Factiva from Dow Jones is a data service that helps companies identify opportunities, accelerate decisions and manage a business's reputation, that includes global news and data accessible via the Dow Jones' research platform, on mobile devices or integrated via advanced feeds and APIs.
Each of the tools I have described share the same kind of premise: the main thing they do is source and collect media content. Then to varying degrees they run filters against this content and produce a range of data visualisations and ways of slicing the data and content. …
I have used Lexis Nexus and Thomson One. I find Factiva to be the most user friendly of these services. I much prefer Factiva's layout on their website when I search for articles and I also prefer its search builder over Lexis Nexus and Thomson One.
At the time, Factiva was already being used by the company I worked for - they had developed procedures specifically for using Factiva, so there wasn't really an option. I've used Lexis, Westlaw and Bloomberg exclusively for legal research, so there wasn't really an overlap …
A large part of our work depends on the ability to source quality media content from a breadth of dependable sources globally. This is Factiva's bread and butter: it has a very comprehensive list of 'quality' media sources such as nationals, dailies, business journals and magazines from around the world that are easily mined for the content they hold. If you're thinking about anything other than these 'traditional' media sources then Factiva probably isn't your thing. It doesn't do social media.
Factiva offers excellent search builders so that I am able to narrow my search to specific companies or topics very easily.
Factiva combines a large number of credible sources into one place and allows me to search all of these sources.
Factiva's use of timestamps helps me understand when the news was known by the market which allows me to analyze how (if at all) that particular piece of news impacted the company's stock price.
Provides an excellent starting place for learning about a company and/or industry.
At the time, Factiva was already being used by the company I worked for - they had developed procedures specifically for using Factiva, so there wasn't really an option. I've used Lexis, Westlaw and Bloomberg exclusively for legal research, so there wasn't really an overlap with Factiva.