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Simplify Your Research With Collect and Draft in Nexis+ AI™

August 02, 2024 (5 min read)
Collect and Draft in Nexis+ AI helps you optimize your research organization no matter what you need.

New technology allows many job responsibilities to be delegated to machines, but there are some tasks that just need a human touch—and proper research is one of them. As data-driven decision-making has become ubiquitous in organizations around the world, the ability to efficiently locate, analyze, and synthesize research findings is an indispensable skill for employees across a range of industries--from journalism and politics to compliance and market research.

But while proper research often demands the expertise of humans, there are technologies that can simplify the process of collecting and sharing information within teams—like Nexis+ AI™ . Whether you’re gathering competitive intel, double-checking sources, or collecting data for a report, Nexis Hub empowers researchers to more efficiently capture, organize, and share insights from sources around the web. Here’s how this powerful new tool can streamline your research workflow.

Political opposition research

The core of any political campaign? Opposition research and thorough risk assessment. With the right data at their disposal, campaign managers and political directors can identify opponent weaknesses, mitigate potential crises or scandals, and secure critical funding that keeps them one step ahead of the competition. But that level of research takes time, which political campaigns rarely have; candidates and managers are always working against tight deadlines for funding and election, and these time-constrained goals demand efficient processes.

When timing is everything, a tool that can make the most of every minute is invaluable. Enter Collect and Draft, which can help campaign managers and researchers more efficiently collect, view, and report on the critical details that can give their candidate or campaign an edge. The Collect and Draft Nexis+ AI browser extension for Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge lets you collect research from the open web and Nexis webapps. Once installed, researchers can highlight, clip, and collate their findings in an online, easy-to-share “portal”. Plus, Collect and Draft automatically captures sources, links, and metadata to back up your research—which is more important than ever in the age of “fake news.”

MORE: How to run a political campaign that delivers results

Media monitoring and analysis

When it comes to properly managing your brand’s reputation, you need a deep understanding of how your company, industry, and competitors are being talked about in the media—both in traditional news and on social channels. But staying up-to-date on the latest industry news and trends, global market events, and the performance of both your own brand and competitors can be a complex and time-consuming slog, requiring ongoing monitoring of diverse sources and content. Indeed, a 2022 research report indicates that the two biggest impediments to effective social listening and media monitoring are “time” and “employee bandwidth.”

With Nexis Hub, it’s never been easier to collect and organize critical news about your brand. All you have to do is “snip” the relevant quotes and content you need to share with your stakeholders—from Nexis Newsdesk®, social media sites, or anywhere else on the web—and save it into a single collection. Once you’ve collected the data you need, you can organize it, editorialize it, and create custom, easy-to-scan reports that you can copy into reporting tools, or assemble directly in Microsoft Word using the Hub for Word Add-in.   

MORE: Three media metrics you’re not measuring, but should be!

Competitive intelligence

Today’s information professionals are under increased pressure to understand shifts in the market and in competitor performance as they’re happening. And it’s easy to understand why: competitive research and analysis can directly impact the decisions that leaders make and inform key strategy changes for product, marketing, and finance teams.

To gain a thorough, well-rounded understanding of competitors and their position in the marketplace, competitive intelligence teams must scour a wide variety of data—from economic reports and financial disclosures to industry trends and breaking news.

And now, Collect and Draft makes the process of collecting and organizing that data simpler than ever. If you’re conducting critical research on a major competitor, highlight and capture the “snippets” you deem useful (either with a click or keyboard hotkeys) in collections that you can quickly scan for insights. Intuitive editing and annotation of these snippets also makes for more seamless integration of your findings with custom reports for your distinct stakeholders. Plus, it will also minimize information loss from copy/paste errors, as all snippets are automatically saved with important links and metadata.

MORE: How to add more value to consulting research

Media and journalism

Journalists and media professionals rely on quality research to deliver breaking news and hard-hitting investigative reports—and the research behind those stories demands quality information, vetted sources, and knowledgeable subject matter experts. Unreliable sources and flawed research have taken down many reporters in recent decades; Rolling Stone was forced to retract an explosive 2015 story after investigation revealed multiple failures in “reporting, editing, editorial supervision and fact-checking.”  Aside from the reputation damage that Rolling Stone suffered, the publication also faced multiple legal battles and had to settle a lawsuit for $1.6 million.

While journalists and editors have a responsibility to properly vet and verify their information, Nexis Hub can help media professionals simplify the process of sourcing, organizing, and tracking information for their stories. Key quotes and data points that support important stories can be saved in just a few clicks to dedicated collections for journalists working on multiple projects—along with important metadata and source links to protect their credibility. Collecting and sharing snippets this way provides newsrooms with a streamlined method of reviewing and approving the source information that stories are built on.

MORE: Everything you need to know about generative AI in media production

Academic research

Whether you’re a graduate student, post-graduate fellow, or a professor, any academic project must be well-planned, researched, and backed up by reputable sources and facts. Especially in the era of misinformation and “fake news,” it’s critical for academic researchers to be confident in the information they cite in their final reports—and have all source information ready and organized for a peer review.

With Collect and Draft, academic researchers can rest assured that they’ll be able to properly cite any source that informs their thesis or research paper. This powerful tool allows students and professors to “snip” relevant data, (including citations and metadata) from online journals, reputable news sites, and Nexis Uni®; from there, they can organize and seamlessly weave their findings into their final project documentation. Plus, the intuitive Microsoft add-in streamlines the process of integrating citations into articles and reports.

MORE: 4 ways to use digital platforms in academic research

Streamline your research with Nexis+ AI

No matter your industry, Nexis+ AI provides a solution to help you organize, analyze, and report your research in an easy and more efficient way. If you are ready to speed up your research workflow as much as 50%, get started with Nexis+ AI today.