What’s clear is that analysts and executives alike don’t know or care how complicated the process is and don’t appreciate AR folks sometimes …. especially when it goes wrong. I’m sure we all have stories of briefings going wrong before they have even started – because the dial-ins don’t work, or there’s a troublesome time-zone challenge, or because the IP-based telephone network decides to crash.

One AR’s worst-case scenario was to selflessly schedule a briefing in the only slot that suited everyone else – even though it fell while he was on holiday. “Finally” opening the call at one minute past the hour led to a barrage of sarcastic comments: he felt that was not the time to mention that he’d just run a mile down a mountain in Italy to get back into cellphone coverage range.

For another AR veteran, mountains also came into it – as he needed to step out of his skis and into a one-hour strategy briefing at the last minute, when a colleague was taken ill and unable to chair a call. The request came in during a ski-lift ride, five minutes before the allotted call. Although the call itself was memorable, the content fades …

Anyway, here’s a quick look at what we’re calling the Hype Cycle of VB requests:

1.       You are at the Technology Trigger and send a briefing request, completing a form that contains many redundant fields, such as the email address and direct line of your executive(s). Of course you give your own phone number instead – and are reminded of when you last needed to queue all day for an official document from a Government administration office.

2.       Or – you fill in the form on the Gartner website, meaning you don’t have a trace of what you asked. The web Gods might not be smiling on you today and you may need to fill in the form more than once before you get a confirmation.

3.       You then receive an automated reply saying they’ll get back to you in 3 days. You get assigned a briefing request number. Meanwhile the coordinator forwards the email to all the analysts you named – as a calendar request (oh, the irony) asking them to respond within 48 hours. That’s it. No value-add, except to sometimes introduce a mistake on the timezone, especially during the spring, when the US and European clocks don’t go forward on the same date. The VB team doesn’t usually even bother formatting the info in the body of the text.

4.       You reach the Peak of Inflated Expectations when the VB team comes back with slots after only 48 hours … but you start to slide almost immediately, when you realise that of course none of the slots on offer matches one you suggested. That means a whole new email chain as you’re doing several briefing requests at once, you’ve lost the context and need to dig through a bunch of older messages to investigate what the request was about.

5.       You reply with more suggested time slots. For “the sake of simplicity” you’ve switched to EDT even though you’re based in London and working on BST, and the analyst is in Italy on CEST.

6.       VB team coordinator comes back 48 hours later with some more time slots, usually none of the ones you suggested. If you ask for two analysts in a single call you may get two different calls. If you ask for 3+ analysts in a single call, you are an optimist, a masochist, or possibly both.

7.       Repeat steps 4, 5, 6 until you finally find time slots that suit everyone. This may sometimes take up to a couple of months, by then the need for a briefing will probably have disappeared, the product or service will have launched, and you’ve not only done the other briefings but also finished checking the write-ups, the white paper, and the quote for the press release.

8.       You confirm the time slots.

9.       Vendor Briefings tells you the slot has gone, or that no single analyst is interested. This is despite you having heard first-hand from your Tier 1s that they want the briefing, but as they don’t have control of their diary, this needs to go through the official channels. Welcome to the Trough of Disillusionment.

10.   Repeat steps 4, 5, 6, until you find time slots that fit everyone, then step 8.

11.   You finally get it all scheduled … and a few days later, your executive cancels because he has to go to an urgent customer meeting. Welcome to the trough of disillusionment.

12.   Repeat steps 4, 5, 6, until you find time slots that fit everyone, then step 8

13.   At last: you’ve got a final confirmation and you’re on to the Slope of Enlightenment, or so you think. The time-zone is in EST. But you don’t always get a calendar invite because it would be way too simple for every analyst firm to adopt best practice. Any firm that does send one – such as Forrester – gets brownie points here.

14.   By now 3-4 months have passed. Your product is on the market but you’re still standing on the Slope of Enlightenment.

