And not a moment too soon. I must admit I am pretty chuffed. Please take a look and tell us what you think. Stephen’s Q&A is as usual excellent, and one thing I particularly wanted to point out is some clarifications he makes with respect to our business model. I get a bit fed up when people try and niche us as sellside only- as Stephen says its money from the sellside that allows us to provide free research to the buyside. And we do have “buyside” customers too. Frankly the buyside sellside distinction is pretty tired anyway. We’re all producing code or content or requirements or analysis. Our base is practioners, many of whom aren’t buyers at all – they are producers and influencers. RedMonk’s model is a new model. And just to emphasize the fact we’re making it more explicit by calling out the fact we’re shooting to become an art gallery by tiering customers as patrons, sponsors or supporters.
Q: What about the tiering of the clients? Is that new?
A: In part, although we’ve informally used these labels on blogs for some time. Again, this is something that’s been in the works for a while, but we more or less lifted the model wholesale from museums. That sounds strange to most of you, I’m sure, but there are actually some interesting parallels between that business and ours. Both seek to educate and inform, both depend on corporations for sustaining revenue, and – as of now – both recognize differing levels of contributions. We’re grateful for every last client we have, and want to be sure to recognize them for the contributions they make to the bottom line.
If you want to see who sponsors our work, and is willing to go on the record, go here.
TimB says:
March 15, 2007 at 12:21 pm
Nice – well done.
Kudos for the transparency in your pricing, engagement models and the FAQ. Best practice for others maybe!
Nigel James says:
March 15, 2007 at 1:48 pm
Looks very clean and clear James. Well done.
Makes it very clear who you are and what you do.
Jens E says:
March 15, 2007 at 3:25 pm
Nice work. Very clean and easy to follow messaging. Just the appropriate amount of eye-candy without the overload of digital BS we see these days – even on the most “professional” of sites. Kudos, and here’s to many happy returns for all!
Thomas Otter says:
March 15, 2007 at 4:37 pm
supercalafragalistic.
vinnie mirchandani says:
March 19, 2007 at 12:21 pm
The cosmetics are fantastic…
you don’t like it when I say your model is vendor funded, but your sponsor page reinforces the notion.
But at least you are transparent about who does fund…there are so many “analysts” who do not
jgovernor says:
March 19, 2007 at 1:04 pm
Glad you like the lipstick Vinnie. Vendor-funded is apropos but that’s not necessarily the kind of term you have used in the past. the question is does funding establish position or not? funding us doesn’t buy a position or perspective. we are primarily vendor-funded, but we are practitioner-facing. it would be nice to have more topline supporters that were enterprises. but we’re very happy with the shape of the business right now.