When it comes to learning more about your favorite businesses, the best source for information isn't likely to be The Wall Street Journal, Investor's Business Daily, or even here at Fool.com. The best sources of investment news are more likely to be industry-specific blogs and expert social media feeds, says Fool contributor Tim Beyers in the following video.
Legendary investor Philip Fisher called this data gathering method "scuttlebutt" in his book, Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits. In Fisher's day, gathering investment news and intel meant talking with salespeople or executives, asking them to open up about competitors they most admired.
Blogs and social media have since changed the equation. Take Twitter, which has become a must-watch source of breaking news for traders. LinkedIn (LNKD.DL), meanwhile, has spent millions beefing up its newsgathering capabilities in order to position the site as a tool for competitive intelligence. The latest? A $92.9 million deal for Pulse.
Incentives call for LinkedIn to pay out up to 480 million shares to Pulse team members, according to the company's latest 10-Q quarterly report. The deal sends a clear message: Scuttlebutt is more difficult to find in a noisy world, which makes tools for gathering it all the more valuable.
Are you using the scuttlebutt method in your search for investment news? Tim walks you through his strategy in the video. Please watch and then, if you haven't already, start a Motley Fool watch list. Clicking here will get you started gathering intel about LinkedIn. How you use it is up to you.
