Gartner Predicts Email to Merge to Social Networks Gradually

June 27th, 2010

One of Gartner’s predictions for Social Networking:

By 2014, social networking services will replace e-mail as the primary vehicle for interpersonal communications for 20 percent of business users.

Greater availability of social networking services both inside and outside the firewall, coupled with changing demographics and work styles will lead 20 percent of users to make a social network the hub of their business communications. During the next several years, most companies will be building out internal social networks and/or allowing business use of personal social network accounts. Social networking will prove to be more effective than e-mail for certain business activities such as status updates and expertise location.

“The rigid distinction between e-mail and social networks will erode. E-mail will take on many social attributes, such as contact brokering while social networks will develop richer e-mail capabilities,” said Matt Cain, research vice president at Gartner. “While e-mail is already almost fully penetrated in the corporate space, we expect to see steep growth rates for sales of premises- and cloud-based social networking services. “

Gartner recommends that organizations develop a long-term strategy for provisioning and consuming a rich set of collaboration and social software services, and develop policies governing the use of consumer services for business purposes. Companies should also solicit input from the business community on what collaboration tools would be most helpful.

Come and hear Ken Dulaney speak about it on July 7th at Gartner’s Tel Aviv Conference:  We will hold a special session on the future of Social Media

http://www.gartner.co.il/event/Gartner_21st_Annual_Regional_Conference.aspx?ref=hp#agenda

Is Email going to Disappear?

June 22nd, 2010

Social Media and Social networking fascinates me and although it is obvious to me that it is and will continue to be an integral part of our lives–I still find marketing and PR people who are in denial about this.

My forecast is that the use of email and blogs will significantly decline in the next 5 years.  What will take their place?  Facebook-like networks and Twitter- like microblogs.  The main reason for this is simple–people’s attention spans are getting shorter and shorter as a result of information overload.

As Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook,  says, if you want to know what you will be doing in the future, you look at what teenagers are doing today and she misstates a figure that  only 11% of teenagers email daily..

Check out her speech here.

The real statistic is: only 11% of teens used email to communicate with friends daily — not email in general.

This guy doesnt think that email is going anywhere:  http://www.businessinsider.com/sorry-sheryl-sandberg-email-isnt-going-anywhere-2010-6#ixzz0rcJJEq7q

But I happen to think that Sheryl is right and I base that statistic on my own son who is 23 and a college student.  If I want to reach him, I send him a message on Facebook which he checks numerous times during the day–he checks his email about once a week….

What do you think the future holds for us?

The Future of the Advisory Model for Analyst Groups: A Discussion

May 10th, 2010

Gideon Gartner starts a great dialogue about the future of the Advisory model.  Lots of analysts joined in–funny, I didnt see anyone from Gartner commenting on this.  But I think it is time they get in the conversation.

“Some day the Advisory Industry may look different than today, and an example of what’s possible may be the manner in which vendor and user clients compensate their Advisory providers. It seems worthwhile for segments of our industry  to study this alternative compensation model, as it has been implemented successfully in the Wall Street Research space over many decades, being both useful and arguably more performance-based than what we’re used to in the Advisory space.”

A wonderful conversation which will take a while to digest;however, as we discussed in Tel Aviv a few weeks ago Gideon, the movement towards open content and sharing is pretty unstoppable and will impact the big analyst firms sooner rather than later. However, most of my clients (B2B Tech vendors) are not interested in the reports/content–they are interested in the influence that Gartner, Forrester and a few others have over the buying process. The Magic Quadrant still has a magic power over endusers in many industries who doubt the value of a vendor if they are not in the Magic Quadrant. This is Gartner’s power over vendors, although as you told me, it was not the original intention of the MQ but rather an internal exercise among the analysts to create a discussion about the vendors. When endusers stop asking Gartner or Forrester or other influencers in the Analyst market which vendors to use–that is when they will have to start really evaluating their model.

http://gideongartner.com/2010/05/04/advisory-industry-a-future-redesign-the-“payment”-model/comment-page-1/#comment-330

A Conversation with Gideon Gartner

May 1st, 2010

I recently posted a comment on Gideon Gartner’s new blog and ended it with an invitation to let me know if he is ever in Tel Aviv  to meet up.  The next day I got an email from Gideon that he was in Tel Aviv and would I like to meet him for coffee.  Whereas some people would get excited at meeting a rock star–for me–an AR Consultant and pioneer in Israel–Gideon Gartner is my rock star.  I met him and his lovely wife Sarah in Tel Aviv and we had an extended chat that included his questions about how I stated my AR business in Israel, the origin of the Magic Quadrant as an internal not an external document and logistics of getting to the local TedEx event.  I expressed my opinion that the Gartner model has huge brand value but the real threat to that model will be the new,open models like RedMonk and others and not a competitor like Forrester.  Only time will tell and I wait eagerly for Gideon’s book to hear more gossip and tidbits on the creation of one of the best brands in history.

