The Role of Independent Research Analysts With Jon Arnold

0:07 Politely Pushy. Welcome to Politely Pushy. I’m your host, as always, Eric Chemi. Today, I’m joined by John

0:12 Arnold. He’s an independent technology analyst focusing on communications, VOIP,

0:17 telecom, all of those great topics that I’m excited to dig into today. John, thanks so much for joining me here.

0:24 Hey, you’re welcome, Eric. It’s uh really good to be doing this with you guys. Uh we haven’t done one of these

0:29 before, so uh really we’re trying to you know reach a broader audience and there

0:35 are many who know me and but there are plenty who don’t. So uh this will help uh address the latter. Right.

0:41 You know I I’m taken back by your client roster. Anyone can go to jay arnoldassociates.com see the client

0:47 roster. A lot of big names there. When I see you know Huawei on there I see Skype

0:52 I see Vonnage. I see Zoom. I see Ring Central. Cisco via what are they bringing you on to do when they say hey

0:59 John we we want you to come work for us writing you a check what do they want from you? Yes. So the world of being a technology

1:07 analyst is mostly about what we would just simply call thought leadership

1:12 where what they value from us is our industry-based expertise and knowledge

1:18 because we work with and speak with and attend events from across the industry.

1:24 So most of these vendors include us in their analyst relations programs. So we

1:29 get a pretty good, you know, insider view of these companies and they trust us to, you know, keep the good stuff

1:36 close to the vest and share the public stuff with our take on things. And so

1:41 where they will bring in an independent analyst is usually to create some form

1:47 of independent thought leadership, Eric. And that usually takes the takes you know the shape of things like white

1:54 papers, case studies, articles, interviews,

1:59 uh webinars, uh interviewing executives, being on panels, making presentations to their

2:06 customers. All these are different scenarios where we’re giving kind of an industry-based view on things. So our

2:13 our role and we are not hired to you know tout a company’s particular

2:18 products. So you’ll never see me talking about oh this is what’s so great about Cisco or Microsoft or Zoom. Um it’s more

2:26 about what value their technologies bring to address the business problems that the buyers are faced with. So

2:34 ultimately our we see our role uh as educating the marketplace with objective

2:39 analysis and by association the vendors come off looking good because we’re not

2:45 really here to you know wave their flag so much as focus on the value that their

2:50 technologies and the broader technologies in the industry bring to the business decision makers and buyers.

2:57 Do you find that after they’ve hired you, all of a sudden you see more value in their product than maybe you had seen

3:04 in the past? Oh, that that could happen. Sure. Sure. Like things that, oh, I didn’t know you

3:09 did that kind of thing, right? Or that you had uh a certain type of customer base or that they have these kind of

3:17 interesting maybe partnerships or integrations with other tech players that might be below the radar. Maybe

3:23 it’s a bit of the secret sauce that they have, that kind of thing. Um, so yeah, sure. When it kind of exceeds

3:29 expectations, I suppose, uh, you know, you got to be tempered in some of these things and there’s no harm in genuinely

3:36 saying, “Oh, by the way, this is something I really think they’re doing really well or I really like this

3:41 feature.” So, you know, we we we can certainly share that opinion. Um, and

3:46 that, you know, there’s a fine line with all this stuff. And, you know, journalists, as you know, Eric, you know, you guys are in the PR world as

3:52 well. journalists have to, you know, they go to school to learn how to do these things. Um, so they know kind of

3:59 where the the, you know, Chinese walls are or aren’t. Um, analysts, just as a

4:05 point of distinction, you don’t go to school to be an analyst in the technology world. You kind of grow into

4:10 the role. So, we are not governed by uh a set of principles or accreditations

4:16 that say a financial analyst has to have. Um, so that’s a bit of a gray area. And the only way you can have

4:23 longevity doing this kind of work is you gotta show, you know, you got to be

4:28 objective. You got to have integrity. You know, you can take advantage of a lot of things. You know, leak out some

4:34 stuff that’s supposed to be NDA, but you know what? You only can do that once and then once they’re on to you, you know,

4:39 you kind of get you’re out. You know, insider element to what we do that’s built on trust, right? Is there pressure

4:47 though to push the objectivity a little bit in the favor of the client, in the favor of the

4:53 of the person paying you? Right. You’re never going to come out there and say, “Hey, their product’s bad. They’re not a

4:58 great pick. They’re the third best solution. I’d always go with the other two guys.” Like, you can never do that if they’re paying you. Well, that’s

5:05 that’s that’s true. But on the other hand, it’s it’s all about like any other kind of consulting type of arrangement.

