There’s some interesting groundwork being done on redefining long-held ideas about influencers and tech purchase decisions. Two of the blogs I recommend, read and sometimes comment on are Influencer50’s Infuse and SAP’s Everyday Influence. Both use custom models of the tech decision process, and map influencers to each stage of the decision process. The ICT industry analysts are an important component of these emerging influencer models, and figure prominently — though not exclusively — in several phases. Examples include analysts influencing short-lists and validating IT strategies and pricing.

I’d like to see the models extend into the final phase of a decision process: the post-purchase phase. I think of this as the window between signing the contract and getting onboard with maintenance. It’s a delicate stage: as Todd Olson (6th Sense Analytics) said last week, “it’s easy to make recommendations — it’s hard to execute them.”

Historically, the post-purchase phase has been “owned” by sales support and customer satisfaction. Analyst relations has been kept clear of these buyers. Yet, social media is challenging many corporate controls, including customer commentary shortly after signing a contract. A quick look at Twitter, expert communities, and review sites shows how much norms are changing. Post-purchase buzz is becoming a big deal. I’ve got to think that analysts and analyst relations can play an important role here, whether through social media or offline relationships.

So, where will the industry analysts figure in this new world of post-purchase buzz? To what degree will they influence the post-purchase phase? What are the opportunities and risks for analysts? for analyst relations?

I found a refreshing take on analyst influence and analyst relations in the book Influencer Marketing - Who Really Influences Your Customers, by Nick Hayes and Duncan Brown of Influencer50. The book proposes a focused, cohesive and research-driven approach to identifying external influencers and getting them to participate in appropriate ways in marketing.

The book is not about buying influence or licensing analyst content/speakers for demand gen tools. It’s about designing an influencer relations initiative that accurately targets the rich spectrum of influencers involved in purchase decisions within specific market sectors.

In the Influencer Marketing approach, organizations create a cross-discipline marketing initiative. They leverage the cream of the crop from traditional influencer silos like PR, AR, etc. They also add some new influencers to the mix — new names or new types of influencers, such as competitors, academia, government.

The first result is a “dream team” of top influencers from the many discrete spheres of influence — analysts, press, consultants, channels, customers, competitors, academia, government, and so on. All identified influencers — and the assigned relationship managers — are placed on equal footing. Refreshing.

The second result is a goal-oriented plan for participative marketing. Participative marketing puts the impetus on managing influencer relationships based on their specific role during the purchase decision. AR activities are driven by customer decision processes, rather than by vendor product/service lifecycles. Refreshing.

Organizations with analyst relations functions already in place could use this book as a springboard for creating a cross-company influencer marketing initiative. Stage it as a pilot program. Or, run it as a special executive buddy program. Make it complement the influencer strategies and programs already in place.

Such an initiative will take some AR professionals out of their comfort zone. Equal footing among all identified influencer means ranking analyst priority relative to the other kinds of voices whispering in the customer’s ear. Instead of comparing a Gartner analyst with a Burton Group analyst, for example, you would compare both to a different kind of influencer — perhaps an association thought leader like AIIM’s Dan Keldsen or an author/consultant/blogger like James Taylor.

Old boundaries are breaking down all over the place — who’s an analyst (and who’s not), who controls the brand reputation, who drives the innovation, who’s the trusted advisor. It’s going to take some trial and error to figure out how best to deal with all these changes. Influencer Marketing suggests one way to move on.

Next week’s book review: Groundswell.

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Cisco was one of the first vendors to experiment with blogging as an analyst relations tool. This month, the Cisco Analyst Relations Blog is showing signs of life again, thanks to the efforts of Terry Anderson, vice president of corporate communications at Cisco.

The Cisco AR blog was launched in mid-2007 by Skip MacAskill, then director of industry analyst relations, and Blair Christie, then vice president of corporate communications and investor relations. Skip seems to have returned to Nortel Networks, as Director of Global Analyst Relations.

Best wishes all around.

Analyst relations professionals can get a quick reality check from Alan Pelz-Sharpe, an analyst with CMS Watch. Alan has expanded and updated his candid AR tips for dealing with analysts, now organized as 12 Do’s and Don’ts.

