5 Top QMarkets Alternatives & Competitors (2024)
The QMarkets innovation management tool gives enterprise leaders and research and development (R&D) teams a suite of tools for developing new products or business ideas.
The platform’s trend management functionality categorizes topics into three categories:
- Mega trends: big picture trends with an impact that will be felt far into the future
- Macro trends: more immediate developments and trends that are expected to have a five to ten year impact
- Microtrends: quick, and at times, fleeting trends with an impact that can be felt right now
Trend metrics are then grouped into two subcategories: those with a financial focus, and those that affect new product development.
It’s important to note that QMarkets’ tools are strictly for trend management, not trend discovery. Using the platform is a very manual process; your team will need to remain actively engaged in research and keep entering trend data into the tool.
If you’re seeking a complete innovation management software solution or a tool that lets you build a library of trend data you provide, then yes, QMarkets could be a good choice.
But if you aren’t sure about the platform, its price (which is only available after a sales call), or need a trend discovery solution, you’ll want to look at one of these five QMarkets alternatives.
1. Exploding Topics
Exploding Topics is a trend management system and trend discovery tool that can be used to drive decisions in many areas of your business, such as:
- New product development
- Innovation strategy
- Innovation initiative launches
- Mergers and acquisitions (M&A)
- Potential industries for investing
- Marketing and SEO
Every day, the Exploding Topics database is updated with the latest trend data across 30+ industries including:
We use a combination of AI and human data analysis to evaluate changes in online conversations over the past 15 years. And, because we update this information daily, we’re able to identify the trends that are about to explode in popularity with your audience.
Exploding Topics Pro members actually get to see trend data up to a full year before anyone else—giving their innovation teams an unparalleled leading edge in multiple industries.
Pro users also get access to a suite of tools that make it easier to manage trends by project and share data with stakeholders:
- Project folders and trend trackers
- Keyword trend search
- Trending startups list
- Trending products list
- API access
- Excel (CSV) export
- Trend forecasting
- Meta trends analysis
How much does Exploding Topics cost?
There’s no cost to begin using Exploding Topics. You can start searching trend data right now on our homepage.
To get advance access and exclusive insights, you’ll need an Exploding Topics Pro Membership. It’s just $1 to sign up for your first two weeks, and as low as $39 per month after that (billed annually).
You’ll get access to every feature that Exploding Topics has to offer, including meta trends and instant trend alerts.
How does Exploding Topics compare to QMarkets?
| Exploding Topics | QMarkets | |
| Free plan? | Yes | No |
| Paid plan price | $39 | Custom quotes only |
| Uses | Innovative product development, market research, M&A, and more | Finance, product development |
| Trend management dashboard? | Yes | Yes |
| Trend discovery tool? | Yes | No |
| Unique features | Instant trend alerts, expert data analysis | Integration with other innovation tools |
2. 4Strat
4Strat provides “strategic foresight” tools for public and private businesses seeking an end-to-end trend and idea management platform.
The company’s primary offering is the 4Strat Foresight Strategy Cockpit (FSC), which includes a trend database and related data analysis.
4Strat touts its database as being focused on “the diverse opinions and insights of experts” and also pulls information from studies focused on future technological developments.
When using the 4Strat suite, users can create maps of connections between data points and even pull in data from other tools and services via APIs. This system can be used for:
- Identifying market trends
- Finding links between trends and media events
- Identifying and mitigating business risk
- Developing long-term business strategies
- Forecast the longevity of business tech stacks
- Explore hypothetical business scenarios by adjusting various factors
If you're not interested in reviewing trend data on your own, you can pay for 4Strat’s data intelligence experts to scan for relevant trends, present monthly trend reports, and help with strategy development.
4Strat doesn’t reveal much information about how it sources and evaluates its trends, and takes a very selective approach to its clients.
How much does 4Strat cost?
Anyone interested in using the 4Strat platform must contact the company to schedule a meeting. It’s only through this process that you can learn more about access and pricing.
4Strat maintains an ISO 9001:2015 certification, so if that’s an important factor in your vendor decisions, then it may be worth going through the process to learn more about this platform.
However, if you’re looking for a more readily accessible trend database, you’ll probably want to try a different QMarkets alternative.
How does 4Strat compare to QMarkets?
| 4Strat | QMarkets | |
| Free plan? | No | No |
| Paid plan price | Custom quotes only | Custom quotes only |
| Uses | Risk management, product innovation | Finance, product development |
| Trend management dashboard? | Yes | Yes |
| Trend discovery tool? | Yes | No |
| Unique features | ISO certification, strategic foresight as a service | Integration with other innovation tools |
3. Itonics
Itonics bills its platform as an “Innovation Operating System” for decision-makers, innovators, strategists, and R&D teams.
