ES 212 Entrepreneurial Business Basics: Welcome!

ES 212 Research Resources

    How to research competitors and industry peers

    Using market and industry analysis and data

    Consumer demographic and survey data 

SIFT is an evaluation strategy developed by digital literacy expert Michael Caulfield (Washington State University Vancouver) to help you judge whether or online content can be trusted for credible and reliable information. The SIFT strategy is quick, simple, and can be applied to various kinds of online content: social media posts, memes, statistics, videos, images, news articles, scholarly articles, etc.​​​​​​​

• STOP. Think critically. Avoid being too emotionally charged or looking for information that confirms your own biases. Have an open mind to consider new or controversial topics, and seek to understand.
• INVESTIGATE. Find out who the author is, why they wrote it, where was it published.
• FIND BETTER COVERAGE. Read laterally. Once you get to the source of a claim, read what other people say about the source and the claim.
• TRACE CLAIMS. Trace claims, quotes, and media to the original source.