Another way to sell the "data" is to use the information you know about your users and sell not only trends, but targeted advertisements based on your user data.
Think about Myspace and Facebook. They have a ton of information about their users (and a statistically relevant amount of info about the general population as well). The magic is that they can sell ads to men between the ages of 18-21 who are in a state college and earn less than $30,000 per year. Not many companies have access to that amount of information about their users.
Think about Myspace and Facebook. They have a ton of information about their users (and a statistically relevant amount of info about the general population as well). The magic is that they can sell ads to men between the ages of 18-21 who are in a state college and earn less than $30,000 per year. Not many companies have access to that amount of information about their users.