Are Industry Analysts Important To Your Go-To-Market?

Throughout my career as a CEO and earlier, when I was in Product Management, and Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A), I managed to gain significant value and also greatly amplify our company success by working closely with industry analysts. Building and managing these relationships is an art, more than science, and requires consistent effort.

I am surprised how many startups and even larger companies fail to leverage leading analysts and miss out on tremendous benefits and opportunities. It is not a topic often written about and a helpful “how-to” guide is long overdue!

First... Why Listen?

1. Learn from my experience: I have managed to get into several magic quadrants, be profiled as a cool vendor, influence new investors, and closed millions of dollars in new business as a direct result of industry analyst support, so this article could make a big impact if you read along.

2. There is upside for your company: Support from industry analysts can significantly impact your valuation on a financing round or liquidity event/acquisition by a strategic buyer.

This same support will also raise the visibility of your company, which can — in turn — open the door to interest from new customers, companies seeking to partner, and is great marketing. Put simply it gets you a seat at the table whereas otherwise, you would not have been considered.

This is an article for founders and other hi-tech executives focused on how to maximize growth by leveraging industry analysts. Analysts are — after all — a significant part of go-to-market engagement and success.

First, who are they?

Gartner is the largest firm by a significant margin with over 2,000 analysts

Professional industry analysts are firms composed of experts in specific industries. They make money by publishing research, advising clients, and holding events. Analysts have been a major part of the industry as buyers need to understand the complex and rapidly changing vendor landscape. In this article, I will focus on hi-technology company analysts. To be more specific, analysts covering SaaS, software, hardware, and cybersecurity, but this advice is broadly applicable to industry analysts.