience' on Millionaire, but with a bigger audience, and one that's had the chance to check what they upload before they do.

I remember someone saying in 1995 that the Internet would never be any good for desk research. If information was useful, people would charge for it. It seemed a little naive at the time and since about 1997 it's been downright wrong: the Web, and to a lesser extent email, have transformed desk research from the poor cousin to one of the key elements in the researcher's toolbox.

In fact, whereas 'desk research' used to be a misnomer, it's now very accurate to say that you can work through a substantial part of a research project without moving from your desk and, for that matter, without ringing anyone. The desk in question used to be in a library somewhere, and it wasn't half as good a source either.

The following stems from a recently presented paper on 'Useful web sites for b2b Research' at the BIG Forum and contains a lot of input from co-presenter Trevor Wilkinson of Purple MR. We've had lots of requests for copies of the presentation so it seemed a good idea to add some consumer research pointers and reproduce it in MRWho. Most of the content is presented in panels like the one below, so you can pick and choose what's of interest. We hope you find it useful!

article from MRWho Issue 21

Thanks to Trevor for permission to use his initial content and for contributing further to this article. He's the real expert when it comes to applying desk research, as opposed to many of the hints n tips below which are mine alone -as are any really stupid bits - but you had assumed that, right?

Nick Thomas

Trevor's email: trevor@purplemr.co.uk

What Are You Googling At?

Desk Research Sector by Sector

Some More General Sites

Better Searching

When Not To Search

In Praise of Desk Research



	Almost a year ago MrWeb set up a number of pages which brought together all the relevant content on the site for each sector - there are 32 such 'Sector Focus' pages and along with news and supplier lists one of the key elements is a mini-library of desk research links for each. These are updated regularly by a researcher so you'll find fewer broken links and defunct sites than you will in other directories.		Here are four of the most popular sectors just to give you a flavour of what's there. For space reasons we have only included the URLs - if you want the same list but with more of a clue where each leads, see the pages themselves - type www.mrweb.com/telecoms into your browser, for example.
	Automotive Home pages of all major manufacturers of cars, commercial vehicles, motorcycles. Trade Press: www.auto.com , www.autowired.co.uk, www.autonewseurope.com, www.automfg.com, www.ai-online.com, www.motortrader.co.uk Trade Associations: 194.216.214.17/rmi/index.htm (RMIF), www.dft.gov.uk, www.dvla.gov.uk, www.rac.co.uk, www.theaa.co.uk Online Directories: www.mira.co.uk, www.rmif.co.uk Telecoms Home pages of all major telecoms companies, mobile manufacturers, networks Trade Press: www.totaltele.com, biz.yahoo.com/n/y/y0032.html Trade Associations etc: www.thecma.com, www.ofcom.org.uk, www.itu.ch, www.intug.net Online Directories: www.telezoo.com/asp/telres/acronym.asp, www.analysys.com/default.asp?mode=article&iLeftArticle=288, www.totaltele.com/viewpoint/default.asp, www.totaltele.com/forum/debates.asp Financial Home pages for all High Street banks, Building Societies, Online Banks, Merchant Banks, Credit Card Companies and the big accountancy firms Trade Press etc: www.bloomberg.com, www.cnnfn.com, www.djnewswires.com, www.ft.com, www.fortune.com, www.reuters.com		Financial (Continued) Trade Associations etc: www.londonstockexchange.com/default.asp, www.liffe.com, www.fsa.gov.uk Online Directories: www.chartered-accountants.co.uk, www.reportgallery.com, www.cbot.com, finance.lycos.com, www.rbrldn.demon.co.uk, www.uktax.demon.co.uk, indexes.dowjones.com Media Home pages for TV stations and media groups Trade Press: www.editorandpublisher.com, media.guardian.co.uk, www.mediachannel.org, www.mediaconference.com, www.medialifemagazine.com, www.mediatel.co.uk, www.mediaweek.co.uk, www.worldmediabuyer.com Trade Associations etc: www.abc.org.uk, www.mediamasters.co.uk/mediacentre/media_bodies.htm, www.naa.org, www.ppa.co.uk, www.wan-press.info Online Directories: www.mondotimes.com, www.naa.org/artpage.cfm?AID=1565&SID=1022, www.ppa.co.uk/data_trends/index.asp + 28 Others There are links for 28 more sectors on MrWeb - try typing any sector name after the www.mrweb.com/ - or see the home page for a drop-down menu.



	General government sites www.Gksoft.com/govt - highly recommended www.sbs.gov.uk, www.dti.gov.uk, www.statistics.gov.uk www.statistiks.bund, www.insee.fr Good general sources of information and portals www.nationmaster.com, www.globalwatchonline.com www.whatis.com, www.eurostat.com		Market and industry reports www.keynote.co.uk,www.hoovers.com, www.business.com, www.datamonitor.com, www.mintel.com Trade bodies and sector specific sites www.smmt.co.uk, www.mira.co.uk, www.cbi.org.uk www.cim.org.uk, www.riba.org, www.just-food.com Journals and Periodicals www.ft.com, www.economist.com, www.bbc.co.uk



	Most of the old tips for better searching are obsolete - Google has integrated the ideas. But it's still worth knowing some of them for the odd case when you're not getting results: >> instead of combinations of several common words, think of one more unusual word. For example 'market' and 'research' are everywhere on the Web. Try 'questionnaire' or 'survey' or 'conjoint', or whatever you can to narrow it down without stretching to two words >> don't forget to use inverted commas for combinations of words, although Google seems to put them in for you in some cases		>> the 'Advanced' search available on most search engines gives useful options, however good the plain vanilla may seem. On Google, this extends to words to exclude, where to look for words within the page [title, URL, text, anywhere, or in links to the page], languages used, when last updated and so on. The option to exclude words can be particularly good if used thoughtfully >> don't spend too long looking at pages 2, 3, 4... of a search and forget that it's possible to go back and refine it - especially if you have a slow connection



	Now that Google is so good, going straight to a search engine is no longer such a bad idea - but we used to advise against it in almost all cases. There are any number of other means of finding more relevant sites quicker, and some may still come up trumps against the Googlemeister. For example: MrWeb's sector focus pages give you a list of ready-made and frequently checked links sector by sector - see panel on previous page for these		>> a good sector portal / news site will often get you to the news item or market info you want quicker than a normal search - bookmark the search pages on your favourite sites, not just the home page. [NB 'Favourites' lists aren't always very easy to use. If you want a home page with all your favourite links on it, it's easy to design. If you're stuck, let us know]