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12 March 2024
Top 7 Questions We Receive About Gartner's Services
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- Why is Gartner a long term relationship? 3 years contract?
It stems from the desire to establish long-term partnerships that allow for the delivery of more tailored and effective advisory services. Essentially because the relationship you develop with the analysts should be mirroring your strategy. Also, this is a strategic decision Gartner took to defend itself from retention issues in moments where their services might appear not essential anymore for a vendor (i.e. Covid 19 times). - How can Gartner's services benefit me as a vendor?
Gartner services offer insights and strategies to drive business growth, enhance efficiency, and stay competitive by leveraging their extensive industry research and expert analysis. Despite what a lot of vendors tend to think, Gartner services are not designed to give you visibility or mentions in research, but rather to provide you insights that you can use to grow your business faster. - Is Gartner's research relevant to my specific geography?
Gartner analysts cover a wide array of geographies. However, the insights and data provided are pertinent to specific sectors, including trends, forecasts, and best practices, but not to specific countries. Some of Gartner’s research is at the continent-level (i.e. Magic Quadrant context for EMEA). It is important to note that most insights you read or hear from Gartner analysts is thought to be applicable everywhere in the world. However, if you have country specific questions, you can try and ask for an inquiry with an analyst based in a specific country (a plus, rather than an expectation). - Can I have competitive intelligence from Gartner as a Vendor?
Analysts are allowed to share information that has not been marked as “confidential” on briefings they receive from vendors. However, vendors need to be very careful on the service levels, which may include Competitive Intelligence best practices rather than insights on competitors (for instance the Startup CEO only contains the CI best practices while the Tech CEO contains both best practices and insights on competitors). - Does Gartner help me with Total Market Opportunity, TAM, or other quantitative research?
Gartner's unique strength lies in their extensive global network of experts, who have interactions with technology buyers every day and gather their thoughts to create research documents. Even though analysts provide quantitative analyses such as Forecasts or Market Shares, these are not bespoke to a single company, but rather general indications of where the market is (heading), which vendors would need to contextualize and change to make it fit with their requirements. Commissioning a study to Gartner is not an option. - What are common reasons why a Gartner-Vendor relationship fails?
Misaligned Expectations: Vendors might have unrealistic expectations regarding what Gartner can do for them. For example, expecting that being a client will automatically lead to a favorable review or recommendation, without recognizing the need to develop a relationship with analysts.
Lack of Consistency: Building a relationship with Gartner analysts is not a one-time effort. It requires ongoing interaction, providing regular updates on product developments, market strategies, and customer successes. Allocating resources for continuous engagement is necessary for maintaining relevance and visibility.
Allocating Junior Resources to it: Someone too junior may lack the experience and understanding of the business, product complexities, and market strategies. This can lead to ineffective communication with Gartner analysts, who expect deep, insightful discussions about the vendor's offerings and market positioning. Assigning a more senior individual to manage the Gartner relationship signals a vendor's commitment to leveraging the partnership fully.
Lack of Accessibility: Not leveraging Gartner as a resource for internal C-level questions and doubts, and failing to make Gartner insights easily accessible and actionable for the entire C-level suite. C-level executives failing to incorporate this intelligence may overlook strategic opportunities or threats, along with overlooking Gartner’s importance in their strategy.
