Analysts influence, as measured by HP - update

I admit I didn't expect a reply to my post on HP's measurement of analyst influence, but a reply I received (see the comment on the post). Hats off to Bob at HP for disclosing the rankings of their survey.

The question is: what influences HP's customers’ decisions to place a vendor on the short-list when purchasing products and services. The rank is:

1. Experience with Vendor
2. TCO
3. Price [statistically significant gap between top 3 and next 5]
4. Analyst Reports
5. Events
6. Vendor Internet
7. Analyst Verbal [statistically significant gap between top 8 and rest]
8. Financial Analyst
9. Marketing Collateral
10. Blogs/Social
11. Media Coverage
12. Direct Marketing
13. Advertising

Inital observations:

- how powerful vendor experience is. We always see competing vendors as strong influencers in any market, but I didn't expect them to rated top.
- financial considerations are key, but not necessarily the financial performance of the vendor itself (if the low ranking of financial analysts is indicative).
- events are much higher than I'd have expected.
- interesting difference between analyst reports and analyst advice in forming a shortlist.
- social media and blogs are on the radar, but still low.
- very low showing for the media
- why does any firm bother with direct marketing and advertising these days?!

Also, I'm surprised at the absence of advisory consultants and players in the supply chain (VARs, SIs, etc). It may depend on the markets being surveyed.

Still interesting stuff and valuable contribution to the wider influence debate. Thanks to Bob for sharing the info.

Bob asks the community to share its data - we're currently putting a paper together on the Influencer50 research. Anyone else?



The original HP announcement is here.

Influencers are old hat

When I was at the CMO Council Summit in November there was a panellist that said (and I’m paraphrasing here), “Influencers? We’ve been doing that for years. It’s old hat.”

I confess, the comment bugged me then. It still does. I was reminded of the comment when in Ghent a few weeks ago, while being interviewed by the Belgian press. Two of the journalists I spoke to suggested that companies have been doing influencer marketing for years.

I know what seeds the belief that considering influencers is well-established. It’s research like Overstreet and Katz & Lazarfield. It’s books like Dale Carnegie’s How to win friends and influence people. It’s Everett Rogers and the theory of diffusion of innovation. And so on.

There are two concerns I have in regarding influencers as old hat. First, if influencers are old hat, where are the influencer relations people? We have press relations and analysts relations. Whither influencer relations? In fact, influencer relations is just beginning to appear, in forward thinking companies like SAP and Wipro (check out the Wipro case study in the book).

Second, I actually think that influencers are old hat, insofar as they have always been there. Despite the talk about so-called “New Influencers” (bloggers and the like) it’s the “Old Influencers” that still dominate.

What’s new is the recognition that (a) we have a way of identifying them, and (b) we can then engage with them to improve marketing and sales.

That is very much "New hat".

Influencing competitors

I'm reminded by Josh Bernoff at Forrester about the influence of competitors. Josh asks, should you talk about your competitors? Absolutely, and I'd suggest that you should hope they talk about you.

In every market there are competitors (otherwise it isn't really a market), and there will be some influencers working for those competitors. So first, a reality check. It's unlikely that competitors will become your advocates (unless you can convince them into a partnership, for example). But remember that the influential competitors are influential on your prospects - that's the definition of an influencer. So you can't ignore them either.

Trashing a competitor publicly will be counter-productive, but neither are you going to endorse them. So what to do?

Josh suggests a middle ground. Talk about your competitors. Give credit where credit's due. Understand where your points of differentiation are, and emphasise them.

What is the point of this? The point is, you want competitors to talk about you. Given that they are just as unlikely to trash you, they will try to ignore you. They’d rather not talk about you.
Engaging with other non-competitor influencers has the effect of raising your profile in the industry, including your competitors. Because influencers are talking about you, your competitors will be forced to follow. Otherwise, their influence is diminished, because they are not seen as being in touch, or truthful.

This is particularly true for players trying to break into a market. It’s easy for the more established players to dismiss such competition. But they can’t do this if industry influencers are paying you attention. Importantly, talking about your competitors to influencers is very effective, because it aligns you with your competitors. What you are doing by engaging with influencers is creating a program to influence your competitors.

Your measure of success is simple. Do your competitors see you as a competitor? If yes, then that’s all you can do. If no, then you need to start influencing them.

Influencers don't buy stuff - the point is...

After Nick's debate with Paul Gillin at the New Comms Forum last week, Katie and others have fastened onto Nick's quote that "Influencers don't buy stuff." It seems that some have taken this to mean that influencers don't matter because they are not buyers. This is not the point.

The point is, firstly, that influencers are influencers, and are therefore important - by definition. They can't both be influencers and not matter - that's an oxymoron. So engagement with influencers is mandatory.

The second, and more important point, is that you need to talk to influencers in a different way that you might to customers. To put it crudely, you can't pitch to influencers.

It's not enough to "join the conversation" with influencers. You've got to know what to say, and how to say it. Saying the wrong thing is worse than saying nothing.

I think the missing link here is the identity of influencers. There may be "new influencers" such as bloggers, but they are not the totality of the influencer ecosystem. In any market the ecosystem will be heterogenous: in most markets we see a dozen or more influencer types.

So, step one is always to identify the individual influencers in your market. Only then can you think about what to say to them.