5:12 It’s all about, you know, setting expectations up front. So, um, when it

5:17 comes to like scoping out a project of some kind, you know, you usually you got to set the ground rules straight ahead

5:24 up front. Uh, where they know going in, I’m not going to do this, I’m not going to say this. Um, where it gets dicey

5:31 though, I will say, Eric, is especially in large company situations,

5:37 it’s usually, as you would know too, there’s too many cooks. So even though the first group of people you talk to,

5:42 they get it, they they they got your back on all this stuff, soon as other departments, line of business people,

5:49 maybe another layer up of management comes in after the fact and they say, “Well, no, that’s not what we want.” And

5:56 then it gets a little more difficult where you kind of have to defend your ground and say, “Well, still, you know what? Uh that’s not what I was brought

6:02 in to do.” And so we have to kind of, you know, we we got to manage the expectations that way. Um, so it’s it is

6:10 tricky stuff, but generally speaking, they won’t come right out and say, you know, we disagree with your findings and

6:16 we’re not going to publish them. I have never come across that before. Um, and

6:21 again, if you’re doing a good job, they’re not going to. Um, you know, and sometimes, by the way, Eric, some

6:26 vendors are, whether you want to call it, open-minded enough or confident enough to say, you know what, we want

6:33 you to find the holes. We want you, you know, to do it in a, if you do it in a professional manner, we’re okay with

6:39 that because we want our partners and customers to see that we’re we’re not perfect, but you know what? We’re still

6:45 doing most of the important things, right? So, there is a little bit of that, but uh you start talking with

6:50 like, you know, the public companies, you know, they have all kinds of public market pressures to deal with and

6:56 earnings to meet and all this stuff. They’re a little more sensitive and not surprisingly they will also be a little

7:02 more, you know, middle of the road in terms of the things they want an independent person to be doing.

7:09 What about being independent? How does that change your approach, your business

7:14 plan, your model as opposed to, hey, the big guys have that brand name, you only have John Arnold. You’re not Gartner,

7:20 Forester, IDC, that kind of thing. Exactly. So our little tribe, Eric,

7:26 there I can count them on probably two hands of how many people who are truly like independents and we’re pretty much

7:32 all one man operations or one woman operations. Um there’s another layer above us which would be like the

7:38 boutique uh practices which have a smaller group maybe four or five

7:44 analysts in one little team but the bigger ones independent analysts as a

7:50 rule of thumb have generally come out of that world. So I got my kind of training

7:55 in this industry working for Frost and Sullivan. That’s where I learned my kind of basics of the industry. Um so their

8:02 model is built on what’s called what we subscription sales where they get their clients to buy uh commit to an annual

8:10 usually subscription for a set number of reports and maybe consulting hours. So,

8:16 so that’s where they get the big fat fees and then we go to work as analysts fulfilling the requirements of that

8:23 subscription. Um, independent analysts as a matter of course, we generally don’t publish research. We’re not in

8:30 that business of writing industry reports. Um, I’m a market researcher by trade. So, I I have actually a pretty

8:38 pretty deep skill set in that discipline that I don’t know any other analyst who has. Um, but generally speaking, uh, I

8:46 will do custom market research for vendors and those work out really well. And does that custom market research get

8:51 published or does it just go to them privately? Well, it I always say you can get a lot

8:56 of value uh, doing a little of both. So, in other words, the whole idea is you’re creating to me I tell clients there’s

9:03 nothing more valuable than your own research data. Proprietary data has the most value and leverage for your brand.

9:10 And that’s how I try to sell them on market research. And I say, but you know what? Yes, obviously you’re going to produce results that go to the the

9:17 market in general. You can also kind of slice and dice it to say top level findings. You know, that’s what we write

9:23 about and no jitter kind of the deeper dive stuff. We we save it just for maybe our best partners to share with them.

9:30 And then there’s going to be a strategic element. The stuff that you don’t publish. It’s more for top management

9:35 for their strategy, right? Because you could do some, you know, uh perception testing. You could do some competitive

9:42 uh you know comparisons from what the market is telling you that you don’t publish but they they use it as a

9:48 benchmark you know to see how they stack up uh what product features they should be dropping or adding you know the

9:55 strategic kind of things that you do but uh yeah so there’s a range of these kind of things so but the project mix is

10:02 pretty broad it’s writing it’s speaking it’s all you know video like these kind of things webinars uh podcasts There’s a

10:10 whole range of things, but we could probably move on a little bit to this, Eric, because the things are changing

10:16 there. The the market is kind of responding to the big AI story in many

10:22 ways. What what have you noticed in terms of your day-to-day? How has it changed the most?

10:29 Well, day-to-day, uh, so it ties into what you asked earlier about, so how do

10:35 I do my business as opposed to a big analyst firm? Uh, because I’ve been

10:41 doing it a long time. This is my 20th year as an independent and most independents have been doing this for a

10:46 while, the relationships are are kind of pretty mature, right? So we have not

10:52 just the personal relationships but also the ongoing uh relationships with with a

10:57 lot of the vendors where there’s you know there’s going to be turnovers of product managers all the time. But if

11:03 you know the reputation is good and the work keeps coming um it doesn’t really matter who’s there as long as the right

11:09 kind of people who are there who value what we do. Not everybody wants to work as you say with a single practitioner.

