Briefings

NDAs mislead, slow, weaken and pressure analyst relationships

Non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) are a continual bone of contention between vendors and the analyst industry. Lighthouse feels that their impact is almost universally negative, especially in relation to briefings and analyst events. This post aims to outline the four main negative effects and respond to the three most commonly given reasons in favour of the […]

24Feb2010 | Editorial | 6 comments | Continued

Go with the grain: Why AR needs to fit Forrester’s imperatives

AR managers need to quit whining about Forrester’s role based research. To make progress, start speaking about the success imperatives its role-based research is founded on. It’s been more than two years since Forrester started the series of focus groups that identified the success imperatives. They gathered together people in each of the roles that […]

13May2009 | Duncan Chapple | 4 comments | Continued

Merv Adrian sparks a debate on giving analysts Powerpoint

Merv Adrian’s posting reminded me how being given vendors’ Powerpoint after a briefing was really useful for me when I was an analyst. You can go into the outline view and cut and paste the heading into Word, then type up your notes often reusing their headings if they were factual. That could lead to […]

4Apr2009 | Duncan Chapple | 2 comments | Continued

Microsoft’s “very savvy” analyst relations spotlit by CNET

The new Microsoft emails uncovered in the ‘Vista Capable’ dispute illustrate the firm’s thoughtful and analyst-driven approach to analyst relations. CNET open source blogger Matt Asay has written about the analyst relations strategies used by Microsoft with Gartner over Vista: perhaps the single analyst interaction with the greatest potential RoI.

22Nov2008 | Duncan Chapple | 0 comments | Continued

How spokespeople can brief analysts successfully, or unsuccessfully

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve helped run a few in-house analysts relations workshops for clients (along with Efrem Mallach and ex-Ovum analyst Alban Thurston) all of which have touched on how spokespeople can develop more influential and insightful relationships with analysts. Taking an Appreciative Inquiry approach, at most of the workshops we had […]

25Oct2008 | Duncan Chapple | 1 comment | Continued

Focus on briefing influential analysts, not only the directors

There’s some discussion on how to spot a good analyst, which has won some kudos.
What this post really describes are the analysts who are most likely to give satisfying verbal interactions. However, other analysts, even ‘poor’ ones, are often as influential or more influential. Senior analysts are often not the ones who are on the […]

19Sep2007 | Editorial | 0 comments | Continued

Best practice at analyst briefings: less common than worst practice

There’s always a lot of interest in best practices for analyst-vendor briefings. Sadly, everyone has their own partial view, and sometimes it’s hard to work out the things that work right for you, but that might not work out for someone else. What works in Canada may not work in China (as we’ll be discussing […]

7Jun2007 | Editorial | 0 comments | Continued

Five innovations define multi-vendor briefing days

Some folk think we are over-impressed by the novelty of Forrester’s move towards multi-vendor briefing days. Thanks to Barbara for her comment: “I’m surprised that you don’t see the Forrester Briefing Day program pretty much as an analyst implementation of a vendor AR briefing day.I don’t see much common ground with the 3rd party multi-client/multi-analyst […]

4Apr2007 | Editorial | 0 comments | Continued

Pro’s and Con’s of multi-vendor briefing days

Tekrati’s comment on Forrester’s multi-vendor briefing days interested us. Last year’s HFN meeting day in Frankfurt was very successful: it allowed a handful of vendors and 22 analysts from many countries to gather together.
Both Forrester’s events and HFN’s are thematic, and allow the opportunity for analysts in a defined research cluster to be briefed by […]

1Apr2007 | Editorial | 5 comments | Continued

Engaging the analysts: strategy before tactics

Back in the 1990s, when people spoke about effective analyst relations they typically focused on organization, process and technique. Lots of companies had very disorganized analyst relations: today AR is better administered but one weakness has principally survived: many vendors are so focused on their messages that they are failing to anticipate or answer analysts […]

15Mar2006 | Editorial | 0 comments | Continued

Some analysts’ perspectives on briefings

UK media relations company Rainier PR has just published an useful note on analyst relations in its series ‘PR White Papers’. The paper summarizes discussions with 50 EMEA analysts, focussing on breifing analysts effectively.
The firm explains: “When it came to the quality of PR agencies that analysts deal with 56 per cent said that PR […]

15Aug2005 | Editorial | 0 comments | Continued

Four myths about analyst relations briefings

I recently came across a short article by Melissa Beck on analyst relations. She explains how often a third-party industry analyst or firm will be referenced as unbiased persuasion to buy, sell, or invest and outlines some key myths in AR, which I summarize below.
Myth #1: A Sales Presentation can be used as an Industry […]

3Aug2005 | Editorial | 3 comments | Continued