Analyst firms and consultancy services are invaluable resources for a growing business.
They offer reports on industry research, technological trends, and competitor dynamics. Being featured in an analyst report can boost brand visibility and credibility, particularly among enterprise clientele.
Plus, these reports serve as benchmarks for procurement teams within larger organizations and directly influence their purchasing decisions.
Gartner and Forrester instantly come to mind when you think of analyst firms. In this blog post, we’ll see how they compare so that you can choose the best one to support you in your data reporting and analytics.
Forrester vs. Gartner: Whose Data Reporting & Insights Are Best?
- What Is Forrester?
- What Is Gartner?
- Forrester vs. Gartner: Features and Services Compared
- Forrester vs. Gartner at a Glance
- Forrester vs. Gartner on Reddit
- Meet ClickUp—The Best Alternative to the Forrester vs. Gartner Debate
- Level Up Your Data Reporting with ClickUp: The DIY Alternative to Gartner and Forrester
Summarize this article for me pleaseWhat Is Forrester?
Forrester is a market research and advisory firm that offers various services, including research, consulting, and events. The firm serves industries such as business services, high tech, financial services, consumer, government, manufacturing, healthcare, communication, and utilities.
Additionally, it offers many certification courses on leadership and research. Forrester also conducts a year-round event program with an active community called The Analyst Relations Council for industry analysts and AR professionals.
Forrester also creates free resources such as podcasts, webinars, and blogs to educate businesses about the market and technology trends and how they influence businesses.
Forrester features
Let’s look at the many services Forrester offers as a data reporting and insights firm that can help you and your business make informed decisions.
Market research
Forrester market reports are tailored toward helping businesses understand customers’ pain points and purchase behavior. These reports allow companies to build relevant products and services and develop effective buyer engagement strategies.
Additionally, Forrester offers insights into the priorities, preferences, and behaviors of four distinct Ideal Customer Profiles (ICPs):
- Technology professionals (CTOs and CIOs)
- Marketing professionals (CMOs and CCOs)
- Sales professionals (CROs and sales managers)
- Customer success and advocacy professionals.
Furthermore, with the Forrester Decisions service, depending on your buyer persona and target market, you can access tools and frameworks to understand your customer segments better. Some of these frameworks and tools include:
- Performance Optimization Model: With this model, you can analyze the sources and performance levels across IT systems within your organization
- CX Business Case on a Page: This can help your CX teams make persuasive business cases for budget reviews
- Izola: This genAI bot swiftly generates answers from Forrester’s extensive research and reports
Consulting
You can opt for Forrester’s consulting services if you’re looking for specialized guidance. This allows you to partner with a seasoned Forrester expert who can work with your team on any strategic initiative.
You can also work with Forrester consultants on one-time initiatives such as webinars, workshops, and thought leadership content.
Consulting engagements with Forrester can help your team create strategic frameworks, pick the right technologies, standardize marketing capabilities, and demonstrate the business value of your SaaS marketing strategy.
Events and community building
Forrester hosts multiple in-person and virtual events throughout the year. Your brand can sponsor an event, or you can participate as a speaker. Such engagements provide opportunities for networking, community building, and knowledge sharing.
These events cover marketing, sales, customer experience, technology, risk and management, and more. Forrester also hosts annual awards ceremonies, localized events, and workshops for The Analyst Relations Council members.
While event registrations are open for everyone, Forrester clients do get a significant discount!
Forrester pricing
Custom pricing
Summarize this article for me pleaseWhat Is Gartner?
Gartner is widely known as one of the world’s biggest IT research and advisory firms. It provides helpful information technology insights, reports, and tools for leaders across various sectors such as IT, finance, human resources, customer service and support, legal and compliance, marketing, sales, and supply chain functions.
Gartner is also well-known for its Magic Quadrant reports, which evaluate vendors in different technology markets based on their completeness of vision and mastery of execution.
Additionally, Gartner publishes Hype Cycles research, which monitors the maturity and adoption of specific technologies over time.