11:17 They want the brand and in many cases it’s worth it for them to pay for the Gartner or the IDC, you know, slapping

11:23 the label on there for legitimacy in the market. Where the sweet spot for smaller

11:29 guys like me is often more in the tier 2 type of market, mid-market players who

11:34 aren’t going to spend the six figures and and up with the Gartners of the world to buy that branding. For them,

11:41 that that’s just too rich for their blood. So they’re gonna they have less money to spend. They can get a much

11:48 better return working with smaller independents like myself who are kind of at that level in in our ecosystem,

11:55 right? We’re not, you know, we’re the smaller guys. So yes, small vendors could really help from our services, but

12:01 they generally don’t have the budget to work with analysts. But mid-market is a little bit, you know, they’re big enough to have budget and need to work with

12:08 analysts, but they don’t necessarily have to hire IDC or Forester for every little thing. So, there’s room there for

12:15 for independence as well. What are they most concerned about clients right now? Is it is it AI? Like

12:21 when they bring you on right now and you’re having a conversation, let’s say this this past summer, what’s the biggest issues and worries that you’re

12:28 hearing about? Well, for them, um, it’s it’s certain, you know, it is everything is about AI right now and and the big

12:35 thing for the vendors is they’re all telling similar stories. So, first of

12:40 all, as you, you know, in the messaging world, you know, how do you differentiate, right? That’s always a

12:45 challenge because everyone’s using the same handful of a, you know, AI companies who are, you know, the

12:51 hyperscalers really kind of own the whole landscape. So, you know, the it’s really hard to to stand out that way.

12:58 So, their challenge is a differentiating and b it’s the adoption rate. So in

13:06 other words, what they’re putting out into the market um very AI kind of first

13:11 AI forward kind of solutions and value propositions is in most cases pretty far

13:19 ahead of what the company the buyers are willing and able to handle, right?

13:25 Because a lot of them are still taking their first steps with AI. They just can’t go whole hog into a full-blown AI

13:32 solution or platform that kind of transforms everything that they’ve ever done. That’s that’s too risky for them.

13:38 Um, and tied to that, of course, is well, what’s the ROI? Am I getting tangible results that make a difference

13:46 and justify this path? Because AI, like a lot of things that are in the cloud,

13:52 you know, it’s that opex model where the spigot never turns off, right? That

13:58 that’s why it’s kind of you start to miss the days of premased technology where you make the big outlay up front

14:04 to buy the hardware and the capex and you then you own it, right? And then that seemed easier. That made more

14:10 sense. Easier. Yeah. So, it’s like leasing versus buying like with a car, right? Long-term, you’re

14:16 going to pay more in the cloud. Yes. But because cloud is constantly evolving,

14:22 especially with AI, the value proposition grows over time. It doesn’t remain static. Like PBX, it provides the

14:30 same value to the business on day one as it does 15 years or like the car just the car gets worse. The car is not improving over time.

14:37 Yeah. You can get although to be fair because cars are now basically software on wheel.

14:42 Yeah. As long as the the software keeps getting refreshed and updated, you are still able to add some forms of new

14:49 value that kind of offset a bit of the regular depreciation that comes from the hardware itself from the hard asset of a

14:57 vehicle that’s always going to get older and wear with wear and tear. So uh that’s a challenge because uh there’s

15:04 there’s a few angles to this but the main thing is is that the big question

15:10 that vendor that the buyers often have with AI is like where do I start? So what do you tell them where where do

15:15 they start? So and it’s the same prescription that I think any other analyst would give but it is really you

15:21 know you know first of all start small you know take on small projects that are

15:26 fairly riskfree and are internally facing not customer facing because

15:32 you’re going to make mistakes that’s interesting a lot of people want to push out customerf facing so people can see public companies look what we’re

15:40 doing exactly and there are by the way I said earlier about being a public company yeah there are some optics to this where

15:47 a lot of times what happens is it comes from the top when senior management just dictates we got to do AI they don’t

15:53 understand it but the message comes down to the business level and they say oh boy we have to get something going that

16:00 to keep them happy so there are a little bit of some optics and politics involved there which is tricky but for us it’s a

16:07 start small be internally facing like focus on automating processes from workflows and things like that that if

16:14 it goes wrong no one’s really going to know, just you know your own staff know you’re taking baby steps along the way

16:19 and it will get better, right? And then the other thing of course is to instead of being so focused about the shiny ball

16:25 of the technology itself, go to the problems. what are your business issues and let’s break it down

16:32 from there because AI can be used for any use case but you’ve got to

16:39 understand what you know what is the problem set um what are the hiccups and and shortcomings of how we’re doing

16:46 things now and then people like us help educate them on well a AI can be used

16:52 for you know x y and z things that because we’re fairly deep in it we kind of know the use cases is and they may

16:59 not have thought of it that way because it’s very easy to take a single-minded

17:05 approach with AI is say oh we’re going to automate so we can save costs okay

17:10 you can that can be a res on debt for AI and often it is but that’s not the only

17:16 thing and research will show that as much as businesses get benefit of reduced costs with AI they also get new

17:23 revenues because when it’s used in different ways AI can help actually improve customer experience, customer

17:31 acquisition that you know the things that drive the the top line which is what management really wants to know

17:36 about right? When you give answers that they don’t want to hear when you when

17:41 you say here’s where you should start and they think well we don’t like what you said because you know we are senior

17:47 management we think this what happens usually do they come around to your point of view or does does no one ever come around to your point of view? Oh,

17:53 well, okay. So, I’m not usually in those positions where I’m trying to drive the business strategy in terms of what they

18:01 need to do. It’s more about why you need to do these things. Um but I in the

18:07 cases where I have been in those kind of conversations it’s very it’s very kind of muted because they um they will be I

18:16 would say differential but you know they’ll be accommodating because they respect the independence of an analyst

18:21 in the room. Um, but behind closed doors, you know, the conversation might might get very different, but I’m not

18:27 I’m not there to tell them that they’re wrong or they’re gonna their business is going to go broke in in two years if

