The system has been designed to gather and filter news and consumer opinion from more than 4,000 Web publications, 60,000 message boards and forums, and 5+ million commercial, government, and academic websites. It should provide client companies with improved visibility into consumer opinion into their marketplace.

In terms of assisting market research clients, the daily feedback claims to be able to provide early warning of problems in brand perceptions, product features, positioning, pricing, customer service, distribution channels, trademark infringement, and other aspects of brand management. This data is then systematically captured and stored so companies can make better informed business decisions.

In the past, companies have relied on intelligence gleaned from a number of different services, including newspaper clippings, broadcast monitoring, database research, online news aggregation, and Internet search engines. However, many have found that separate services make it difficult to manage, integrate, and analyse the whole body of information.

However, the automated Netpinions service should save researchers nearly 80% of the time they spend searching the Internet manually for news and consumer opinion on specific subjects. In designing searches for Netpinions to execute, clients can specify complex Boolean-type search strings with multiple words or phrases. Information gathered can also be integrated with results of other consumer opinion research including surveys and focus groups. "As a new approach to market intelligence and consumer feedback, Netpinions from CyberAlert offers companies and brand managers an effective and cost-efficient way to get at the heart of news and consumer opinions on brands, trends, issues and competitors by delivering daily reports of new consumer comments posted on the Internet," said William J. Comcowich, president and CEO of CyberAlert. "By closely monitoring consumer discussions on the Internet, Netpinions delivers the most timely possible insights into consumer attitudes and provides early warning of problems, issues and trends about companies and brands." Netpinions is available as a custom subscription service, with intelligence reports delivered daily. For more information visit the Netpinions Web site.