As the CEO of CustomScoop, I would second your recommendation. For many small companies, Google News represents the best solution. Professional services like ours make sense only when a company needs to track a significant number of clips or wants to engage in more advanced measurement or analysis. Simple alerts of a handful of clips every day (or less) don’t justify the expense.

At the same time, I encourage most businesses to think more broadly about how they use a clipping service — free or paid — to be sure they are getting maximum value. Your suggestion to look at competitors or industry information is right on the mark and is actually similar to advice I gave in a white paper published earlier this year.