18:34 they don’t get on the bandwagon. I’m happy to tell them those things, but that’s that’s not what they’re hiring me for. I’m not there to be their strategy

18:42 advisor um on the whole AI story. That’s, you know, they’re going to bring in the McKenzies of the world, the

18:48 bigger companies to do that. But I suppose as you say this, Eric, geez, now you’re making me think about I should be

18:54 carving a path for more like advising SMBs on their strategy. You know, that’s normally not the role that an analyst

19:01 plays. But as I said before, there’s no guidelines about what constitutes an

19:06 analyst these days. So there’s nothing stopping me from doing that either. And sometimes it’s not just me who would do

19:13 it. I would gladly partner with others you know who have complimentary expertise that really makes it a

19:19 stronger story right because it’s like no one knows everything about this stuff

19:24 and you know the starting point is we need to admit that first and that’s why you bring in consultants and experts to

19:30 fill those holes right but it it’s very much a thing about you know it’s

19:36 technology is important but at the bottom line is still about what is it that’s going to make your business more

19:42 successful. So, I tend to think in terms of more of being a business consultant than a technology consultant. There’s

19:49 lots of engineers out there who can go under the hood and really break it down and get into the details and the coding

19:55 and the LLMs and all that stuff, but that’s I’m that’s not me. And frankly,

20:00 there’s so few data scientists out there that that expertise is pretty rare these days. We’re all kind of figuring it out

20:06 as we go. How do you win business? Let’s say you said there’s, let’s say, 10 of you guys out there that are true independents.

20:13 You got the boutiques, you guys. How do you say, “Hey, you should hire me, but not the other nine guys.” Like, what’s

20:19 your edge? What’s your niche? I’m sure you know the other nine guys, but like why would they pick you and not, you know, B through J, the other options?

20:26 Well, so for for starters, because we’re such a small group, we’re pretty colleial. Um, we travel in packs because

20:33 we’re if we’re all covering the same technologies, we generally get invited to the same conferences. So, the event

20:38 I’m going to be at, for example, next week, most of that crowd will be there, too, because we’re all doing similar

20:44 things. It’s not so much like I at least don’t really chase or get

20:50 involved in like competitive bid situations. That’s pretty rare for the independent consultants. It’s really

20:56 more about the relationships. And so, the businesses that know me and want to

21:02 work with me, they there’ll be a couple of things. They will come to me and they may they may solicit a couple of

21:08 different pitches from others as well. That’s fine. But generally they one of the issues a lot of them have is um

21:15 because our pool is so small, it’s it’s just it’s just good business to mix it up. In other words, going back to the

21:22 same analyst over and over and over again makes it look a little too cozy, right? And the optics of that if you’re

21:28 I see right. So it’s just good business on both on both sides. Um so it’s

21:34 generally more about you build the relationships uh personally with the

21:40 vendors and you know all at different levels by the way um and and in time

21:45 because we’re such a small group they get to know who’s really strong in which areas. So like they may say so maybe one

21:52 analyst really has a lot of expertise in say the Europe market or the Asia market and they say oh well we’re doing a

21:59 product launch in Asia you know who they they’ll figure it out they’ll know which analyst really you know lines up nicely

22:05 with that particular market then they’ll understand that and we all have a common level of expertise but then there’s a

22:12 lot of niche things within those that say hey you know what uh this guy knows contact center but this guy doesn’t know

22:19 UCaaS we need someone who knows both. Okay, let’s talk to those analysts and they they can figure it out. And you know,

22:25 there’s the ones who know you, right, Eric? Like your business too, but then there’s the leads, the inquiries that

22:31 come in my website and then that starts whole new relationships. Um, where they

22:37 kind of the kimono opens a little bit after a call or two and then they say, well, here’s where we’re really struggling. It’s often, you know, how

22:44 can you help us? Much like, how do I start with AI? Because frankly, and I’m really glad this is why we’re doing

22:50 this, Eric, most people don’t understand the hell of anything what an analyst does. Um, I have a bit of an explainer

22:57 video about it on my website. Oh, really? That that means that means so many people must have asked you what

23:02 you did that you thought, I need to make a video because I’m tired of answering this question over and over. Yeah. I mean, to this day, none of my

23:09 friends know what I do and my my mother’s never understood it. I don’t blame her. She’s, you know, but you know

23:14 what I’m saying? It’s like it’s hard to put a finger on and say, “Well, this is it.” So, I have tried over the years to

23:19 articulate some of that via my website. Um, the people in the tech vendor world,

23:26 they they’re very aware because they have analyst relations program. So, there’s no schooling needed for that,

23:32 but often it will be like maybe the smaller companies who haven’t really worked with analysts much before. Um, so

23:38 this is where different conversations happen because I have to show them first what it is that an analyst can do and

23:45 can’t do. Um, we get lumped in with PR a lot. They think that we are going to write them press releases. They think

23:52 they’re we’re going to write articles about them and pitch them to magazines. No, we don’t. That’s not what analysts

23:58 do. So, there’s a lot of education that’s needed to say here’s what we do. Here’s what we don’t do. And then it

24:04 gets a little clearer to figure out, okay, I get it. let’s talk about the things you can help us with and you know

24:10 can you propose a program or propose a you know an article or something that would be beneficial. How do you work

24:17 then with the PR firms or the companies? Because obviously there’s a big analyst relations program. A lot of of the

24:23 vendors, they want to get in front of you, right? They want to get you to write about them. They have their PR team, their AR team that are trying to

24:29 reach you. How do you best work within that ecosystem? What do you want to see? What do you want to avoid?

