Industry analysts are a key influence on IT vendor selection decisions, especially when the vendor does not have a huge installed base to provide sole-source add-on purchases.
Most vendors do not understand their influence and do not know how to use this infrastructure effectively. Sadly, the same is true of most (not all) PR agencies, who often do more harm than good by treating analysts like a variation on the press.
My company, Kensington Group Inc., specializes in helping vendors work with this key public. We offer several regular reports, services and database products, as well as custom situation analysis and consulting.
We can be found on the Web at
http://www.kensingtongroup.com, or my e-mail link works. (As you might suspect from a posting here, I'll fly anywhere for an initial discussion.)