Month: November 2008

Monitoring Analyst Opinion within the Context of Measurement

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AR Metrics & MeasurementCounting analyst mentions is often an operational metric.  However, it is a very incomplete measurement because counting mentions typically does not consider the intensity, the exposure, the focus, the alignment, or the accuracy of the opinion; all critical factors in determining the net impact of an opinion on shaping market perception and influencing buying decisions. If you consider these other attributes it can become a form of performance metric  because it can demonstrate that AR reached out to the analyst and communicated information for them. 

In order to move beyond an at-best tactical performance metric such as counting mentions to something more strategic, AR needs to elevate its focus by tracking opinions and data points (relevance, perception, net impact, etc.) over time on a more regular basis.  Monitoring opinion can help AR understand the effectiveness of its work by tracking whether opinions are improving over time. For instance, merely counting that there were 20 quotes per quarter in Q1, Q2, Q3 and Q4 indicates little on AR effectiveness. However, tracking that overall opinion in those four quarters went from very negative in Q1 to negative in Q2 to neutral in Q3 and positive in Q4 shows that AR has been very effective in understanding the positions of the analysts and presenting the company’s case to them.

It is our recommendation that AR programs do not settle for simply counting mentions in the press and research notes, but move to include analyst opinion monitoring. However, in the spirit of making data collection practical, this does not mean that […]

Defining “Performance Metrics for Analyst Relations”

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Background:  When building AR measurement programs, AR practitioners must distinguish between performance and operational metrics.    Performance metrics help AR teams measure progress against strategic goals while operational metrics measure utilization and productivity against plan.   

Performance metrics measure AR’s progress against strategic results.  They primarily are externally focused and typically fall into one of three categories: 1) Shape […]

You have to focus on influential analysts even if they are negative or unpleasant

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An all too common comment from vendor executives is “That analyst is such a jerk, I don’t want anything to do with him.” Or maybe the executive thinks the analyst is out to get the vendor, an idiot, or just wants to extract money from the vendor. For whatever reason, the executive has decided not to brief or otherwise interact with the analyst because this influential analyst is unpleasant. 

On the other hand, this executive loves to talk with another analyst who is by no stretch of the imagination influential, but is nice, agrees with the executive’s points-of-view, and is just more pleasant.

A critical success factor for your AR program is getting your executives to understand analyst influence and to get on board with a plan to turn around negative or unpleasant analysts instead of just […]

Good post by IBM’s John Simonds on “Getting Your Executives to Cut Down Their Presentations To Analysts”

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John is an AR professional running AR for IBM’s Lotus division. The post is well worth reading, click here to visit John’s Delusions of Adequacy blog. Here are a few extracts (with my emphasis in maroon):

2. If you can’t get your message delivered in 15 charts or less, you likely have clarification issues.

5. No chart is golden, (many) could (should) be sacrificed.

8. If the analyst wants to go off the charts, be willing to go as long as you stay on topic.

9. Use A/R to speak to the analyst before the briefing/discussion/meeting/conference to see […]

Tool for Sales – The Prospect Profile Form

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icon-dollar-euro.jpgThe analysts possess a wealth of information that can help vendor sales organizations better understand their prospects. The question is how to get the information from the analysts. SageCircle has put together a simple process and checklist that AR can use to conduct a structured inquiry with key analysts to collect and organize important information about your prospects. The process is simple. Schedule an inquiry with one or two of your Tier 1 analysts (with whom you have Inquiry privileges). Use the questions on the Prospect Profile checklist to gather information from the analyst and enter the responses into the form. After finishing the inquiry, complete the form and forward it to sales.

There are two main categories of input that you are looking for: “Analyst’s Perceptions about the Prospect or its Peer Group” and “Analyst’s Perceptions about Your Differentiation in this Situation.” Within each main category there are sub questions like market, prospect and business challenges. 

Besides obtaining valuable information and insights for your sales teams, using this technique is also a great way to improve your relationships with key analysts. As we mentioned […]

Getting executives to agree to making changes to their presentation for an analyst briefing

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SageCircle strategists review a number of presentations each month in the context of phone-based inquiries. First-time critiques often result in recommendations for significant revisions.  This is because atypical sales or marketing presentation does not produce the sequential flow or information content required for an effective analyst briefing.  Unfortunately, when a sales presentation is used with an analyst, it frequently results in a negative perception of the company and its products by the analyst.

For example, SageCircle conducted a presentation review with a new client. The AR team representative and the intended product spokesperson were on the phone. Upon review, the “deck” resembled a typical sales presentation and suggested changes met strong resistance. The spokesperson had very firm ideas on how his presentation had to be built. Many of his beliefs were rooted in years of successful selling, but were quite inappropriate for an analyst “deck.”

The impasse was resolved by stepping back from the immediacy of the presentation and focusing on the intended result – getting the analyst to agree with a set of perspectives held by the company.  From the spokesperson’s selling background, he agreed that to achieve this result, the message had to be tailored to the audience.  The spokesperson further admitted […]

Defining “analyst consulting day”

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Analyst consulting days are full-day engagements where a vendor spends a significant sum to get the use of one or more analysts. Analyst consulting days are not to be confused with projects by the analyst firms’ consulting groups, which often have little or no analyst contribution. There is a distinction between contracting for “analyst consulting time” and contracting with the consulting side of an analyst firm. “Analyst consulting time” refers to purchasing the time of an individual analyst, usually in one-day units. Contracting with the consulting side of an analyst firm usually refers to research projects with specific deliverables that are designed to meet the intelligence, strategy or marketing needs of a vendor company. Multi-client studies are common deliverables from the consulting side.

Gartner uses the term SAS (strategic advisory service) to describe analyst consulting days. While other firms use […]

How much to spend on analyst contracts [AR practitioner question]

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question-mark-graphic.jpgInquiry: SageCircle received the following inquiry via e-mail: “Is our use/cost of the major analyst firms at about industry standard or better – especially as it relates to analyst contracts?”

“Are we spending the right amount on analyst contracts?” is a common question that SageCircle receives. This is one of a group of “standards” or “benchmarks” inquiries (see The Size of the AR Team [AR practitioner question]) that many AR managers wrestle with, often in response to their management’s demands for justification for budgets. While clients want us to provide a simple rule-of-thumb for analyst contracts (e.g., as a percentage of vendor revenue), we cannot provide it. Through our research, we have discovered that comparable vendors (in terms of markets, total revenues and number of employees) can have dramatically different analyst contract requirements.

The more important questions that need to be answered are: “Are the contracts providing us the services we need to reach our defined goals?  Are we managing the contracts to get full value? 

For end users clients, usually IT managers at large enterprises, the answers are much more clear cut. Even though enterprises use analysts for a variety of purposes (see Why technology buyers use the IT industry analysts), these purposes basically fall into either strategic and tactical decision support. Thus, spending can be focused on active topics and activities, especially where internal expertise is not available.

How much IT and telecommunications vendors spend on analyst contracts is dependent on a variety of factors. In this SageCircle blog post, we will focus on identifying the factors.

Breadth of usage – How many different functions in the company will analyst research and advice be supporting? The broader the usage, the more […]