24:35 Well, sure. So, for companies that have established AR programs, like AR is kind

24:41 of like your point of contact. um you you have to kind of like respect the process so to speak and say okay well I

24:48 will I will work with AR because they get a lot of the inquiries from within

24:53 the lines of business right and they say okay well we got someone you know for this product launch is going to need

24:59 some support and over the next two quarters we’re doing a marketing rollout campaign we’re going to need some assets

25:05 this is kind of getting into the shop talk of what they need and then they’ll say okay well we need some stuff we’re going to do this internally and then for

25:12 other things. We’re going to go outside and then we’ll work with an analyst there. So, that’s how that relationship

25:18 goes. So, there’s AR, analyst relations, but there’s also, as in your world, Eric, there’s PR, which there’s a bit of

25:25 a there’s some overlap in those two spaces, but again, PR can look to

25:31 analysts to help them with their clients for in a variety of ways. And and a

25:37 typical one, of course, is getting cited in press releases, right? where they’re going to have some news to get out there

25:42 and they gota they want to you know give us some cred more credibility have an analyst provide a quote for that. So

25:49 generally the analysts who are working with those companies are familiar with the products and stuff and the PR

25:55 agencies generally know who those analysts are or if they don’t they should come to us and say hey could you

26:00 provide a quote for this we know you’ve been working in this space. So that’s one way and another way too of course is

26:07 it’s like everything else it’s who who you know and who knows you. So within PR when you’re pitching new clients um

26:15 knowing you know coming to them and saying we have a stable of analysts we work with regularly who know your business that adds value to your story

26:22 and um also within the practice. So, uh, PR firms, I I mean, they’ve come to me

26:28 off and on saying, “Hey, we’re trying to beef up our tech practice in particular in the customer service arena.” Okay.

26:35 Well, then I’m your guy because I know that space really well. I can help you accelerate your closings, targeting the

26:42 right companies, getting the right approach, and, you know, obviously building me in either to your projects

26:49 or to have me, you know, almost like subcontract me out. And you know there’s a business side to that, referral fees,

26:55 all those kinds of things, right? So there’s there’s all kinds of angles and there’s a lot of intersecting for sure.

27:01 I like what you said earlier because there’s no license or like journalism

27:07 ethics or financial stock analyst types of rules. It is a little bit of a free-for-all. Like every analyst can

27:13 kind of do what they want. Some of them are former journalists, right? Some of them are former whatever. They they’ve

27:19 all gotten here different ways. So they’re they’re playing by different sets of rules. Yes. And that brings us to another topic

27:26 which we should at least say speak for a minute and that’s influencer. So in the digital age in the social

27:32 media age um influencers carry a lot of weight obviously you know uh I still

27:38 don’t understand you know to me in the consumer world they’re just they’re just spokesman for products. They’re not they

27:45 don’t have any particular expertise per se. Some do, but you know, they’re basically in it to make money. Um, the

27:52 influencer persona is becoming stronger and stronger in our world, technology

27:57 vendors. So, what used to be just called an analyst event is now in a lot of

28:03 these companies framed as an analyst and influencer event. So, there are two

28:10 different camps. Um, and some are really good influencers, but that their real

28:16 expertise is how they amplify other people’s messages. They are not cont I

28:21 hate that word content creator, but they’re not thought leaders. They don’t produce their own original material or

28:26 research. But that’s fine because there’s still a lot of value in delivering reach for a client.

28:32 Are you are you annoyed by them? You seem a little you seem a little bothered by them. Well, the bother part is this is my

28:38 mantra for this stuff. All analysts by definition are influencers,

28:43 right? Because people trust us. But not all influencers are analysts. So I have no

28:49 problem with influencers who are positioning themselves the way I’ve been describing. As you say, it’s a little

28:54 gray. So when influencers start to kind of take on the persona of an analyst as

29:00 an industry expert, um, we we know who the experts are, so they’re not fooling us. But there are

29:06 some who will try to kind of you know wear that hat and and pass off as

29:11 are these social media focused influencers? Are there people who look like are they writing white papers? What

29:18 is the influencer non-analyst person pushing out there? What kind of Yeah, it’s well the non-analyst type is

29:25 really it they’re really in the business as I say of reach amplifying messaging but just on social media where are they?

29:31 Yeah. Well, no. Yeah, it’s through the so that’s their that’s their bread and butter, right? It’s social media channels driving engagement, LinkedIn X,

29:40 you know, whatever, Instagram, Tik Tok, all and they’re all that’s all legitimate stuff. The market needs this.

29:45 Are vendors paying them? Like are vendors paying them like they’re paying? Of course they are because what’s what’s happening? Coming back to what I said

29:51 earlier, Eric, about how do the vendors differentiate, right? If they’re all using very similar

29:57 AI capabilities. So one answer to that is I’m a MBA marketing guy so I view

30:03 everything through the lens of marketing and branding and all the vendors now are

30:08 becoming much more conscious of their branding how they’re going to market and

30:14 for them that reach that influencers deliver is is gold. It’s like it’s

30:20 really really valuable to them. The content is almost secondary sometimes.