Reaching out to influencers

There are two major dangers making contact with influencers. One stems from ignorance, the other from deep understanding.

Firstly, ignorance. We had an experience where we identified the key influencers on a market segment to a client. As part of the service we provide contact details. The client then wants to make contact with those influencers. It sends out emails to every influencer on the list, telling them how important they are. Saying how much attention they will be paid.

The typical response: “Please remove me from your mailing list “

I used to get this fairly frequently as an analyst. In my coaching workshops I still use examples of emails sent to me by vendor marketing or PR folks, inviting me to events or meetings. If the offenders were lucky, I’d politely decline their approaches. Usually it was easier to hit the “Send to spam” button.

Bang. There goes your opportunity to engage an influencer. You really didn’t understand the value of the information you had. The 50 most important people on your market, and you spammed them.

The second danger is that you understand only too well how important these influencers are. Which makes approaching them scary. What if you upset them? Or they’re hostile to your firm?

There are some basic rules of engagement. The first is to pick up the phone. Most busy people these days get over a hundred emails a day, most of which go unread. A colleague of mine just received a reply to an email he sent 300 days ago! I told him he was lucky to get any response.

The phone, on the other hand, is direct, allows synchronous conversation, and demonstrates your commitment and approachability, and you can immediately address any questions or negativity in real time. Importantly, the phone is now not the norm, which is why it works.

The other key rule is that any phone conversation must be a peer-level discussion. You can’t contact influencers through a call centre, or use junior executives. They’re too important for that.

Only when you really know your influencers well can you send them email, to confirm discussion points or to arrange meeting logistics. Sometimes, the old fashioned ways of contact still work best.

How important are blogs? To me? To decision makers?

I’ve been busy. Really busy. Too busy to blog.

Is this true, though? How important is blogging to you? How important should it be to me?

The truth is, if you’re going to blog you should commit time and resource to it. I haven’t, lately. My bad (as they say). As luck would have it the projects we’ve been working on recently both had interesting perspectives on blogging.

The projects show that bloggers are now emerging as influencers in specific niche areas. A year ago it’s doubtful that any bloggers would have appeared on our top 50 list of influencers. Senior decision makers, in general, didn’t read blogs. This has changed, not in a big way, but blogs are now firmly on the list of decision maker reading. There are some infrastructure reasons for this. The adoption of RSS makes reading blogs easy nowadays, even for busy technology buyers. More likely, the adoption of blogging as a communications mechanism by already well-established influencers encourages adoption of the medium, which then prompts wider exploration of the blogosphere.

The main reason, we think, for growth in blogger influence is that the influential bloggers are getting out more. They attend conferences, they write articles in mainstream media, they consult and advise. In short, they engage in more ways than just on their blog. This, we think, is the primary reason why bloggers are increasingly influential.

What’s also interesting is that, in general, bloggers refer to other bloggers in a self-referencing cluster. This is why bloggers appear to be highly influential – they increase the number of links and references from blogs by increasing links and references to other blogs. For most, though, their influence is restricted to the blogosphere and few have escaped into influencing the real world, and real decision makers.

Hugh and friends discuss influence

Hugh McLeod does a regular podcast with Rabbi Pinny Gniwisch, Johnnie Moore and Mark Earls. This week they talked about influence.

Well, they did for about 10 minutes – for the next 30 it was mainly about success in marketing and creativity. Interesting, nevertheless.

Listening to these intelligent chaps solidified my view that influence is grossly being misunderstood and/or misrepresented. As Johnnie Moore said, there are two views. One is to think of “cool people” that tell the rest of us what to do. Find those influencers and success will follow. The other view is that life is more complex (duh) and success is often just down to luck, or random acts of traction (as Hugh puts it). (Echoes of The Wisdom of Crowds and Fooled by Randomness here.)

This is being played out on the blogs as Malcolm Gladwell versus Duncan Watts.

I think neither of these views is right – this polarisation masks the real complexity of influence, which is that it’s damned hard to pin down in what it is and how it works.

I can’t criticise these guys for saying it how they see it. In fact, I think the biggest culprits are consumer-facing WOM agencies that claim to be able to identify influential consumers or, worse, to position celebrities as influencers.

The podcast does actually acknowledge that influencers do exist, though these may be the people that “show up.” In other words, anyone can be an influencer if they are committed and diligent enough. I think that this is true in large parts.

A couple of their comments jarred with me:

“The Influential model is most often touted by people who would like to be seen as Influentials, or at least, friends of Influentials.” Ouch. In fact, I “tout” Influencer50's approach because I see it working with clients. Some influential people don’t even know that they influence the market, and are surprised on being told such.

The idea that once you find influencers it’s a simple task of pulling the levers and success follows. My experience is that although identifying accurately is complex, it’s actually the easy part in the process. Engaging with influencers is much harder.

It’s also cemented my view that influence in the B2B world is different from B2C, in that B2B lacks a strong sense of peer-to-peer communication. Business people don’t talk to others outside their organisation because of the lack of opportunity, or due to competitive sensitivities. Influencers act as proxies here, acting as go-betweens for firms. This role is critical, and underpins the entire consulting and industry analysis business models.