The Itonics trend scouting tool can be used to:
- Set up automation workflows
- Scan and scout for new trends
- Streamline work across global scouting teams
- Identify business opportunities
- Monitor innovation initiatives for continuous improvement
- Keep an eye on competitor activities
The tool uses AI to gather information on more than 10,000 trends and organize them related to users’:
- Industries
- Geographic information
- Key research topics
It also includes a companion app and web clipper tool that makes it easy for Itonics users to add additional data points and news items into their company databases. Anyone in the company can then view data by type (trend, technology, or inspiration), collection, date, and other relevant filters.
How much does Itonics cost?
Like many QMarkets competitors, Itonics doesn’t reveal its pricing tiers up front. However, you can jump right in and try out the platform with a 30-day free trial. You’ll need to talk to a member of the Itonics team to learn more about ongoing subscriptions.
How does Itonics compare to Qmarkets?
| Itonics | QMarkets | |
| Free plan? | No | No |
| Paid plan price | Custom quotes only | Custom quotes only |
| Uses | Business development, competitor research | Finance, product development |
| Trend management dashboard? | Yes | Yes |
| Trend discovery tool? | Yes | No |
| Unique features | Web clipper, data from scientific publications and patents | Integration with other innovation tools |
4. BrightIdea
Brightidea is an enterprise innovation platform that provides companies with a way to:
- Capture trends and business ideas
- Start crowdsourcing idea challenges
- Run hackathons
- Track experiments and idea progress
- Build proposals related to innovative ideas
- Collaborate and brainstorm through the innovation process
Best used with a large team, BrightIdea’s Monitor dashboard serves as a repository for trending topics submitted by other people with your company. (This employee engagement is essential to getting the most out of BrightIdea—if you’re working independently or as part of a small business, you might not benefit from a BrightIdea license.)
BrightIdea doesn’t curate any emerging trends for you.
However, once your team is regularly entering data into the BrightIdea system, you can filter data, subscribe to specific topics, and add notes about possible business impact.
How much does BrightIdea cost?
You’ll need to set up a Brighidea demo session in order to learn more about how much the full idea management software suite will cost for your company.
How does BrightIdea compare to Qmarkets?
| BrightIdea | QMarkets | |
| Free plan? | No | No |
| Paid plan price | Custom quotes only | Custom quotes only |
| Uses | Collaboration, hackathons | Finance, product development |
| Trend management dashboard? | Yes | Yes |
| Trend discovery tool? | No | No |
| Unique features | Proposal creation tools | Integration with other innovation tools |
5. HYPE
HYPE is an innovation management software and consulting company serving businesses that need to build new product roadmaps.
Their software is a complete suite of tools for strategy, ideation, partnership development, and project management.
A key part of the HYPE platform is its trend scouting tool. Like QMarkets, HYPE organizes data into mega, macro, and micro trends.
The HYPE trend tool finds this information for you, creating a curated dashboard of insights. You can organize trends by:
- Industry
- Country
- Product type
- Service type
HYPE also adds a crowdsourcing software element, allowing other members of your company to chime in on various trends to provide feedback and insights.
Once you identify high-value trends, you can use HYPE’s trend radar tool to see connections across different levels of data.
Like some of the other QMarkets alternatives on this list, HYPE is best suited for users who are in need of the entire ecosystem of products. If you’re simply looking for a straightforward industry trend tracking tool, HYPE might be overkill.
How much does HYPE cost?
HYPE offers access to its product through calls with its sales team. They’ll put together a custom quote that’s based on your team size and goals.
How does HYPE compare to QMarkets?
| HYPE | QMarkets | |
| Free plan? | No | No |
| Paid plan price | Custom quotes only | Custom quotes only |
| Uses | Product development, business development | Finance, product development |
| Trend management dashboard? | Yes | Yes |
| Trend discovery tool? | Yes | No |
| Unique features | Collaboration tools | Integration with other innovation tools |
Get instant access to emerging trends
When you’re looking for straightforward, fast, and early access to trends, there’s no better tool than Exploding Topics.
By using our trend spotting and management tool, you'll get access to curated, expert-reviewed trends that refresh on a daily basis.
There’s no need to find your own data or sift through additional tools. Exploding Topics puts up-to-date trend data right at your fingertips. And if you’re a Pro member, you get the earliest insights right in your inbox—plus trend management features to support your business development.
Give Exploding Topics Pro a try and see the difference it makes in your business trend management—it’s just $1 for your first two weeks.