15.   You get to the briefing on time, and you’ve even sent the deck in advance (well, 5 minutes is still “in advance”, but sod it if you know the analyst is at an airport).

16.  You try to dial-in but realise you were sent US and Canadian access numbers (plus a link to other numbers, which takes time to look up). This is despite everyone including the analyst being in Europe, as you indicated in step 1. You dial-in and get an error message: the toll-free bridge only works for callers from the USA. You abandon the vendor’s bridge and send out your own numbers – in a frantic exchange of emails. Your executive thinks you’re incompetent, the analysts wonder why AR people are such idiots.

17.   Rinse and repeat.

18. Your exec asks why you’ve briefed everyone, including Hurwitz and Associates, but not Gartner. You help yourself to another large G&T.

Sounds familiar? Then congratulations, you’ve reached the Plateau of Productivity.

Learning points for VB teams

• Don’t act like a Government Department. We know that handling VB requests is an overhead but it also impacts the analyst brand and customer satisfaction (we know about the Chinese Wall between research and sales, we’re AR professionals). But it’s a necessary cost to running your business, as analysts rely on information asymmetry. Here, we are taking away the brownie points awarded earlier to Forrester because they are pushing analysts into consulting (by virtue of metrics management) and try to condense briefings into 30-minute slots.
• Make it easy. Include context. Send a calendar invite. Instead of giving us the email addresses of the analysts (like we didn’t already know them), include them and us on a calendar request and embed conference call details.
• Do a customer satisfaction survey among AR pros to see how you could improve the service. For example, AR pros have been known to groan out loud when they get assigned the “wrong” coordinator, because they know chaos will ensue
• Try to automate where it makes sense. For instance, set-up a tool to provide “open slots” for briefings to “qualified individuals” (having a Gartner sign-on and having registered as AR pros, but not necessarily Gartner clients) on a portal on your website. This would speed up the system by enabling ARs to do a first pass by checking free/busy times – just as they are checking their executives’ schedules.
• Stop sending ET times to everyone (when youmean either EST orEDT) by the way the norm is UTC) and check for times using free, web-based tools such as the meeting planner on timeanddate.com or worldtimeserver.com.

Advice to AR folks

• Don’t swamp the VB team with un-targeted briefing requests over the wall. They always advise you to name as many analysts as possible. Don’t do this. You will not get the two you really want.
• Make the subject explicit and clear. Say why analysts should care and what they’ll learn.
• Agree briefings with analysts beforehand when possible. Make sure you remind them you’ll be working it through VBs. Points mean prizes!
• Convert the Word form into a template email.
• If you get stuck and are a Gartner client, schedule an inquiry.  You’re not supposed to but it works.
• Make a note of the reference numbers and add them at the bottom of your emails
• Look at tools to help scheduling such as Tungle.me or Doodle.

By Simon Jones (LinkedIn, @mrnesjo, blog) and Ludovic Leforestier (LinkedIn, @lludovic)

If you’re interested in helping shape communications strategy for international high-tech clients, and you have at least 4 years agency experience combined with an affinity for technology, then we’d love to hear from you.

What we offer:

-          Flexible working hours and conditions

-          Membership of a talented, close-knit multicultural team

-          Opportunity to work on AR and PR programs for leading technology brands

-          Competitive package

-          Early start: From mid-June

What we expect:

-          Fluent English and German skills

-          At least 4 years’ experience in AR/PR/communications

-          Self-starter

-          Good media/analyst contacts

-          Flawless writing skills

-          Active interest in new technology and social media

Interested?

Apply in English to Darina Gugleva

The teleconference will be held on Wednesday 6^th June at 11am Sydney / 9am Singapore when the Knowledge Capital Group (KCG) will be delivering an APJ perspective on the definitive market share and market size numbers for Analyst Firms globally.