In B2C, sure, there are influential consumers. But I’ll bet that no agency can identify which fellow consumers are influencing me on my (ongoing) new PC decision. But they could identify which web sites, retailers and magazines I might consult. Fixating on consumers as B2C influencers is missing the primary sources of influence: the supply chain and value-adding influencers.

It’s clear to me that most firms looking for influencers amongst consumers are looking in the wrong place.

Does Oprah have influence?

A lot of the discussion on influence gets sidetracked by the allure of the super-influencer, or what I call the ‘Oprah Winfrey distortion’. The argument goes that super-influencers can make or break a product, or a market, by dropping the right or wrong names. Oprah is usually the cited case, where being named to her book club can rocket an author from zero to the top of the bestseller list. In the UK we have the Richard & Judy book club, which is similar in structure, if not in status.

Does Oprah really have influence? If so how does one tap it?

There’s no doubt that appearing on Oprah’s Book Club has a huge effect on a book’s sales. But is this useful information to a marketer or author? It would be useful if the right action to take was to call Oprah and ask her to read an aspiring writer’s novel. Except that isn’t the right thing to do. Why? Because (and here’s the ground-breaking insight) –

***

Oprah doesn’t choose the books.

***

Ms Winfrey heads a production firm called Harpo Productions, which employs a large team of producers and an even larger team of production assistants. This job spec was recently posted by Harpo productions (emphasis is mine):

Supports team and producer in daily production-including answering phone, getting lunch, opening mail, copying scripts and post-show notes, and other administrative duties. Production skills include research/resourcefulness-proficient in Lexis/Nexis, internet searches, DT searches. Must be resourceful in searching for guests, doing research, and obtaining footage. Reads all books considered to be selected with a critical eye. Maintains up-to-date knowledge of publishing industry. Consistently reads new books, searching for potential book club selections. Can suggest titles that are worthy candidates for upcoming selections. Can create system (charts, procedures, etc.) that are specific to the needs of the club/special projects production process. Charts and tracks show production and book selection process and can anticipate deadlines for the team. Must be able to consistently demonstrate solution driven communication. Communicates effectively with all Harpo departments demonstrating respect and professionalism. Team player works consistently to mesh well with supervisor, teammates, other department members and fellow staffers. Good phone etiquette.

If you want to get on Oprah’s Book Club, Oprah is exactly the wrong person to influence. It’s the new Production Assistant and her colleagues. They read the books, and make the decisions. I understand that Oprah reads the chosen book of the month, but that’s probably the only book she’s got time for (is my guess).

Believing that alleged super-influencers like Oprah, or Bill Gates, or David Beckham have real influence over the decisions that affect you and your firm can distort your marketing efforts, and completely misdirect your activities. Better to understand who really influences the decisions, and target those instead.

Of course, it’s much harder to find out who the new Production Assistant is, but that’s why knowledge of real influencers is valuable. It can give you a unique market insight which leads to competitive advantage.

Anything else is just wasting time and money.

Duncan Watts – influence killer?

There’s a bit of a stir going on regarding Duncan J Watts and his theories on how ideas spread. In particular he’s becoming known as the influencer killer because he says that influencers have no catalyst effect on the spread of ideas. Indeed, they have no special role in trends at all.

I’ve been following his research for about a year, since this was published. But the recent article in Fast Company magazine brings the issue to a head (and I think Clive Thompson has done a great job in raising the relevant issues).

As I see it, Prof Watts highlights some of the basic misunderstandings of influence. There is, frankly, a lot of nonsense and assumption talked about influence. Much of it stems from the Keller & Berry book The Influentials, which states that 10% of people tell the rest of us how to vote, where to eat and what to buy. I loved this book. I’ve read it three times. Nowhere does it say how Keller & Berry came up with the 10% number - why not 9% or 11%, or 1%. It is based on assertion, and the data in the book simply reasserts the 10% assumption. The Influentials is really useful in understanding how people gain influence in society. But it’s not useful in understanding who or where these people might be, or how to get them to influence markets on your behalf.

Another key misunderstanding on influence is that the people with influence are marked out through the roles they play, or the jobs they hold. Or worse, through the degree of celebrity status they hold. The consensus of research shows that we are more influenced by people with expertise than people with celebrity. And we are more likely to be influenced by people we know than by any other group.

Equally influencers don’t influence evenly through a decision process, as I wrote in this post and the book. And influencers aren’t influential in every category – influence is context-sensitive. So an influencer in buying a house may not have influence in buying a digital camera. This should be intuitive, but marketers sometimes get carried away by the promise of influencers that hold the keys to increased sales.

However, it’s clear that influence occurs in markets, and it’s attractive (I say essential) that firms understand how and what this influence is, and who are the conduits of it. So the final misunderstanding of influence is the assumption that it exists only within the consumers themselves. Clearly this is nonsense when you think about it (except marketers don’t tend to think about it). As consumers we are influenced by a host of people who are not (in the roles they play) consumers.

We’re clearly influenced by a range of people in different roles, some local, some national. What we do as decision-makers is to process the variety of influencers and then make a judgement. Not all influencers are successful in influencing every decision.