I would say #7, “don’t kiss my a**,” is not widely applicable. However, individual skills in puckering up do count. If you don’t do it well, you’re at a disadvantage. On the other hand, #8 - “don’t ask me for advice,” is a universal reminder that analyst feedback during a briefing is best viewed as a priviledge and a courtesy, unless the analyst has been contracted for feedback.

CMS Watch defines “independent analysts” as those research firms that do not earn revenues by consulting to vendors. In fact, CMS Watch sees taking vendor revenues as a conflict of interest. This is one of the most extreme and controversial definitions of “independent analyst” that I’ve encountered.

For many years, I’ve used the term “independent analyst” to describe small and sole proprietor research companies. It’s more comfortable for me than saying the more popular term “boutique analyst.” Who wants to look an executive in the eye and say, “This quarter, we should spend an extra $50K with these boutique analyst shops.”

Lately, I’m thinking that Alan and his colleagues have the better idea. It’s time to start using SOHO, mid-size and large as appropriate. Leave “independent” where it belongs, on the competitive battlefields of objectivity and transparency.

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 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?

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.

Hot off the H&K press feed:

Peggy O’Neill, former head of Oracle’s analyst relations program, has joined Hill & Knowlton as SVP, US Director Industry Analyst Relations. She will be responsible for leading and growing Hill & Knowlton’s US AR practice, reporting directly to Joshua Reynolds, SVP of messaging, positioning and analyst relations for the global technology practice… O’Neill will also contribute strategic thinking and direction to H&K’s global analyst relations practice, which has grown to include more than 14 full-time analyst relations professionals in the US, Europe and Asia.

According to the press release, the appointment is being formally announced right now, during a speech Joshua Reynolds is making at the Gartner AR Forum, being held in conjunction with the U.S. and European Gartner Symposium events.

I’ve always admired Peggy’s moxie. She helped establish the VP level as a valid title for in-house analyst relations management. That was no small task here in Silicon Valley. I suspect she also helped eradicate any lingering local stereotypes of analyst relations as “pink collar” jobs.

This should be an interesting change for Peggy. Likewise, it should be an interesting change for the H&K AR and accounts teams and clients. I’ve worked directly with several of the H&K AR people — and with some of their clients — and came away with the highest respect for each.

Join me in wishing Peggy the best.

Check out Johnny B’s April 1st post, ““IDG to merge IDC with Gartner?”

I’d put money on the global analyst relations community reacting something like this.

Dave Rossiter has navigated the Institute of Industry Analyst Relations (IIAR) blog into an ongoing discussion about analyst ethics and independence. The post more or less recounts the usual assortment of issues and war stories, and then poses the perennial question:

“As analyst relations professionals, we face a challenge. What responsibility do we have for ensuring these practices are stamped out? Are we proactive or do we just refuse to support them? Do we have a ‘quiet word’ in the right ear? Do we out the bad apples in public?”

Whether the IIAR is truly sinking its teeth into the issue — or simply jumping the shark — remains to be seen.

The IIAR needs to focus attention on where it can make a positive impact. If you look closely, David does bring up one area where the IIAR could make an impact: the misuse of briefings as sales calls.

This is actionable because it’s a specific business practice, it’s commonplace, each occurrence is obvious, and each occurrence is easily documented. As an added bonus, there’s no “objectivity” rhetoric around it to make AR practitioners uneasy: an analyst sales pitch is attached, or it’s not.

Plus, a precedent exists. ESOMAR’s guideline, “Maintaining Distinctions between Marketing Research and Direct Marketing,” addresses similar issues within the context of consumer market research:

“Whenever researchers are acting in their capacity as researchers they must not be involved in carrying out direct marketing or other non-research activities. Such activities are by definition incompatible with Rule 4 of the International Code which safeguards the confidentiality of respondents’ personal data which have been collected for marketing research purposes and prevents these from being used for any non-research purpose.

“This Rule does not prevent researchers, when they are acting in a different capacity (e.g. as a general information manager), from being involved with the operation of marketing databases. However, in such a case they must clearly differentiate such an activity from their work as a marketing researcher and avoid any confusion arising between the
two types of activity.”

Of course, the IIAR would need to clean up some questionable AR practices around briefings, as well.