Every April KCG conducts a survey looking at the analyst landscape using a selection of data sources including; publicly available revenues, privately sourced figures and business model evaluation among others. KCG then estimates the total Sell Side and Buy Side markets for over 400 firms worldwide. During this call KCG will be presenting its latest findings using 2011 figures and updating the KCG “Mystical Box Chart”. This is an MQ like representation of the relative market position of the major and significant emerging and specialty firms.

In this session, KCG CEO & Founding Partner, Bill Hopkins (former Gartner analyst) will outline the methodology, the conclusions and the likely outcomes of last year’s trends and changes. Dave Noble (Intelligen MD/IIAR Board Member) will provide an APJ perspective on the findings.

If you would like to take part in this call please let me know via email so that I can send you the dial-in details. This call is open to all IIAR members. If you are not a member but would like to take part in this discussion please get in touch for further details on how to join.

It was at the London IIAR meeting in March, where R “Ray” Wang and his Constellation all-stars were agitating for radical change in the research industry. Ray was talking about new models, new delivery methods, and new value propositions, while some very respected AR practitioners were questioning the value of his approach. Did the world need this kind of shake-up? And, if so, was it really going to change the nature of AR’s dealings with analysts?

I was supposed to be keeping the peace and chairing the meeting. But I kept being distracted by thoughts about whether all this might be relevant to me.

I suspect our clients at The Skills Connection have a narrow view of AR, centered almost entirely on the analysts’ impact on buying decisions.

And this thought made me ponder how much that’s true for AR in general.

Ultimately, the analyst relations role is all about influencing the influencer.

And is the arrival of Constellation and the other Young Turks really going to alter the basics of influencing the influencer? I think the answer is probably no.

Maybe our real value-add doesn’t lie so much in knowing the nuts and bolts of what needs to be done in engaging with analysts, as in the how, in the very specific application of that knowledge.

So it’s not about telling companies to answer the questions, without being dishonest or evasive. It’s not about knowing they must provide the numbers and customer success stories the analysts will need.

It’s about which numbers to give, which to hold back, how to present them, and how to use them to tell a story, and about framing case studies in ways that underline what matters most.

The outside world thinks we know big secrets about how Gartner, IDC, and Forrester operate. We don’t. There aren’t any big secrets. What we, as AR professionals, know is all the little secrets, the fine skills and deft touches that make the difference.

As I sat there at the IIAR, I realized we could probably afford to lay bare all the fundamentals of what we do. I could tell The Skills Connection’s prospects just what they’d need to do to get a good assessment.

Because it’s not the recipe we’re selling – it’s the secret sauce. And that secret sauce is what makes the analyst relations professional a chef, rather than a cook.

After the meeting, I published these dangerous thoughts in a blog posting called ‘Roll Up, Roll Up, We’re Giving Away the Shop’.  That might be a mistake. Maybe listing the recipe will put us out of business. But I don’t think so.

You might like to take a look. If you think it’s useful, you might want to share it with the people you work with. It might explain to them why you need to keep your focus on the fine detail of the AR role. Because we are the secret sorcerers – and getting the subtle stuff right is where we add the value.

Our thanks to Simon Levin (IIAR UK Co-Chapter Lead / MD, The Skills Connection) for this contribution.

The original post can be found here.

Gartner. Forrester. IDC. And lots of smaller fish, too. You can’t read a tech-industy news story, attend a conference or listen to a sales pitch without someone quoting an industry analyst. For tech companies, analysts are big news and big business, promising to help with transformation, monetization and a slew of other things ending in “-ation.”

But what do technology industry analysts really do? And how do you find the one that’s right for your company’s needs. Let me try to explain, from the inside. You see, from 1999 through 2001, I was an analyst at Jupiter Research, now part of Forrester Research.

Every spring KCG conducts a survey looking at the analyst landscape using a selection of data sources including; publicly available revenues, privately sourced figures and business model evaluation among others. KCG then estimates the total Sell Side and Buy Side markets for over 400 firms worldwide. During this call KCG will be presenting its latest findings using 2011 figures and updating the KCG “Mystical Box Chart”. This is an MQ like representation of the relative market position of the major and significant emerging and specialty firms.