30:26 So, we’re kind of we have to wear both hats, right? I have a reach, organic reach

30:32 from my various followings. That’s great, but I don’t have a million followers out there, but an influencer

30:39 knows how to reach a million people. So, there’s place for both, right? And um I

30:44 just find it’s a little harder for the buyers to know the difference and to think, oh, well, I’m going to these

30:51 influencers are talking to me now and they seem to know this stuff really well. I think we’re going to hire them to do some stuff and they may never have

30:57 worked with analysts before and that’s totally fine. This is all part of how we learn because also too, Eric, you know,

31:04 I being in the space a long time, it wasn’t the digital world with social media 20 years ago. It wasn’t. Now it

31:12 is. And the people in the buying decisions, I’m sure you’re seeing this too. They’re younger now and they’re

31:18 digitally savvy. They don’t think in terms of the way we do who have analog.

31:24 They’re gonna just go look on LinkedIn or Twitter and some quick web articles and maybe that’s enough for them to make their decision.

31:30 Yeah. And this ties back to to AI because why do I need to hire an analyst to write something for me if Chat GPT

31:37 can give it to me in two minutes? And that’s a legitimate argument. But then of course, what do you tell people who are now

31:43 you’re competing against a free product? Yeah. Well, I say listen, you know, this is the thing with the younger generation

31:50 is is moving more into these decision-m and buying roles. This is the world they know and for them

31:57 it will be good enough, right? But for the more experienced, more savvy buyers,

32:03 end users, professionals, people like us in the analyst world, we know the difference a mile away. The vendors who

32:10 typically hire us know the difference a mile away. So they’ll say, “Okay, yeah, we can spit out a few of those.” But if

32:16 I really want something that’s got a real, you know, you can tell it’s the real thing, they know. And so you can

32:24 not to fool people once or twice because this is going to become the norm. It just is. But is this going to all go away? Like

32:29 in 20 years, will a job like yours disappear because it’ll all just be AI and influencers? 20 years,

32:35 five years, two years. I it’s gonna it’s gonna I I’ve seen in the last six months even

32:40 I’ve seen enough of a shift where you know we all have to your business too we

32:45 all have to keep reinventing moving forward because the criteria for the buyers keeps you know drives everything

32:52 and as they they follow certain things that that translate to value for them

32:58 that’s what they’re going to do and that’s kind of how the market how have you reinvented yourself then in the last couple of years or how will you

33:04 reinvent in the next well I’m certainly you know, you you get the cues and you see how a lot of analysts are responding. Um, people

33:11 don’t read as much as they used to. The in-depth critical analysis is a smaller

33:16 and smaller audience for that. And that’s where I have to kind of gravitate more and more to um I’m not going to

33:24 have success trying to write for a broad audience uh because ChatGPT can probably

33:29 do that pretty well and they won’t know enough to know any better. So that’s fine. There’s a market for all of these

33:35 things. So we just have to be a little more focused on our value prop. Um um

33:40 using the tools maybe a little more progressively. You know what that means is

33:46 more video, maybe more audio, less longer form writing. You know,

33:51 consumable stuff that’s easy for people to kind of pick up on and run with. But you on the other hand, like your

33:57 business too, you can’t give it all away either. You got to make a living. So this this pressures on all these sides,

34:04 you know, it’s for independence like we don’t live off of subscription fees from big clients to just we can just ride on

34:11 that. We have to per project usually project fees. Well, there’s both. There’s a mix of retainer kind of engagements that it’s

34:18 more ongoing which is always the best because again that’s about the relationships but then there’s certainly

34:23 more yeah transactional stuff where you know an inquiry comes in hey we need a white paper. Well, okay, I can do that.

34:30 But what you really want to steer them to, and your business is no different, is okay, I can give you that white paper, but if we talk a little bit more

34:37 about your your business, your marketing objectives, your, you know, the longer term things, there’s other ways that I

34:44 could provide value and help you be more successful in what you’re trying to do. Then that conversation becomes a little

34:50 more strategic, right? Less transactional. Oh, John’s trying to upsell us. He’s trying to upsell us all the time. All

34:57 the time. I’m not downselling you, that’s for sure. I’m never downselling. Yeah. Um, take the cheapest option. No.

35:04 It’s like, you know, you don’t want a white paper. You just want me to put one tweet out. That’s it. You don’t want you

35:09 I’ll give you less than a white paper. Yeah. Well, what should what should um

35:18 let’s say someone who’s running an AR program who’s trying to reach you, right? what’s the you know number one

35:25 thing good and the number one mistake to avoid in terms of them coming to reach

35:30 out to you say hey I’m you know now running AR on behalf of blah blah blah you know Telco uh company whatever it

35:37 is right what do you what do you want to hear from them what do you not want to hear from them oh well what I what I want to hear from

35:43 them this is presuming I’m not already working with them yeah let’s say they’re trying to get in

35:48 front of you maybe they’re trying to get you to write about them and they don’t want to pay. Amazing. Just just just get a meeting with us, you know, but we

35:55 don’t we don’t have money for a client. I’m doing that next week with a UK company. It’s just that’s exactly what