Consider the process of buying a house, something that most of us will be familiar with. You’ll be influenced by the house vendor and a real estate agent. Both have a vested interest in the transaction, so you do more checks. You’ll be influenced by any people that you know of within the area. You'll be able to check out whether a ‘neighbourhood watch' system is in place. You will consult published crime figures, possibly even calling the local police station for advice. You’ll refer to school inspection reports and league tables. Local councils will be quizzed for pending planning applications. The local head teacher may be critically important if the main attraction for the property is its proximity to good schools. Builders and other tradesmen may be asked for quotations for structural work you want to do.

I see this even more pronounced in B2B markets, where we can identify the individual people that influence a specific market segment. These are people that are not particularly obvious but undeniably carry influence in their area of expertise. B2B influence works in a different way to B2C, primary because B2B markets don’t have the word of mouth communication that B2C markets do.

But even in B2C markets we find that influencers in the supply chain and its ecosystem carry the majority of influence, with consumers having limited impact on the market as a whole.

I don’t believe that Prof Watts signals the death of influencers. But perhaps he has hastened the death of much of the nonsense that surrounds the notion of influence.

A list worth reading

I hate lists. Especially top 10 or top 50 lists. Those pointless (endless) TV shows of 50 best comedy/horror/soap/movie/. Top 50 CIOs, top 50 management gurus, etc, etc, etc.

Typically such lists are poorly researched guesstimates noting the bleeding obvious people, in some sort of non-obvious order.

But consider this list. I confess I'm not an environment zealot, but I found the people identified in the list really interesting, primarly because I'd never heard of most of them. Besides the obvious Al Gore and prominent politicans, there is an eclectic mix of campaigners, artists, religious leaders, journalists, scientists and farmers. It's the mix of backgrounds and perspectives that give the list its credibility. Clearly the result of deep research.

So it is with any worthwhile list. While researching influencers for our clients we often find that potential influencers don't appear on any 'obvious' list. Yet their influence, once discovered, is clear.

We've often looked for shortcuts through the research process, and have examined methods for automating influencer identification, but they all fall short in thoroughness and completeness. There's no substitute for deep research.

Research of WOM and influence - a warning

Guy Kawasaki points to an important article published in the December issue of the Journal of Advertising Research (JAR). The article is entitled Reconsidering Models of Influence: The Relationship between Consumer Social Networks and Word-of-Mouth Effectiveness. It looks at how influence works in wom, and whether common preconceptions of influence are valid.

Spookily, I gave a talk at the London WOM Forum yesterday, which was organised by WARC, the publisher of JAR. Copies of the journal containing the article were handed out to delegates.

The research suggests that a pyramidal model of influence, where the majority of influence is concentrated amongst relatively few, highly connected people, is incorrect. Instead, the paper says that "it is the moderately connected majority, not the much smaller number of highly connected people, who hold the greatest potential for influence.

It also says that, "contrary to conventional wisdom that points to ... blogging as indicators of influence," more altruistic behaviour, like product rating, carries more weight. The research concludes that influence is not an exclusive, top-down model. Instead influence is something we all share.

This article is important because it identifies some key assumptions being made in the market about influence and the way it works. Some of these assumptions are identified and challenged by the article: others are not.

Here are the assumptions I detected in the article, and thus probably quite common in the market. My list may not be exhaustive…

Assumption 1. We know what an influencer is. The paper cites ' influence' (or derivatives) 52 times but nowhere does it define it. This is really important, as the scope of influence frames all further discussion. It’s difficult to recognise or measure influence if you don’t know what you’re looking for. At Influencer50 we restrict influence to those effects that impact on a purchase decision.

Assumption 2. Influence is concentrated amongst an elite highly connect few. In fact there is a non sequeter here - that connectedness is somehow related to influence. The article challenges the view that influence is restricted to a small group, but it reinforces the view that influence is somehow correlated with connectedness. This is unproven (and I have big doubts, based on Influencer50 research).

Assumption 3. Influence is unidirectional. In fact, influence flows in all directions. You can observe this the next time you have a conversation, debate or argument.

Assumption 4. Influence online is a proxy for influence in the real world. The article is based on research sources from web site users.

Assumption 5. WOM happens just between consumers. It clearly doesn't - wom, and influence, occur throughout the supply chain, and outside it too. This has huge implications for the structure and measurement of word of mouth campaigns. It’s much easier (and more effective) if such campaigns are grounded within the supply chain.

We have never thought that influence lies with a few people. But it does cluster and there are certainly those with more influence than others. But who are those people? The only way I know is to research the market thoroughly and with a rigorous methodology and rationale - anything else is just guessing.

Guy Kawasaki seems to equate 'elite' with celebrity. In the book we say that celebrity is very unlikely to influence buying decisions, and there’s plenty of research to back this up. In the markets Influencer50 tracks – predominantly B2B markets – the closest we come to including celebrities is when notable management gurus or authors exert influence on purchase decision-makers. People like Geoffrey Moore or (ironically) Guy Kawasaki.

It’s good that influence is being researched, but we do need to be careful about exactly what we’re researching.

The "Wave" is picked up by Paul Gillin

I'm flattered that Paul Gillin, author of The New Influencers, has linked to the post on influencer roles.

I've just read The New Influencers. I highly recommend it to anyone struggling to understand the influence of social media (which is most of you, and me too!). If Naked Conversations got you started on blogging, then The New Influencers will make you see just how important bloggers can be.

Thanks, Paul.

Daft question #3 - Are bloggers influential?

