Conquer Growth Equity with Data-Driven Insights

Thinknum on April 14, 2022

Alternative data use cases for investors in private markets
Get a God’s Eye View of Private Markets with Alternative Data

As business activity comes online, new data trails are left behind. Savvy growth equity investors use this alternative data to plug the information gap between public and private markets. Read on to find out how Thinknum’s alternative web data can help you track business activity like never before.

Track Employee Headcount at Drone Delivery Startups

Drone Delivery: Take-Off or Hard Landing?

To proxy for employee headcount, use the aggregated number of LinkedIn profiles that list a company as their employer. Compare competitors’ headcount, or track corporate expansion and layoffs, all in real time.

Drone delivery startup Flirtey slashed 12.8% of its workforce over the last 9 months, while rivals Matternet and Zipline went on a hiring spree.

Compare Job Listings at Sales

SaaS Rivals

Sales SaaS: View Competitors’ Job Listings

Savvy investors look to hiring data as a valuable leading indicator of future corporate performance. View the number of open job listings at Insidesales.com and Salesloft.com in real-time, for example. Filter to gain in-depth competitive insights into specific market, location, and job categories.

Job listings at Gong.io have increased 790% since last year, when demand for online business meetings skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Track Product Pricing at Cannabis Upstarts

Cannabis Industry: Track Average Online Prices Over Time

View and compare thousands of retailers’ pricing trends. Track changes in the number of discounted items, as well as the percentage discount daily. Use retailer-listed products and discount prices to derive trends in companies’ pricing strategies.

Average prices at Eaze.com, a popular cannabis e-commerce site, are up 20.6% since February 2020.

Rank App Reviews for Cash

Rewards Competitors

Cash Rewards: Track App Ratings for Major Rewards Companies

As businesses go mobile, analyze real-time user engagement data from mobile apps and social media.Rank competitors on their number of app reviews and ratings.

The number of Apple App Store ratings for Fetch Rewards has seen strong growth this year, leaving rivals Doshcash and Ibotta behind.

Track Active Users in the Payroll & Compliance Industry

Payroll & Compliance: Track Active Users and Membership Growth

Thinknum’s Traction dataset is comprised of idiosyncratic metrics harnessed from corporate websites. It tracks user activity for Deel by indexing the number of registered and concurrent users on its website, giving investors a real-time view of who’s winning in the payroll and compliance industry.

Deel, a payroll and compliance platform serving multinational corporations, has achieved an 811% increase in registered users since October 2019.

Compare Web Traffic for Social Media Management Platforms

Social Media Management: Track Real-Time Web Traffic

Track the number of visitors for specific online channels and websites. Identify topics and products that capture users’ interest. Access historical web traffic data - including monthly pageviews, monthly unique visitors and average page views per user - to see who is winning the war for eyeballs in a given industry.

Social media management tool Buffer is facing intense competition from Hootsuite. Buffer’s web traffic (measured by Pageviews per Million users) has been waning for 5 years.

Analyze Product Reviews for Skincare Brands

Skincare Brands: Analyze Products Winning Customer’s Hearts & Minds

Retail brands are increasingly disrupting traditional business models by focusing on direct communication with customers. Customer feedback reflects not only product quality, but also how brands position themselves and deliver goods and services to their customers.

User reviews area increasingly important proxy for growth. Glow Recipe, a Korean beauty startup that has been around since 2014, has seen steady growth in product ratings, which on average increased by 14.2% in the last 2 years.

Track Social Media Traction for EdTech and Recruiting Firms

EdTech and Recruiting Firms: Leverage Social Media Engagement Trends to Analyze Brand Value

Track real-time engagement for specific companies or brands across major social media outlets including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Facebook ‘Likes’, for example, measure popularity and are a good indicator of shifting tastes and market movements.

E-learning was booming even before schools and universities were shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic. Platforms where people can learn and hone their coding skills are racing to get more traction across social networks.

Stay Ahead of Auto Industry Trends with Car Inventory Data

Auto Industry: Track Car Inventory in Real Time

Our car inventory dataset tracks the daily inventories of all major online dealerships through each vehicle’s unique VIN identification number. Users can filter by brand, year, car model, location and other attributes to predict car sales in real time.

With the success of Vroom and other vehicle e-commerce platforms, used car marketplaces are stocking up. User car listings at TRED, which connects buyers and sellers through technology and financing options, are up 146.6% year-on-year.

Visualize Store Locations in the F&B Industry

Our Store Locations dataset allows users to compare brick-and-mortar locations across companies in a user-friendly map - a powerful tool for lead generation, competitive intelligence, and more. As the food delivery wars heat up across New York City, for example, map the restaurants that partner with each player to understand where competitors are fighting for market dominance.

Learn more about Thinknum Alternative Data Today