In this session, KCG CEO & Founding Partner, Bill Hopkins (former Gartner analyst) will outline the methodology, the conclusions and the likely outcomes of last year’s trends and changes.

If you would like to take part in this call please let me know via email to receive dial-in details. This call is open to all IIAR members. Non-members may also listen in to the call for a nominal fee of $25 / £15.

Bazaarvoice helps clients create social communities on their brand websites and Facebook pages where customers can engage in conversations. These conversations can be syndicated across Bazaarvoice’s global network of client websites and mobile devices, which allows manufacturers to connect directly with customers. The social data derived from online word of mouth translates into actionable insights that improve marketing, sales, customer service, and product development.

Headquartered in Austin, Texas, Bazaarvoice has offices in Amsterdam, London, Munich, Paris, Stockholm and Sydney. For more information, visit www.bazaarvoice.com, read the blog at www.bazaarvoice.com/blog, and follow on Twitter at www.twitter.com/bazaarvoice.

Who We Want:

Reporting to the Director of Communications, this candidate will lead Bazaarvoice’s global industry analyst relations program. Specific responsibilities include:

• Develop and execute a global analyst relations program that aligns with the company’s business goals.
• Manage the operational aspects of analyst relations, including budget, research subscriptions and measurement.
• Establish and nurture relationships with key analysts at Gartner, Forrester and Altimeter.
• Set cadence of analyst interactions, including inquiries, briefings and strategy days.
• Stay current with future research opportunities and lead Bazaarvoice’s participation in key evaluations.
• Partner with sales and marketing to secure relevant analyst contacts, quotes and data.
• Track and measure impact of AR program.
• Monitor analyst coverage and surface data and trends relevant to Bazaarvoice’s core businesses and competitors and share with relevant audiences in a timely fashion.

Skills and Experience Necessary for the Role:

The candidate should possess the following capabilities:

• Minimum of 2-4 years of Industry Analyst Relations experience in the technology sector with a strong track record of measurable results.
• Experience in enterprise software and software-as-a-service applications preferred.
• Strategic thinker with the ability to execute flawlessly against competing deadlines.
• Excellent interpersonal and executive presence skills, including a proven ability to develop and maintain relationships both inside and outside the organization.
• Leverage strong written and verbal communications skills to effectively synthesize, interpret and summarize third-party analysis and research for cross-functional audiences, including senior executives.
• Self-organized and motivated team player with a demonstrated ability to achieve objectives
• An enthusiastic team player who is proactive, energetic, efficient, resourceful and has a dedication to excellence.
• Active social media user on networks such as Google +, Twitter, LinkedIn, Chatter, etc.
• Bachelor’s degree in communications or journalism preferred.

To Apply:

https://careers-bazaarvoice.icims.com/jobs/1582/job?mode=view

For the next IIAR UK Forum in London on Wednesday 30th May at 4pm BST, we’re delighted to welcome Ovum MD Brett Azuma, Global Director for Ovum IT Ian Charlesworth, and Global Director for Ovum Telecoms Richard Mahony. We’re meeting with Brett, Ian and Richard just after the Ovum Industry Congress, being held in London from the 23-24 May, so this will be a great opportunity to hear the latest news at Ovum and what’s upcoming, and find out more about Ovum’s strategy and how this is developing.

In addition, David Treacher (Industry AR Manager, Dassault Systemes) will be sharing his insights on how he runs a global AR programme. This will be an opportunity to share experiences and views of the analyst companies that we all typically work with.

Plus there will be updates from IIAR Board member, David Rossiter and the IIAR UK chapter.

