More Cool Vendors: A Chill Wind?

May 6, 2013

I was interested in the four news items in my alert system. A large consulting firm, which I think “invented” the notion of “business intelligence”, identified four companies as “Cool Vendors.” I was not familiar with any of these firms: Cloud Sherpas, Glue Networks, Nintex, and Reveille.

Here’s a snippet from the Reveille news release I saw:

The Cool Vendors in Content Management 2013 report provides IT and business buyers with innovative solutions to help them to create, manage, and access their information better. The analysis focused on providing solutions to support content on-the-go, improved collaboration capabilities and more effective management of the applications delivering the content.

And I noted from the Glue Networks’ item this passage:

Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

There are many lists generated, including those from one of the publications for which I write a for-fee column. My questions include:

How does a company get on a “list”?
Are the lists useful if the organization generating the list does not have some confidence in the listee’s business viability?
Are these lists of most use to insurance, real estate, and other commercial enterprises trying to sell the listee something?

When I read lists for anything, now more than ever I feel a chill marketing wind, not the hot breath of customer buzz. If a reader can shed light on these lists, please, use the comments section of the blog?

Stephen E Arnold, May 6, 2013

Comments

Comments are closed.

Search the site
Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive

Stephen E. Arnold monitors search, content processing, text mining and related topics from his high-tech nerve center in rural Kentucky. He tries to winnow the goose feathers from the giblets. He works with colleagues worldwide to make this Web log useful to those who want to go "beyond search". Contact him at sa [at] arnoldit.com. His Web site with additional information about search is arnoldit.com.