I get asked this all the time - are bloggers influential?

The only polite response I use is to answer with a question - "Influential on whom?"

In a client project we did earlier this year, there were zero influential bloggers (on UK CIOs in large enterprises).

In a case study for the book, there were dozen of influential bloggers (on tech-focused database administrators).

So the next time you see this sort of nonsense, ask yourself "Influential on whom?"

Then worry about how you might measure influence (clue: it's not the number of links...).

Nike’s influencers

The Journal reports on Nike’s use of influencers in training shoes (aka sneakers). Nike is well known for its use of celebrities to promote its products – Michael Jordan is the best example. But it’s the growing use of “under the radar” influencers that is interesting in the article.

Some observations:

• The use of influencers applies both to B2C and B2B markets. The influencers, and the engagement rules, may be different but the basic concepts are the same.
• The use of celebrities is fraught with risk: the article cites several cases where celebrity sponsorship has had to be pulled hastily when the celebrity misbehaves.
• It’s vital to know your market segment. Tattoo artists are hugely influential in some segments. Graffiti artists in other segments. Bloggers in others, still. Remember that influencers don’t travel well between segments, including geographic-based ones.

Most importantly, targeting influencers works.

On the diversity of influencers

At Influencer50 we bang on about different kinds on influencers and why the world has moved away from focusing on journalists and analysts. And we don’t just mean bloggers and other social media users, which represent only a small proportion of influencers (especially in B2B markets). We’ve identified over 20 different types of influencer and probably are still missing some.

But why does this matter? Clearly, it matters if there are influencers out there that you’re not in conversation with. But why do influencers come from numerous sources? Why is there no small group of “super-influencers” that dominate a sector?

The reason is that diversity within an influencer community improves the overall functioning of the wider market. Having diverse backgrounds and agendas (and opinions, more than likely) means that a cross-section of influencers’ perspectives is maintained, which is good for broad-based discussion. It also means that the influence of a few personalities can be kept in check, lest bias be introduced. This is particularly important in decision making.

It turns out that a market, or a decision-making unit, will seek out a diverse array of opinions because it’s the wise and safe thing to do. It shouldn’t be a surprise, therefore, that influencer communities are not dominated by journalists or analysts, or any other type of influencer.

What’s difficult is identifying the less-than-obvious influencers. Identifying analysts and journalists is too simplistic and misses the bigger picture.

There are a couple of reference works in this area: The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki is very accessible, and the recent article in HBR on The Wisdom of (Expert) Crowds by Robert S. Duboff is interesting too.

Facebook: agenda setter or over-hyped?

Here's an interesting juxtaposition. Richard Holway points to Mark Zuckerberg from FaceBook topping silcon's list of agenda setters. Facebook represents the zeitgeist of this decade, towards social networking, with all the implications that has for influence.

Except that The Economist has today published a sceptical article on Facebook, questioning Facebook valuations and its role as a one-size-fits-all social network. There's also an interesting (if brief) examination of whether social networks exhibit network effects of their value increasing with usage (aka Metcalfe's Law). It argues that smaller communities are valued more highly, since they represent members with similar interests.

This contrast in views is relevant to discussions on influence, in two ways. Firstly, it helps inform the debate on how, or whether, Facebook and other social media can enable or enhance influence. Is the value of a social network based on its popularity or its focus? Can we predict which social networks will be populated by most influencers?

The second point on influence is that I'd consider both Richard and Tom Standage at The Economist as influencers on the adoption of technologies. Who's right? Who carries the most weight with technology adopters? Who's opinion will sway valuations? How can you assess the influence of two heavyweights with countering opinions?

Answers on a postcard, please...

Daft question #2 – Can we mail our influencers?

One of the things Influencer50 does for clients when researching their influencers is provide contact details of the top 50. It’s so that the client, or us if commissioned, can develop an outreach program. It’s difficult information to collect as some influencers are much more protective about their direct contact information - switchboard numbers are insufficient.

I was bemused one day by a client’s question that asked “do we own the list of contact details?” What do you mean “own the list”? I was flummoxed. Then the penny dropped – the client was thinking direct mail.

These influencers are the top 50 most important people in influencing your target market. And you want to send them direct mail – oh boy.

Outreach to influencers is like buying a birthday present for a spouse:

• It’s got to be wrapped up nicely, showing obvious care and attention.
• It’s got to be personalised, and suited for the specific needs/wants of the recipient. How would your spouse feel if you gave everyone the same present?
• It’s got to be planned and delivered on time – too early and it’s suspicious, too late and you’re dead meat.

Most importantly, you’ve got to know the recipient well. Now, most of us can’t hope to know our influencers as well as we know our spouses. But you should do your research to have some idea of what is important to each influencer. The last thing to do is to treat influencers as you do everyone else.

And don’t ever, ever take them for granted…

HP's Lusher on AR and social media

Carter Lusher, AR head at HP and ex-Gartner analyst, posts on the use of social media by analyst firms (synopsis: not enough) and wonders on the impact of blogging on influence from analysts. Great issues.

The current position, as I see it, is that bloggers have relatively little influence on CIO-level execs and business folk. They do, however, have influence in the more techie arenas. Big generalisations, of course, but it seems to hold for most markets, and makes a reasonable starting hypothesis. Demographics are also an important feature of socila media's reach (but this may be changing: if The Archers are podcasting, anyone can...). Country differences also exist (e.g. France is generally more blog-friendly...).

