The industry analyst business is no stranger to M&As. Generally, most of the dust settles within a few weeks or months. However, there are rare occasions when the business integration takes so long that everyone forgets they’re waiting for closure. We’ve got one of those rare cases today: the official integration of Analysys, Mason and Catalyst into Analysys Mason.

The official integration was unveiled today. Datatec announced plans for it back in August 2004. Almost four years in the making.

The new Analysys Mason footprint uses what’s becoming the universal analyst business org chart: analysts on one side of the aisle, consultants on the other. On paper, this model benefits research and consulting clients alike.

For prospective clients and the rest of us, the new brand means less confusion at last between Analysys and Analysys International.

Much about Analysys does not change. I continue advising prospective research buyers to look into Datatec, the majority owner of Analysys Mason, as part of the analyst selection process. I’ve never heard a single criticism stemming from the Datatec ownership since the acquisition. However, what’s the point of demanding transparency if you don’t take advantage of it? Make sure you’re informed and comfortable. Datatec puts its subsidiary holdings into perspective in a handy menu.

Best of wishes to all at Analysys Mason.

I’ve started my summer reading early this year, with a round of books on social media and influencer marketing. Please speak up, if you can recommend other books in these areas.

Groundswell - Winning in a world transformed by social technologies, by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff. “It’s a book by two Forrester analysts with practical, data-based strategies for companies that want to harness the power of social technologies like blogs, social networks, and YouTube. Featuring 25 full case studies, a complete road map for social strategy, and data from around the world.” - excerpt from the book microsite

The New Influencers - A Marketer’s Guide to Social Media, by Paul Gillen. “The New Influencers is a book for corporate marketers and executives who want to understand and engage with the vast new channels of influence that are emerging online.” - excerpt from the book microsite

Influencer Marketing - Who Really Influences Your Customers, by Nick Hayes and Duncan Brown. “The book demonstrates clearly, authoritatively and with numerous real examples Seth Godin’s widely accepted view that it’s ‘useless to advertise to anyone except connectors with influence’… For all those involved in marketing and sales this book will be an essential analysis of how to identify who has influence, how they apply it, and how you can turn it to your advantage.” - excerpt from the book microsite

Several bloggers have been talking about industry analysts and high tech startups. Brings back the dotcom days, when startups rolled down 101 in their stretch limos, on their VC and analyst tours. Everybody needed a nod from Gartner or Forrester to clinch that next round of funding. Much has changed. Some suggest the changes include a more mature view of where analysts fit in startup strategies:

Carter Lusher suggests the analysts as more important than PR for startups. He sees analysts as almost a sales lead generation/conversion resource. He’s got a case study where the entire marketing budget went to Gartner to Gartner and a customer reference program.

Raj Kanaya and John Oh advise startups to look to at least two customer-focused advisory analysts — smaller firms in particular — to help offset the typical bootstrap shortage of product marketing expertise as well as market data. (Hat tip to Duncan Chapple for pointing to their blog.)

It’s good advice, but analyst sales reps should size up the obstacles. The biggest: getting startups to look past the nearest Gartner Magic Quadrant or Cool Vendors list. The other biggest: convincing startups and their boards/VCs that they should part with cold cash for analyst services.

Free is a very attractive idea. Selling analyst services to startups is not a walk in the park. There are lots of indicators out there that the “zero marketing budget” mindset of the old open source software crowd is about to come back even stronger on the wings of social media and community based conversation.

Of course, analysts could turn this momentum to their advantage. Chris Kelley suggests that analysts interested in the early adopter markets could use microblogging tools like Twitter to slash overhead and boost loyalty.

Interesting ideas.

The ReadWriteWeb reviews a tool many market watchers will crave and therefore every industry analyst should study: Trendpedia. It represents a new approach to promoting market research:

The service, now out of beta, lets you scan the blogosphere for trends to see what’s getting buzz. Trendpedia also lets you compose visualizations of those trends as charts and graphs, which can then be shared on the social web.

I can see in Trendpedia a template for a topic-specific trend watcher tool. Instead of searching against blogosphere buzz statistics, imagine searching against an analyst’s statistical data for trends in something that matters to you — be it virtualization or outsourcing or cellphone vendor rankings. Imagine using this kind of simple form for on-demand insights from some — or, on a paid basis all — of an analyst’s statistical knowledgebase.

For me, Trendpedia proves that you can make some types of research data fun and relevant. It’s a great way to stimulate User Generated Content around market data. It’s a natural for gaining visibility through company blogs/sites, media partner sites, and social media platforms, like Wordpress, Facebook and LinkedIn.

I suspect this sort of application would be fairly easy to mobilize, as well.

Tony Law (ITasITis blog) was in touch today, following up on his very first contribution here (that head-to-head competitors to Gartner’s Hype Cycle report include Forrester Research, with their TechRadar reports). He’s just posted a comparative assessment of TechRadar and Hype Cycle. Start-ups, VCs and enterprise early adopters will appreciate the comparison. Check it out. Well done.

The only point I would add to Tony’s analysis, is take care if you decide to track TechRadar reports via Google/RSS/Technorati alerts. Despite the Forrester mark tacked onto “TechRadar,” you’ll need to filter out monster results pointing to Future media’s consumer tech news and review site, TechRadar.com.