36:00 we’re doing. I said, well, it’s kind of like the first one’s free. I It’s a two-way street. When when they come out

36:07 to AR, as you say, they want coverage, right? They want someone to make them look good. But what we’re really trying

36:12 to do is say, “Okay, we need an initial meeting, an initial briefing. um I need

36:17 to learn more about your business and you got to learn more about my business because what you’re thinking is

36:24 perfectly fine but you need to understand you know there’s a broader kind of menu here that you could

36:30 consider because there’s a lot of different things an analyst can do. So just cuz you say we need an article uh

36:36 that’s fine we can do that but so the fact that they are coming to me that’s an opportunity for you know, A, to

36:43 position what an independent analyst can do for them versus you know a firm you

36:49 know that kind of thing. because they may not know enough of the difference. And secondly, because we’re a small

36:54 tribe of independents, my job to them is to say, “By the way, we’re a small group and the way you’re going to get good

37:00 value from us is you talk to each of us and you’ll get a comfort level pretty quickly of, you know, who you think

37:05 might be easy to do business with and help your business, right?” When they say we, let’s say we want an article, where’s that article going?

37:13 Well, this is a good one because just like we have there are this screen here for folks watching there’s a split

37:18 screen one on each side. So I write the I do the writing PR does the publishing

37:25 like this I I tell clients there’s two ways to do it. I have friendly relationships with a handful of the

37:31 pubs. So yes I can I can get articles in magazine like in trade journals in our

37:37 spaces. So that’s something I bring to the table to say, “Okay, I know for sure XYZ pubs will take what I give them, but

37:46 I’ve got to conform to their editorial guidelines, which means I don’t talk about your company specifically. I can

37:52 talk about you along with others to show what the broader market is doing.” That I

37:58 can do. But do people say, “Then why am I paying for that then? Why am I paying for you to talk about my company?” And it works. Sometimes it works. It’s

38:05 it says by association your company is listed in there and say you’re not in the top three well that people will say

38:12 oh I didn’t know these guys were doing this that might work and that has worked it bumps them up to the bigger uh you

38:19 know the bigger bucket basically yeah but the ones who want that I this the answer is very simple if if you just

38:26 want someone to talk about you and and how great your company is that’s sponsored media right

38:32 I don’t do that you go to the publisher You pay them a crapload of money and they and they just say you can write

38:38 whatever the hell you want, right? It’s an ad. Yeah. Yeah. We label it as sponsored. Everybody knows right away even though I

38:44 could be the one writing it or even ghost writing it. Uh that’s the understanding going forward. But I don’t

38:50 do that. That’s not my business. I would be out of business if I if that’s what I did. So that’s kind of one approach. The

38:56 second approach though that I tell them, I say, “No, we really need some solid name recognition in here.”

39:02 This is where the PR companies who have the good media relationships can come in and say, “Okay, here are the pubs that

39:09 we know we can get you into.” But there’s a process. We have to pitch the idea first to the editor, and they have

39:16 to approve it, and only then can we come back to you and say, “Okay, I can get you into Forbes. I could get you into

39:23 Fast Company.” Those are, you know, more consumer oriented pubs. Um um but here’s the guidance from the editorial team

39:31 that says this is what you have to write to. Um and generally speaking, that’s probably not going to line up well with

39:36 what they had in mind. Unless the PR company knows how to pull strings or has friendly relationships with the editors

39:43 and say, “Hey, listen. This client really needs some help. Can you just do me this favor?” Maybe that’s that’s between you guys. I’m not in that

39:50 business. Right? But it’s again the relationships with the media. But that original idea of let’s say you

39:56 write an article, the company’s paying for it, but other people will get mentioned in that article. You find that

40:02 that will still work and everyone gets a win out of that? Well, I find that’s the most ethical most ethical way to do something that’s

40:10 going to at least get the company’s name associated with the topic. I mean, that’s what I can bring as an analyst.

40:16 There are analysts though, Eric, I will tell you, that will happily shill for the for the vendor. They’ll take the

40:23 money and they’ll do it. And sometimes they can get it published, sometimes they won’t. Uh I come from the

40:28 publishing world, so I know how that game is played. So, I’m sensitive to that and I really respect the need for

40:35 editorial oversight because otherwise the other solution of course is the only

40:40 way I can do this is I’ll write the article and I can say a lot of good things about you in a balanced way and

40:46 you publish it on your website and then you guys let it ride and push it out there on LinkedIn on your socials.

40:53 That’s perfectly fine because you’re the publisher. You can do what the hell you want with it, right?

40:59 But it loses credibility. It doesn’t have the cache of being in a no jitter right or channel futures or whatever.

41:06 Is it true and just a couple questions. Is it true that the big the big research

41:11 firms is it going to be paytoplay? Like is a small firm ever going to get anywhere trying to just be hey write

41:17 about us you know we can’t afford to be a client but we just you need to know that that we’re important in this sector.

