On Market Research Departments, RedMonk and Tekrati

Tekrati Weblog � Balancing IT Industry Analyst and Internal Research Skills, Risks and Rewards

“Market research, analysis and reporting tools — and on-demand services — are changing at a fast pace. Business processes are changing. Decision support, communications and collaboration tools are all changing. Even if your organization is not now a power user of both home grown and IT industry analyst research, it’s a good time to start monitoring the evolving uses of IT market intelligence in your organization. Start thinking about different approaches for aligning IT industry analyst services not only with changing business decision processes, but also with internal research charters and skills.

In the not too distant future, the high tech industry analysts’ toughest competitors may be the researchers working inside your company.”
Great stuff from Barbara. I had been meaning to blog on this issue but hadn’t gotten it down yet.

The one point I would add to the analysis concerns the past, present, and future of competitive intelligence.

Everything is secret
In the past a vendor would go to an analyst to find out about a competitor, because a direct conversation was somewhat out of the question. Information control was the order of the day. Everything is a secret.

You said WHAT?
In the present there is an intriguing balance emerging as the Corporate types try and work out what is going on. Chances are developers and others in the firm are out there talking happily to the market about what is going on in the company- blogs are an obvious manifestation of the water cooler on steroids crossing organisational and competitive boundaries, San Francisco coffee shops are another. People blog things policy says they shouldn’t. But if good happens based on the voice then noone is complaining. Suddenly requirements gathering is far more effective. Suddenly Microsoft has a human face. And so on.

I see inside Google
OK just kidding – obviously Google is never going to be transparent. But many other corporations are moving from opacity to see-through. Bloggers will divulge secrets at a furious pace, but only the secrets that don’t really matter. Its only corporate marketing and over-arching legal that think everything must be secret. For the great mass of workers that get things done, however, talking is natural, and valuable. Customers are more engaged, which is a far stronger barrier to entry than any trade secret. In the future then, market research departments in vendors won’t need us for the grunt work, while we won’t reveal the really-secret-have-to-kill-you secrets. Our value as industry analysts providing data will be in being interpretive, rather than being prophylactic. Market research needs to rethink its expenditures now that competitors are sharing so much information.

RedMonk TCO and Risk Factors
In terms of TCO, like open source, entry cost to RedMonk is near zero. Talk to us for free. Comment on our blogs for free. Contribute to our wiki for free. Call us. Brief us. And so on. When do we get paid? We do monetisation at the point of first perceived value.

When it comes to risk I am pretty confident of our trendwatcher, coolhunter skills. We make some pretty bold calls at RedMonk, and many are on the money.