The report he evaluates, “Forrester TechRadar(TM): The Extended Supply Chain Application Ecosystem, Q2 2008,” lists at $279. I would compare to current Gartner Hype Cycle pricing, but their public site is down until tomorrow.

BTW, Tony is a scholar and a gentleman in my eyes. He made Tekrati history last month, by becoming the first person to send me a detailed assessment of the free Tekrati firms directory — including some outdated links, links/nomenclature we disagree on, and links/companies I hadn’t heard of.

Jen McClure issued a friendly challenge at the New Comm Forum: turn to the person nearest you who hasn’t used Twitter, and show them the ropes. (Twitter launched at the 2007 New Comm Forum.)

One thing led to another, and here I am, setting myself up on Twitter this afternoon. I couldn’t be doing this with any kind of immediate work benefit at all, were it not for Carter Lusher’s and Dave Eckert’s Analyst Twitter Directory.

With their directory, I was able to start following some favorite analysts in a matter of minutes. Interesting trivia: most of the analysts listed there also blog. Don’t see any other obvious common denominators, except that Charlene Li is the only female so far.

Also found in their directory 3 firms new to me: Accendor, Bathwick Group and SiriusDecisions.

Very cool. Carter and Dave are developing a specialty around new comms tools and analyst relations. This Twitter directory is a great example of their community spirit.

It’s the perfect solution for me for two reasons. First, I wouldn’t take the time to send emails to a bunch of people asking for their Twitter name. Let alone cause the interruption.

Second, I’m interested in following, versus being followed. That makes this ready-to-use list of Twitter names a comfortable, low key approach to adding analysts to follow.

Twitter seems like an interesting way to incubate many of the new professional relationships I started this week at New Comm Forum. Plus, it doesn’t hurt that Twitter is another reason to spend more time using my newest shiny thing, a Nokia N95.

The analyst relations organization based in the UK, Institute of Industry Analyst Relations, is gearing up to name this year’s most popular industry analysts, analyst blogs, and research companies, as determined by online votes from analyst relations professionals. You can also name the 3 companies that lost the most mojo over the last year. If you believe you perform analyst relations as part of your job, you can vote by filling out the IIAR’s Analyst of the Year survey. You don’t need to join the IIAR to participate, however you must include registration info with your votes — no anonymous cowards.

This is not quite American Idol. Only one vote per person (unlimited people per company, as long as each voter works in AR. Plus, no independent 3rd party is counting/rejecting the votes and validating results — the IIAR is doing this inhouse. Finally, you won’t be voting analysts off the stage. At least, not directly.

Voting closes at the end of April.

The program raises some interesting questions for industry analysts as well as vendors and agencies. For example, is it a good thing for an analyst to be identified as a favorite by vendor/agency analyst relations people? If you are analyst, what do you do about being named an idol, or having your company named a loser? If you are an analyst relations person, do you tell your favorite analysts you’ve voted for them? Do you console those who are not voted as idol? Do you treat this kind of information as competitive intel, or share it with your professional peer group?

.. explaining that both Tekrati blogs would be ignored effective late March/early April. Manual pings do nothing. Any suggestions on how I can fix this?

Sometimes, it seems like all I get from the Long Tail is whiplash…

Brian Clark, who writes Copyblogger, put together a great post on The 5 Immutable Laws of Persuasive Blogging. It’s good advice. It reminds us that there’s more to an influential blog than a famous author or a Technorati ranking.

Brian also touches on a point about persuasion that deserves attention: whether the style of writing prompts action.

By tradition, analysts who address best practices write copy intended to prompt action. Analysts focused on market and technology analysis are less likely to do so. Instead, these analysts write copy designed to educate readers or persuade readers to agree with their opinion, be it positive, negative, or neutral. Both types can be influential. The difference is the outcome.

Blogs eliminate many traditions, including analyst writing styles. Like everyone else, analysts can exercise greater personal choice in how they express themselves in their blogs. Their blogging voice is not determined by their employer or their other publication channels. There’s only one way to figure out what kind of persuasion — if any — is at work in an analyst blog: you read it.

For more on persuasive writing techniques, check out Clark’s other post, Ten Timeless Persuasive Writing Techniques. It summarizes techniques associated with personality as much as style.

What do you think? I’d like to develop this idea further. I’ll come back from the New Communications Forum (April 22-25 in Sonoma) with more on this idea. Catch up with me there (contact me for special Tekrati discounts), or link/share your thoughts here.

Analyst relations managers can make good use of the social media release, as shown this week by Visible Technologies. The company announced on Tuesday that it has been selected as one of Gartner’s Cool Vendors for 2008, in the High Performance Workplace category. They also pushed the news through the company blog.

For comparison, check out LucidEra’s traditional press release. They were named a Gartner Cool Vendor in the Business Intelligence and Performance Management category.

Both releases are written well. Both conform to strict Gartner requirements. Both go beyond the bare bones minimum for approved content. Yet, the formats make the releases come across quite differently.

I’ll be pigeonbuttonholing some of the A-listers on using new media for industry analyst relations and industry research promotion at the New Communications Forum, beginning April 22nd in Sonoma. If you’re interested in learning more too, why not attend? Contact me for info on my special media sponsor discount.