It's important to recognise that bloggers are often influential because of their "day job" and just happen to blog nowadays. Richard Holway is a good example. Blogging is a means of access, and it allows previously inaccessible people to gain exposure. So you find DBAs and developers emerging as influential bloggers - their influence is expanded out to the web, beyond the confines of their employers.

In researching case studies for the book, I discovered that blogging and other social media need to be dedicated activities, with time and budget allocated. Otherwise it's just dabbling, as Carter points out in IDC's approach.

The key question is always, influential on whom? If analysts are trying to influence CIOs then there is no immediate need to blog, because CIOs generally don't read them. James Governor is successful because he aims at the more techie audience, and is thus more influential on that audience.

The trick, then, is to monitor blog readership closely, and to respond when the sitation changes.

The value of referrals & references

Serendipity strikes again. I’m arranging a reference call between a prospect and a client, and then HBR alerts me to this article (subscription required) on the value of word of mouth (WOM) referrals. And then Brand Republic points me to a Robin Grant post on the latest Nielsen* research that shows, yet again, that people trust people more than anything else.

The HBR article is interesting not so much for the mathematics of referral value (yawn) but because it identifies a gap between those who say they’ll make a referral, and those that actually do so. Strangely, the higher value customers tend not to carry out the promise, whereas lower value customers are more inclined. Thus there’s a difference between a customers lifetime value and their referral value (which, the article states, could be significantly higher).

In the world of Influencer Marketing we often say that reference customers are the ultimate influencers. In the absence of direct experience of a product or supplier, a prospect will defer to a peer as a proxy for personal experience.

The Nielsen research and HBR article talk about referrals in a B2C context, whereas Influencer50’s focus is predominantly B2B, which typically involves references. The difference between a referral and a reference is timing, occurring at the beginning or the end of the decision process, respectively. But otherwise they are the same, a recommendation, with the same high impact.

In my experience, references in B2B are just as difficult to realise as referrals in B2C. Why is this?

• They’re generic: a reference is best if it maps closely to our own needs. That’s why banks like to get references from other banks. But most reference customers are used indiscriminately – case studies are notoriously bad for this approach.
• They get tired easily: the goodwill established in a reference client erodes quickly. You have to use them soon, and appropriately, or lose them.
• You don’t always have references: if you’re entering a new market, or have a new product to launch, you’re starting from scratch.

Understanding the whole ecosystem of influencers, not just customer references, is important for these reasons. You can use non-customer influencers to backfill your reference programs. This also means you keep your customer references fresh and focused for those situations where you really need them.

*The full Nielsen report is here.

Daft question #1 - Who owns the influencer?

My commercial director Scott sent me a link to this post by Pete Blackshaw. Pete is a founder member of WOMMA, of which Influencer50 is a member. So Pete must know what he's talking about, at least in a B2C context.

But the question - Who owns the influencer? Oh, please. This is so 1990s. I remember endless (and pointless) debates about who owns the customer and various organisations getting upset because their partner firms claimed customer ownership. Completely pointless, because NOBODY OWNS THE CUSTOMER. Customers are fickle and are as able and likely to change suppliers as change their underwear. Especially these days, when your competitors are one click away.

So, here we are again, ten years later. Same question, even more pointless debate, and the same answer:

NOBODY OWNS THE INFLUENCER

What a crazy concept. True influencers have their influence largely because they are not affiliated to anyone. In fact, the more someone tries to "own" them, the less influential they become. That's why rent-a-quote analysts lack substantial influence - they're paid for ("owned") by a vendor to endorse a product or position.

The only value I can see coming out of asking "Who owns the influencer" is the shock - similar to being hit in the face with a spade - of realising that, more than likely, the influencer owns you! Or at least access to your market (which amounts to the same thing).

Treat your influencers not as peasants on your land but as royalty, to whom you need to pay dues.

How analysts can increase their influence

It turns out that I’m becoming known for my “analyst bashing” blog posts and other writings. It's not a reputation I've sought. But I've made no secret that I think analyst influence is generally overstated, and that’s with eleven years of inside knowledge at Ovum and IDC. I’ve seen analysts with huge influence and those with very little. The real issue is, how do you tell them apart?

As Richard Holway told me:

Any fool can be an analyst
But very few get to be influencers.

Bill Hopkins’s AR text Influencing the Influencers maps out very clearly why a few analyst firms carry the majority of influence within the analyst community – I commend you to read it. As Bill states in the book, “Some influencers are more vital to you than others.” Though it’s completely obvious if you think about it, many vendors (and AR agencies) don’t think about it, and propagate blanket importance of analysts. PR agencies do the same with journalists.

I think a primary challenge for all analyst firms is to make their analysts more influential. The first question to be asked, as always, is who do they influence? A better way of understanding the relevance of this question is to ask another: who do vendors want to be influenced by analysts? Usually, vendors are trying to influence decision makers, so that they buy products and services. It’s logical, therefore, to want to know which analysts have influence over those decision makers, that can sway a decision in one direction on another. These are what Hopkins calls Deal Makers and Breakers.

