How to Brief a Forrester or Gartner Analyst
What ChatGPT imagines a briefing is like - what’s up with that…Dove?
I am still surprised how many companies aren’t aware that you can brief Forrester and Gartner analysts for free - but only if your briefing request is compelling enough for them to accept!
Forrester’s form is here: https://www.forrester.com/help/analyst-briefing/
Gartner’s form is here: https://www.gartner.com/en/contact/vendor-briefings
For both firms you’ll need to register, but the account itself is free - you don’t need a seat license for this. Right now I am seeing lead times from request to briefing with Gartner that can take 2-3 months in some cases. Forrester is typically under a month in most cases.
Pro tip: be sure to draft your request in a separate document first - these forms can be a bit buggy (for example Gartner’s limits most fields to 500 characters but doesn’t say this on the form itself, so you won’t find that out until it fails to submit!)
Quick tips for a compelling request:
Use their language. If you are hoping to brief the analyst who writes about XYZ your request needs to directly convey that you are a fast-growing / highly relevant XYZ vendor. Don’t make your life harder by being dogmatic about how you prefer calling the space ABC.
Prove the fast-growing / highly relevant. Name drop noteworthy clients who have switched from already-covered vendors to you in the last 6-12 months, or share other data about growth rate and customers you are adding. You’re telling this analyst that if they haven’t already heard of you, they are about to be, so they should want to spend their precious time getting to know you.
Preview how you’ll use the time. If there’s a major trend or disruption your company leans into, share a sentence of that differentiation here, along with its value to the businesses you serve. I have also had some success with Gartner where you might only get 30 minutes saying that if they give us 45 we would love to show them a short demo of X functionality.
Here’s a highly cliched fictional example:
PawTech AI is a Series B startup in the XYZ space, focused on bringing AI workflows to the fast-growing pet care space. In the past year we have implemented our technology for Fortune 500 companies such as CanineTech Innovations, PawPrint Enterprises, and Bark Industries - each of which switched to our solution from traditional technologies such as SAP (Smart Animal Pathfinders) and SFDC (Safe and Friendly Dog Care) because of their desire for a more streamlined and responsive technology. If you would be open to spending 45 minutes with us, we would love to demo how our PawBot customizes each walk to its canine recipient (our clients tell us SAP and SFDC have promised this in their roadmaps but have not delivered successfully).
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Hope you find this helpful in making that first briefing request!
Up (and to the right!)
-Elena
