Use Cases for My Dashboard App

As we build our amazing app for viewing and analyzing industry data on the cybersecurity vendors I am thinking of all the use cases. I would love your ideas for other uses cases.?

Industry analysts

Because I built this data base for myself, the first use case is other industry analysts that cover cybersecurity. Last time I checked that would include 54 analysts at Gartner, eight at Informa/Omdia, 16 at Forrester, and at least a dozen independent analysts such as Brad LaPorte who I am working with on defining industry categories. At least 100 that could immediately benefit from my data.?

Knowing analysts, I am sure each subscriber will have valuable suggestions for new features, and new data types to collect.?

Investors?

I find that most VCs that focus on cybersecurity already have their own spreadsheets. But, as TK Kader says: “Every spreadsheet is an opportunity to create a SaaS platform.”?I only have to convince them that my data is better than theirs. And it certainly is if they just pull from Pitchbook or Sourcesscrub, which do a bad job of categorization. I assume here that no VC has an investment thesis of: We want to invest in AI/ML cybersecurity, which is an approach, not a category. :-) ?

Private Equity investors usually look for more mature companies to invest in. Many are inspired by the $26 billion invested last year and the continual flood of news about cyber attacks. They view cybersecurity as an area they should investigate and they often reach out to me over the likes of GLG or AlphaSights to discuss the space.

So far we have identified 3,500 separate investors in cybersecurity.?They too will have requests for features and new types of data to include. I look forward to hearing from them.?

Wall Street Analysts?

These are a different animal. Their day to day job is to look at public companies and predict how the current quarter is going to turn out so they can issue Buy-Hold-Sell guidance. They already have all the data they need on their coverage portfolio. The question is: do they research the broader market of competitors? If you are a Wall Street analyst who has initiated coverage of Zscaler, the only public SASE provider, do you want to track the direct competitors like Cato Networks, Perimeter81, and Netskope??I know they could benefit from talking to an industry analyst because CRWD, ZS, OKTA, are in completely separate segments, yet most Wall Street analysis seems to conflate the three.?

Marketers?

With 2,705+ vendors the cybersecurity space is a ripe target market for PR agencies and Analyst Relations professionals, events, and even other technology vendors. If I add contact details for all the marketing people and executives at each vendor, the Analyst Dashboard may be valuable to them. They can apply filters for geo-location, size, and recent funding, then download a spreadsheet to put in their CRM system. ( Will I have to build CRM functions into my platform?) ?

Our very first subscriber is in this group of marketers.?

Headhunters?

I know they hate that term, but we all identify job placement companies as headhunters. This use case was suggested by a firm in the UK. I think of it as "reverse headhunting." Instead of working with companies on lucrative contracts to find people, they already have the candidates and are looking for companies where there would be a great fit.?

This use case highlights a new data set I will be collecting in 2022: number of job postings by each vendor. I need that anyway because number of job postings is a good measure of a company’s health and growth prospects.?

Academia?

So far I have talked to two Phd candidates that use Security Yearbook 2020 to assist their research. Numerous professors use the book and recommend it to their students.?

I don’t see academic research as a big target market for the Analyst Dashboard today.?For now, I will continue to support them by answering their requests with data and lists that they need.?

End Users?

This is the biggest potential market for the Analyst Dashboard. Organizations that can use the data and my advise for vendor selection. I have already heard from CISOs that use Security Yearbook 2021 to do just that. There may not be a Gartner MQ for what they are looking for. They may have a special requirement like: Made in the US, or GDPR compliant,?

The challenge is adding all the products for each of 2,705 vendors. I can assign this task to my research team but then I may have 30,000 or so products that I have to put into categories!?Doing that in a spreadsheet was a non-starter. Doing it in a relational database is easy. Technically easy that is. Five minutes to categorize each product = 2,500 hours of mind numbing work.?

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Any other ideas for use cases??Journalists??Regulatory agencies? You??