41:23 Yeah. I mean, you know, uh, you know, look, it’s not my, it’s not my place to

41:30 to, you know, to put down any any of these companies, but, you know, there there is always is and will be a

41:37 pay-to-play element to some of this stuff, but I will not I’m not going to categorically say that’s how it works. I

41:44 mean, I saw elements of that when I was at Frost and Sullivan, and it’s no different with the other companies that

41:49 of course the incentive is, you know, only work with companies who can be paying clients. Um, but there will

41:56 certainly be cases the fit has to line up where, say, say an analyst firm,

42:02 whether it’s big or boutique, is initiating some new coverage in a in a sector that they haven’t done much

42:08 before. So, they got to get friendly with a company. They got to know who’s out there in cases like that and say,

42:13 “Hey, you know what? You fit into this new area of coverage for us. So, let let’s talk to you. We can’t guarantee

42:19 what we’re going to do for you, but you fit the profile of what we’re working towards.” So, that that could work out

42:25 well. But if you’re trying to say, you know, well, yeah, all you talk about is is Microsoft and Amazon and Google and

42:32 we’re like the little pisser guy at the bottom of the pile. you’re never going to get their attention and they’re not going to give

42:38 you any attention because you’re too you cannot afford to play at that level. I

42:44 mean, it’s all about it’s all about budget. So, you have to find every size of vendor has to find their kind of

42:50 level of where they can get the best bang for their buck because they can throw good

42:55 money after bad with the big firms, but if those vendors aren’t important to those big analyst firms, it’s only going

43:02 to go so far, right? So, it’s a matter of where the fit is. If you need them more than they need you, well, you’ll

43:09 pay the money to go to go there. And that every every business works like that, right? So, you mentioned you’re

43:15 independent. You talked about, you know, you at your firm. Who are the and associates at Jay Arnold and Associates?

43:21 Who are these characters? Are are those characters around? No, I’ll be very very direct though. There are no like formal associates. So

43:30 the way you know to position an independent you know single consultancy that way it’s really to say that as

43:37 project needs dictate I could bring in a network of people who are in my circles

43:43 to say okay well I need someone who’s really strong on mobile networks so I I

43:48 don’t have that background but I could partner with another but you know the person who does you know the guy place. Yeah.

43:54 Yeah. So yeah, I I and I never pretend to be an organization. You know, all of

43:59 my peers who are independents operate exactly the same way. You know, I don’t think they call themselves associates,

44:06 but we’re all in the same boat. If we get a bigger project, okay, we can bring in we can share the work, right?

44:12 Will you work with some of the other sort of competitors in your space? You said you’re collegiate. Will you guys team up?

44:17 Yeah, of course. So, some of them Yeah. Uh there are also and we’re not this is not exclusive to our little little

44:23 corner but we have a few there are industry like collectives. So for example, I’m part of one that’s called

44:29 BC strategies that I’ve been tied to for a very long time and it’s a virtual

44:35 collective but again the idea is the strengthen numbers of saying under one umbrella that we you know we’ve we’ve

44:42 got a you know we have like a pool of maybe 20 maybe 30 independents who have

44:48 various levels of expertise in various things. Um the brand hasn’t been leveraged probably as big as it could be

44:55 but it’s a pretty unique mix of say you know if you want all the thought leader types in one place this is the home for

45:02 it. So uh I contribute content there on occasion and we do pitch group projects

45:09 on occasion as well where say hey say you have a program you want to run maybe it’s a marketing campaign and but you

45:16 don’t want to have one analyst name associated with everything you’re doing right we can bring you a pool and say

45:21 let’s bring three or four of them in and then you can have a nice little rotation all under our banner that’s not a bad

45:28 value proposition right that makes sense that makes sense this has been fascinating John I I’ve

45:33 learned a lot. I I found while you were talking, I found the video on your website about Let me uh explain what my

45:39 job is on this video. So, anyone can find it on the homepage of Jay Arnold Associates.com. Yeah. So, is Yeah, that I think that’s going

45:47 to be replaced soon by a new thing that went up today, actually. But Oh, wow. Are you talking about I’m I’m holding a

45:53 tablet. Yeah, you’re holding the tablet from a few years ago. All right. So, this is that’s pretty old, but that was one of those. Tell us

45:59 what you do, John. Is it okay? I’ll explain it now. If you really want to have some fun, Eric, if you don’t know

46:05 me that well, I’m I’m comedy is my kind of comedy and music are the things that keep me going. Um, if you care to do it

46:13 or certainly steer your the listeners here on that website landing page next to that is another video with a kind of

46:21 a stuffy looking guy in a suit. It’s or would you rather listen to this guy talking about side fumbling with a

46:26 straight face? Wow. It’s about two and a half minutes and this guy, I don’t know how many

46:33 takes they did, but it goes nonstop. The most incredible string of babel speak

46:38 you’ve ever heard. And he does it all with a straight face. And it it’s

46:44 hysterically funny. And in other words, what I’m trying to say is if you want engineers

46:49 to school you in technology, this is what it’s going to sound like. But if you want clarity, if you want business

46:55 level that you actually can do something with, talk to me. Otherwise, you know, this guy, you know, is is your

47:01 alternative. I’m going to look at the Rockwell encabulator. The encabulator and the side fumbling.

47:07 It’s the funny. It’s one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. I don’t think anybody ever looks at it, but I I leave

47:12 it up there because I think it tells the story. I’ll click on it as soon as we’re done. John, thanks so much for the time today. I really appreciate it.

47:18 Me, too, Eric. Really appreciate it, too. All right. Bye-bye.

47:23 Thank you to my guest and thanks for listening. Subscribe to get the latest episodes each week and we’ll see you

47:29 next time.