Clearly, then, the more analysts are influencing decision makers the more influential they are to vendors. And while it’s risky to categorise all analysts within one firm together, a firm’s business model will point to the likelihood of influence on decision makers. So Gartner, with its end-user research focus and consulting business, is likely to be more influential than, say, IDC, which has a predominantly supply-side viewpoint.

Additionally, the closer an analyst gets to the decision maker, the more influence they will have on that decision. In my experience, this deep level of influence is delivered only through client engagements and consulting. So analysts that directly advise decision makers carry the greatest influence.

There is also an issue of when influence is being applied. Analyst research papers are used by end-users as guidance and pointers, sometimes in the development of shortlists. This occurs early in the decision making process. Consulting, again in my experience, happens later in the process where evaluations and recommendations are being made. At this point the stakes are high, and individual analysts much be sure in their understanding of both the needs of their client and the capabilities of the vendors they are judging.

I think that this is where many analysts, and analyst firms, cop out. They are unwilling, or unable, to help a specific end-user client make a final decision. They may claim that doing so would conflict with their vendor independence. Nonsense. Recommending a specific product to a specific end-user organisation does not conflict with independence, as long the same analyst is just as likely to recommend a different product to another client with different needs.

So I think analyst firms should tell their analysts to get out more. Talk to, engage with, and start influencing end-user decision makers. It’s the only route to real influence.

Handling detractors - What Ovum and IDC illustrate about Influencer Marketing

Last week I posted some thoughts on the current fortunes of my previous employers, Ovum and IDC. Both posts expressed my concern at their present situation and questioned their future direction, though for different reasons. The feedback I got from the firms, and from the wider community, illustrate some interesting aspects of influence. In particular, what should you do when a blogger (in this case, me) creates a negative view of your firm?

I should say at this point that I consider myself as an influencer in neither of the two firms. As a former employee, most recently from IDC, I guess I have some insight into the firms’ inner workings. But I doubt I’m affecting purchase decisions in a big way.

Anyway, this post documents the reaction from Ovum. I have to say I was surprised that Anthony contact li’l ol’ me, but flattered was I that he took the considerable time. Unfortunately his response, which I published in full with Anthony’s consent, was received by the wider community with more negativity, most notably by Richard Holway. Now Richard is an influencer – did Anthony’s response spark an otherwise sleeping discontent amongst Richard and his followers?

In contrast, I’ve heard not a peep out of IDC. Have they read my post? Maybe not. Do they care? Probably not.

There are three strategies to deal with a so-called detractor. You can (1) try to convert them, (2) surround them with other (more positive) influencers, thereby neutralising them, or (3) you can ignore them. Ovum is attempting strategy #1. IDC is practising #3 (by default or design).

Microsoft’s Blue Monster gig with Hugh McLeod is an example of #2, where MS are attempting to engage with its influencer (and wider) community to address the tide of negativity towards it. Smart move, executed creatively.

How would you handle a detractor?

Trouble at IDC too

Further to recording the troubles at Ovum, it turns out that my other former analyst employer is also having issues. IDC is focus primarily on hitting its profit targets, and having failed has made 5 people redundant. The significance of this is that redunancies included sales staff which, in a sales orientated organisation, indicates a sharp drop in revenues.


IDC is desparately trying to move up the thought leader stack and change its image as a "data-monkey numbers factory" (and I'm not the originator of this phrase). It has two challenges. The first is its poor depth of good analysts in Europe. Some are excellent, but most lack insight and strong opinions.


Secondly, it continues to struggle to penetrate the end-user market. Its Insights business units were loss-making to June last year (when I left IDC) and I doubt whether they've made a substantial turnaround now. Financial Insights longs to advise banks on IT strategy, but more usually advises vendors on how to pentrate the banking sector - traditional supply-side IDC fodder. There are claims that IDC is increasing in influence but influence on whom? Not end-user decision makers. As always, the key question is, who are you trying to influence?


This is at the time when IDC management seem to be on a charm offensive, inviting AR professionals (Duncan Chapple at least) to its flagship IT Forum, and lately addressing the IIAR. I wonder if anyone asked them about projected profitability...

The most important question about influence

It’s not about who has the influence.

The question is, influence on whom?

Most studies of influencers are lists of important or high profile people. Fair enough, except there is no discussion on the scope of their influence. What decisions are impacted by their influence? How can you tap into their influence? Are these influencers influencing my customers?

Here’s another example of a nicely researched and presented example, this time looking at the top 50 influential bloggers (allegedly). Have a look through, then count how many bloggers on list do you think are influencing your target market today. My prediction is, not many.

If you start Influencer Marketing by looking for people you think are influential you end up missing the point. It’s not for you to decide.

Instead, put yourself in the shoes of your customer. Who are they listening to? What do they read? Who are they following? My expereince is that you can only do this by asking them.

Otherwise, you’re just guessing, and probably guessing wrongly.

Influencers are people, not groups

At Influencer50 we always (with one exception) talk about influencers as individuals, not firms or groups. To me this is intuitive, but clearly not to others. I’ve now come across several clients and prospects of ours that think of influencers as groups, usually trade bodies or user groups, but also firms as a whole. Surely Gartner is an influencer, they say.