AR Must Reduce Time-To-Influence (TTI): a new Report by Kevin Lucas, Forrester

April 14th, 2010

Kevin has written another insightful article to help AR professionals upgrade their current program.   Forrester defines the Learn and Earn sides of working with analysts and define 4 stages of AR Relatonships: Establishing, Engaging, Influencing and Partnering.

“Many newcomers to industry analyst relations believe that analyst influence begins with the first briefing. But analyst influence depends on many more prerequisites than just turning up and saying your company is great — even when you have an hour to make the case. Experienced AR managers know that there are more precursors to influence but, in the hectic environment of day-to-day AR, even they easily forget that poorly planned or executed interactions can slow their progress toward a position of influence.

Consequently, AR managers at all levels must understand how the early life cycle of each analyst relationship affects the time required to reach this position — we call this period the time-to-influence (TTI) — and must actively reduce its duration for their influence program to be optimally effective.”

“Forrester uses the term time-to-influence to indicate the period between the first contact with each analyst and the first point that you begin to achieve lasting influence over them. For many AR programs, this period is infinitely long — they never get there. But savvy AR managers take charge and:

· Plan to minimize the time-to-influence. Recognize that the effectiveness of your earn-side AR program depends upon how soon you can influence the analysts who matter. Together with your analyst tiering scheme, assess your analysts, their current relationship phases, and their propensity for deeper yet productive relationships. As with tiering, use the results to drive analyst-specific interaction programs.”

· Set executive expectationsuses the term time-to-influence to indicate the period between the first contact with
each analyst and the first point that you begin to achieve lasting influence over them (see Figure
7).5 For many AR programs, this period is infinitely long — they never get there. But savvy AR
managers take charge and:
· Plan to minimize the time-to-influence. Recognize that the effectiveness of your earn-side
AR program depends upon how soon you can influence the analysts who matter. Together
with your analyst tiering scheme, assess your analysts, their current relationship phases, and
their propensity for deeper yet productive relationships.6 As with tiering, use the results to
drive analyst-specific interaction programs.
· Beware of flighty analysts. If you turn the head of an analyst very early in your relationship,
monitor whether your competitors are achieving the same results. If so, recognize this analyst
as an unreliable champion of your company in the marketplace. You’ll be more productive
if you focus your efforts on analysts whose loyalty, though harder to earn, generates lasting
value.
· Set executive expectati

The Future of PR–Social Media

March 21st, 2010

This post is from 2009 but reveals the future of PR which is the Social Media engine which may change and use different tools but will remain the catalyst for the new future of PR.  http://mashable.com/2009/06/19/teaching-social-media/#

Paul Bradshaw, senior lecturer of online journalism and magazines at Birmingham City University, said the most basic tools that students should know how to use are WordpressWordPress for blogging and site building, Twitter for live updates, Facebook for posting articles or videos, DeliciousDelicious for bookmarking, FlickrFlickr for photos or videos, and YouTubeYouTube for video. All of these can be used from the field with a smart phone or laptop.

The biggest problem is that once these students get out of school the game will have changed again.  Probably the best tool they can be taught is how to track the evolution of PR and Social Media and be ready to learn something new on a regular basis.

However there is no doubt about the need to have these skills today and tomorrow.

Inside Gartner-Your own webpage

January 11th, 2010

Did you know that you could create your own personalized webpage in Gartner? Whether you are a member or not?  As an Analyst Relations Consultant I have my own personalized webpage at www.insidegartner.com which gives me free content, webinars and reports.  I recommend you set your own up especially if you are just starting out.  It will help you get in the mind of the Gartner gorilla or elephant in the room as they call themselves.

Social Media is a must not an option for B2B

December 26th, 2009

If you are a B2B marketer and you still dont get why you should be using Social Media–here are some statistics:  emarketer forecasts that B2B will be increasing their spend on Social Media by 60%!! in 2010 and that the main uses of Social media are to create Thought Leadership and Generate Sales Leads. Check out 7 predictions for 2010: http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007416

My take on Forrester’s Purchase of Strategic Oxygen

December 5th, 2009

Although this didnt make the splash that Gartner’s of AMR acquisition did- it signals a move towards more go-to-market tools for clients. I believe that this is a move that makes sense to a lot of marketing people who need real tools to quantify their decisions. Unfortunately it will not be a part of Forrester’s membership so it comes at extra cost.. Some answers to your questions on the acquisition by Forrester: http://www.forrester.com/sofaq

Real Relationships Bring Referrals-not just Social Networks

November 26th, 2009

95% of our new Public Relations, Analyst Relations and outsourced Marcom clients today are direct referrals from people I know and who I have worked with in the past.  We do use Linkedin as our main marketing tool to create and maintain our brand in the marketplace–but in the end of the day–most of my new clients have come to me because someone has given me a personal referral…So keep on learning about and using social networks–but dont forget real relationship building.


 

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