Engaging with industry analysts on social media
Courtesy of Eria, our resident analyst relations guru, we look at engaging with the industry analysts via social media channels:
Things were easy in the ‘good old days’ of analyst relations. If you wanted to know what analysts thought about technology, markets or vendors, all you had to do was read their reports. Or, occasionally, get it direct when they spoke at events.
With so many channels for information exchange now, AR teams have their work cut out tracking analyst opinions. This is even more difficult considering all the ‘disruptive’ analyst firms that have sprung up over the past five years.
Many analysts don’t just rely on reports, inquiries, and speaking engagements to engage with their audiences. They use social media so naturally that there are significant opportunities to interact with them meaningfully. Analysts who use social media successfully don’t see it as a separate project/strategy from what they do. It is simply part of a multi-faceted approach to engagement, which fits in naturally with everything else they do, including paid engagements/products.
How to engage with analysts across social media
- First, we must understand that we have moved on to a time when social media is seen as part of normal day-to-day activity. For many, it is now simply a channel to engage with followers and/or communities where information sharing, recommendations, and online reviews are fundamental to decision-making.
- You’ve missed the boat if you still need to meet to decide whether to have a social media strategy. You have to realise that it can’t simply be a case of following analysts on Twitter. A well-executed and comprehensive AR program will include many traditional elements (i.e. briefings, inquiries, speaking engagements, white papers, etc.) but will also have adequate resources to track analyst conversations on social media.
- More importantly, there will be a willingness to engage with analysts via social channels by sharing useful information or providing comments that add value.
- Understand how end users or key decision-makers use social media to help them engage with analysts and make purchase decisions. This is hard, really hard! Engagement within relevant communities can sometimes indicate views that end users have regarding particular technologies. Checking analysts’ reactions to these views is also important to understand what they think needs to be addressed.
- You have to accept that social media engagement with analysts will not necessarily result in their endorsement of your products/solutions. More often than not, you open yourself up for scrutiny and possible criticism. This means being prepared to address community concerns in real time to maintain credibility.
- The social media experience should give companies more information on the analysts they engage with and form part of the wider intelligence they gather about analysts, including their views on the market and trends they see.
We shouldn’t really be talking about social media for AR any more. We should consider it seamless, multi-channel AR. One where we curate information from multiple sources to build better pictures of analysts and develop mutually beneficial relationships.