I’ve found two arguments to support the influencers-as-groups idea. The first is that scale businesses (those trading in volume products) need “scale” influencers. Trade bodies, such as the Institute of Directors and the Confederation of British Industry in the UK, are membership organisations. If we build a relationship with them, we can use their influence to establish a relationship with their members. Thus these groups are a shortcut route to market.

The second argument is that some groups or firms hold such influence in the market that we have to include them in an influencer programme. Quote something (anything) from McKinsey or Gartner and see the heads nod in agreement.

There is some truth in each of these arguments, and in general I guess I agree with the theory. The practice, however, is different. Influencer Marketing is about building relationships with people. You can’t build a relationship with a firm or a group or firms, or a membership organisation. You end up floundering around, influencing no-one, or (worse) trying to influence the wrong person.

Importantly, the influence of a group of firm is determined not by its membership or its client base, but by the individuals within the executive of the group or firm.

The mindset of marketers trying to influence a group determines the types of activities that are most likely to be pursued. Because you haven’t identified the key person or people with real influence, you are limited to buying your way into the consciousness of the group as a whole. Inevitably, activity becomes centred on sponsorship and events.

Unfortunately, buyers are rarely influenced by events, and even less by sponsorships.
When you try to influence a group or a firm you end up building a relationship with the events director, or the PR manager, or a sales rep at that group or firm. I know plenty of vendors that have a great relationship with their account manager at IDC, but who have a lousy relationship with the influential analyst covering their space. The events manager at Gartner is really well-known to vendors, but influential she is not.

The pursuit of scale is your enemy. I know a firm who is targeting the Institute of Chartered Accountants (ICAEW), in order to influence the finance director community. Fair enough - lots of FDs belong to the ICAEW. Except that the ICA is only one of three professional bodies to which FDs may belong – CIMA and ACCA are the others. By focusing on the ICA this firm is missing out on two thirds of the potential influential associations in the influencer ecosystem.

Attempting to influence a group consumes a lot of resources. Instead, why not identify the one or two key people in each group, and focus on them? By identifying and targeting the key people you focus your resources narrowly for maximum effect. Why put your eggs in one basket?

The essence of Influencer Marketing is that you market to influencers with the intended outcome that they then influence your prospects. In other words, it’s not enough to identify an organisation that might have influence, and pay them to host an event for you. You have to identify the people within that organisation that carry the majority of influence, and market to that person specifically. In that way, you can manage the outcomes in a direction that will influence your market. A word in the ear of a prospect by an influencer is worth 1000 event attendees.

The other flaw in the “groups” theory is that not all people in that group are influential. This may seem obvious, except that the tech industry is full of sweeping generalisations about the influence of Gartner (and, increasingly, Forrester). Firstly, not all Gartner analysts are influential – it depends hugely on their levels of interactions with end-user organisations. I know this because I’ve seen it first hand at IDC and Ovum. Secondly, not all influential Gartner analysts are influential in the same degree. We know markets where three of the top ten influencers are Gartner people. We also know of markets where the top-ranked Gartner chap is 25th on the list, with four non-Gartners ahead of him. Influencers are specific to a market segment, and you need to know who’s influential in your segment.

Group influencers are usually a cop-out – they’re for the lazy. It’s easy to say Accenture is an influencer on IT architecture and design. It’s much harder to identify the partner within the UK that has the real influence on your customers.

(The exception to the “influencers are individuals” rule are events (conferences, trade shows, etc) that are influential by virtue of the quality of the speakers and the decision-making profile of the audience/attendees. Suffice it to say that very few events are influential these days – decision-makers don’t often attend events. As an order of magnitude, if you have one influential event in your market you’re lucky. If you’re sponsoring more than two I pretty much guarantee you’re wasting money.)

Silicon's Top 50 CIOs

I’m not a fan of top 50 lists. I think they are usually meaningless and pointless, naming obvious people in obvious companies.

Not so the silicon.com Top 50 CIOs. This identifies the top IT executives in the UK, across private and public organisations. The list makes interesting reading, including less obvious organisations such as Oxfam and Hampshire County Council.

As I recall, the average tenure of a CIO is around 18 months, so the chaps (and they’re almost all male) must appreciate some profile-building to aid the hop to their next post.

In the meantime, I pity them. The number of unsolicited calls from eager salespeople will reach industrial proportions. The CIO community is the most sought-after group of prospects. But appearing on the list means that these CIOs are even less likely to respond to marketing in traditional forms.

More on the influence of blogging

Who’s got time to blog? It’s been 2 weeks since my last post (forgive me for I have sinned…). But I’ve been busy doing … errr … work. Two major deliveries coinciding, plus recruitment and web site redesign has distracted me somewhat, and diverted me from the blog task (which I tend to fit in where I can anyway).

Importantly, I haven’t had the time to read other people’s stuff, which is how I form opinions, so nothing to rant about.

I’m coming to the impression that people who blog either don’t have regular (or full) jobs, or that blogging is their job. It’s no coincidence that most blogger give up after six months – they just don’t have the time. When Scoble et al tell us that you’ve got to blog often (= daily) it’s no wonder that most succumb to normality.

This then limits the influence that blogs can have. It’s the people who have “proper” jobs – consultants, analysts, regulators, academics, etc - that carry most influence. From Influencer50 research, we see that few blogs have influence, and those that do come from other sources. Influencers blog, more than bloggers influence.