Marketing with fascinating data: IntraLinks Deal Flow Indicator

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was originally formulated in 1896. For more than a century, "the Dow" has helped to brand Dow Jones (publisher of The Wall Street Journal) as a player in the financial markets.

I often challenge companies to consider what fascinating data they have available or can formulate that can be released free to the marketplace to build buzz for their organization. Most people nod their heads and do nothing. It’s always cool when someone does actually does it.

IntraLinks Deal Flow Indicator

IntraLinks is a provider of secure virtual datarooms for Merger & Acquisition work. IntraLinks is used in nearly half of global M&A deals greater than USD $25 million so the company has interesting data that they have aggregated to give an advance preview of M&A deal flow into the future.

The IntraLinks Deal Flow Indicator - announced today on the IntraLinks blog - is calculated using the total volume of IntraLinks virtual datarooms that were proposed for use by deal teams initiating projects during the quarter. The totals are then analyzed regionally and compared to previous time periods. IntraLinks Deal Flow Indicator results will be published quarterly as a PDF document.

This is important information as a valuable business trend indicator for the media as well as for investment bankers and corporate finance professionals.

The first report is available here.

I really like this kind of data. It brands an organization as a thought leader and one worthy of doing business with. Many companies have data lying around that can be re-packaged in a way that it benefits people who are in the position to buy their products or talk about them.

Another example is the free Email Marketing Metrics Report from Mailer Mailer, a company that sells email marketing and newsletter service. This report is so valuable that Google ranks it number one for the phrase email marketing metrics out of nearly two million hits.

Do you have data that you can turn into a report?

Any other great examples of this kind of marketing you want to share?

Top photo credit: Shutterstock

Disclosures: I have worked with the Dow Jones Enterprise Media Group and I recently spoke at an IntralLinks event (although I was not involved in the work to create the IntraLinks Deal Flow Indicator).

Comments

[Judy Wolf, Marketing Director, IntraLinks]

Thanks David for your encouraging words. We knew we had great data here for a long time, and that it would be of value to our clients and prospects. It was a real challenge to figure out how to best gather and present the data in a format that would be most meaningful, useful, and insightful. In the end, persistence and better internal reporting tools finally made the new tool possible.

It’s great to finally be able to provide our sales team with the answer to the question they are most often asked: “What does IntraLinks see happening in the market?” Our unique perspective and 10 years of experience with key firms in the M&A market creates a cohesive story to tell.

[David Meerman Scott]

Well done Judy. Thanks for jumping in with a little more information. Good luck with it. David

[Omar Halabieh]

Thanks for sharing David. I particularly enjoyed reading the report from Mailer Mailer. Some of the metrics they have, such as frequency of checking email, best days to send marketing emails etc. offer some very good insight into email marketing/consumer behavior.

Regards,
Omar

[Alana Baker]

Definitely a good read David. The section on "IntraLinks Deal Flow Indicator" was specifically insightful.

Best,
Alana Baker
http://www.onlydownloads.net/