Agenda:

4-4:15pm        Welcome and networking

4:15-4:30pm   IIAR update

4:30-5pm      Guest presentation by David Treacher

5-5:15pm      Break

5:15-6:30pm   Guest presentation: Ovum

From 6:30pm Networking with informal dinner to follow

If you would like to attend the Forum either in-person or over the phone please let me via email so that I can send you further details. This event is open to all IIAR members.

This move has a strong reminiscence from Forrester’s purchase of Springboard last year (read our post:Forrester joins the feeding frenzy, buys Springboard)

Who is Ideas?
They’re a 40-strong company with 12 lead analysts with a strong brand name in the hardware space, providing benchmarking, very detailed detailed comparisons and competitive profiles of hardware and data-centre vendors. For instance their RPE2 methodology allows to compare data centres.

They sell both to vendors and “increasingly to end-users” according to our sources, though our assessment is that the end-user proportion is quite small.

According to their last annual report they’re highly profitable with AUD1.9m profits from an AUD8.7m income, quite a nice ratio. They have good leveage too, closer from IDC than Forrester with USD224k per employee, compared to Gartner who claims USD419k per billable employee (see their fact sheet) while Forrester’s revenues per employees stand at USD194k (source: company fact sheet). IDC is privately owned by IDG and doesn’t publish numbers but they’re in the $300m range for about 1200 staff.

Why IDEAS?
It seems that the Burton Group acquisition was successful enough for Gartner to repeat the operation with IDEAS. The feedback we gathered from various sources was that Gartner was surprised by the quality of the research (detailed stuff) and how much it was appreciated in IT mid-management circles, at the time they were striving to go up and appeal more to the C-suite.
Ideas is the same play: take some good techie content and give it a better reach through their excellent sales coverage. Gartner has more sales reps (usually of the aggressive type) than analysts and knows what good execution is about.

Gartner closed their consulting division in Australia in 2007 but grew their events and research there, and in other APAC countries (specifically India, China, etc). So this acquisition is not only complementary from a product coverage standpoint but also geographically. Crucially for Gartner, it should give them a better access to the fast growing APAC countries.
That’s a glimmer of hope for the support and management staff, usually the ones bearing the brunt of M&A’s (Gartner states they will “virtually retain” everyone, maybe they’s stick a hypervisor layer on top of them?).

Un-answered questions
As usual, it’s not clear if IDEAS will remain as separate product line within Gartner. Our prognosis would be that it will not be merged with Burton into that separate GFTP end-user service but rather in the “Don’t Call Me Dataquest” (HTTP or GFIL or whatever it’s called now). The IDEA brand will probably disappear, just like Dataquest, AMR, Burton, META, and most of the now 33 acquisitions they made since IPO’ing back in 1993.

Bottom line and takeways
It seems Gartner, the industry 800 pounds gorilla, is learning how to better execute for acquisitions. The META takeover did not go well at all, with over 2/3 of brains drained out of the company even if it was probably a good competitive move. This is to be contrasted with AMR (where the founders cashed in but the other analysts had been offered jobs and issued new laptops very swiftly) and Burton which went quite smoothly too.

• Other analyst firms will probably read this tale of consolidation with great chagrin, in particular Forrester and IDC who see Gartner pulling away even farther and quicker.
• In particular, this has implications for Canalys Current Analysis (read Ideas International and Current Analysis Ink Distribution Agreement)
• AR pros should do their due diligence as usual
  • Check who are the analysts impacted on both side , the relationship status, any WIP, etc
  • Decide a new action course where they used IDEAS as a second source
  • It’s likely Gartner will stop white papers and things like that, look for other suppliers if you had something in mind

Read our 42 other posts about Gartnerand their previous acquisitions.

• Breaking AR news – Gartner buys Burton Group
• Gartner buys AMR -what’s the impact for AR Managers and competitors?

And also: Forrester joins the feeding frenzy, buys Springboard

The PR and AR Coordinator is responsible for supporting and executing global communications plans to promote the company’s key messages, products and intellectual capital in media, public, corporate, and analyst forums. Reporting to the Corporate Communications Manager the role includes: support of communications strategies and planning efforts primarily for FRSGlobal, but also for other Wolters Kluwer Financial Services lines of business; writing communications including (but not limited to) press releases, articles for external publication, analyst related materials; developing effective relationships with the media and industry analysts; coordinating media interviews; providing input into the communications reporting and evaluation processes, the PR and AR coordinator will also be responsible for assigning work to external public relations agencies. The PR and AR coordinator will provide back-up support for external and internal communications as needed, and will provide back-up support to the VP Global Marketing, Wolters Kluwer Financial Services FRSGlobal.

About Wolters Kluwer

Wolters Kluwer Financial Services is a comprehensive regulatory compliance and risk management business that helps financial organizations manage operational, compliance and financial risk and reporting, and improve efficiency and effectiveness across their enterprise. The organisation’s prominent brands include: FRSGlobal, ARC Logics for Financial Services, PCi, Compliance Resource Network, Bankers Systems, VMP® Mortgage Solutions, AppOne®, GainsKeeper®, Capital Changes, NILS, AuthenticWeb™ and Uniform Forms™.

Wolters Kluwer Financial Services supports its global customers with more than 30 offices in 20 countries and is a leading worldwide provider of compliance and risk management solutions for the financial services industry, serving more than 15,000 banking, insurance and securities customers across the globe. Wolters Kluwer Financial Services is part of Wolters Kluwer, a leading global information services and publishing company with annual revenues of (2010) €3.6 billion ($4.7 billion) and approximately 19,000 employees worldwide.

Tasks / Responsibilities

The successful candidate will:

• Assist in the development and execution of comprehensive communications plans in support of assigned business lines to promote the division’s brand, products and services and image, incorporating public relations and analyst relations.
• Writes and/or manages internal/external resources (including the company’s subject matter experts) to complete elements of communications related plans, ensuring consistent and appropriate voice, messaging and tactics in partnership with line of business marketing teams. This includes but is not limited to: press releases, byline articles for publication, media pitches, speaking engagements, analyst briefings, internal communication and award opportunities.
• Facilitate and review all articles for internal and external publication, and facilitate final approval of press releases, responsible for routing releases through various internal stakeholders (Wolters Kluwer Corporate Comms, legal etc).
• Identify and support the development of effective relationships with the media, analysts and influencers.
• Assist in comprehensive media training for company spokespeople participating in media interviews, participate and manage media interviews, identifying opportunities and concerns and proactively addressing them to ensure best possible outcome.
• Possesses a sound level of understanding related to applicable market trends, issues and opportunities, proactively identify relevant news stories that subject matter experts can comment on;
• Responsible for maintenance of PR and AR planning calendar, incorporating applicable external and internal events and helping plan press and analyst activity accordingly;
• Provides support for Wolters Kluwer Corp Communications initiatives as needed.
• Provides back-up support for other members of wider communications and marketing teams as needed.
• Some travel required.

Education:

• Minimum of undergraduate degree in communications, journalism and/or public relations or equivalent

Essential:

• Minimum of two years of communications, journalism and/or public relations experience or equivalent.

Personal qualifications:

• Must possess strong writing, communications and organizational skills.
• Ability to facilitate and prioritize multiple projects at once required.
• A can do attitude, focused on delivering results.
• Communications experience in the finance or technology industries (preferably financial services software vendors) preferable.
• Fluency in another European language beneficial.
• Growing company, expanding markets
• International scope with respect for local culture
• Modern infrastructure
• Lots of career opportunities
• Can-do attitude
• Real responsibility
• Entrepreneurial attitude is required
• Space for initiatives and new ideas
• Result driven
• Competitive remuneration
• Considerable result-driven variable reward
• Excellent benefits according to country practice (health and travel insurance, pension etc.)
• Hard work and a flexible attitude go together

 For more information and to apply click here

Job Number: FRSGL00022