Gartner features
Let’s explore the breadth of Gartner’s services, ranging from in-depth research to consulting, offering support for navigating the complex business landscape.
Market research
Apart from its annual Magic Quadrant reports—that compare competing vendors on set criteria—and Hype Cycles research reports, Gartner also releases market intelligence guides on emerging trends and technologies, helping CXOs thrive amidst new challenges.
The research firm also offers tools that complement its Magic Quadrant reports. These include:
- Critical Capabilities: This provides you with more information about a provider’s products and offerings by extending the Magic Quadrant analysis
- Digital IQ Index: This proprietary research tool allows you to measure your digital performance against industry competitors, helping you prioritize investments
- BuySmart: This tool supports procurement managers with pre-defined scoring templates and checklists as they evaluate vendors
- Product Decisions: This is a fantastic resource for your product managers and marketers to help them understand their product analytics, create product roadmaps and go-to-market strategy, and prioritize features based on market and competitor intelligence
Consulting
If you’re looking for in-depth consulting, Gartner’s team of experts can provide strategic insights and practical solutions tailored to your business needs.
Many of them are former CXOs with a distinguished track record in consulting, which adds credibility to their role and makes them the perfect advisors.
Additionally, Gartner boasts a team of 2200+ experts across multiple functions, ensuring easy collaboration with the right individuals for your team’s high-impact campaigns.
Gartner provides three kinds of consulting services:
- Benchmark analytics: With these services, you can monitor your progress against market standards and compare them with those of your competitors
- Strategic consulting: These insights equip your team with industry-specific best practices and propriety data to make the right decisions
- Optimization: You can select suitable products and establish a robust IT infrastructure with contracts tailored to your needs, ensuring risk mitigation
Events and community building
Gartner has a year-round event program across multiple geographies, such as the Americas and the APAC and EMEA regions. Since these events are open to exhibitors, you can enjoy plenty of opportunities to showcase your brand.
Some exhibitor packages also include a speaking slot as part of the arrangement. This can be especially useful since Gartner doesn’t accept speaker proposals through its event website.
Apart from these events, Gartner also runs two communities:
- The Gartner Peer Community: This is a free community where you can connect with peers, receive recommendations, and stay updated on market trends
- Evanta: This is an invite-only community for C-level executives where they can build connections, participate in local networking events, and engage in knowledge-sharing with other executives
Gartner Pricing
Custom pricing
Also Read: 10 Best Gartner Alternatives to Develop Solid IT Strategies
Summarize this article for me pleaseForrester vs. Gartner: Features and Services Compared
While both Forrester and Gartner offer invaluable insights and guidance, understanding their features is essential if you’re looking to leverage a firm’s expertise. Let’s compare their attributes to appreciate their offerings better.
Forrester is best known for:
- Market insights: Get comprehensive insights into industry trends, competitor analytics, and market dynamics to make strategic decisions with confidence
- Customer analysis: Understand your customers’ preferences and pain points to build products that improve customer experience
- Peer networking: Connect, collaborate, and share knowledge with peers and professionals via communities and events
- Thought leadership content: Collaborate with Forrester experts and produce original, thought leadership content that makes your brand stand out from the rest
Gartner is best known for:
- Industry-leading research: Get valuable insights and predictions across various industries and technology domains
- Vendor evaluation reports: Get access to a structured approach to evaluating vendors within specific market segments
- Emerging tech analysis: Gain a better understanding of both the potential and risks associated with emerging technologies such as genAI
- Strategic consulting: Partner with Gartner experts to develop data flows, strategic frameworks, roadmaps, and more
Now that we’ve seen what each firm is best at let’s see how they measure up against each other.
Analyst reports
Forrester and Gartner are both renowned for their analyst reports, which assess vendors across various categories based on predetermined criteria. Reports are refreshed yearly to ensure realignment with new product updates and technological advancements.
Both these reports play a huge role in establishing a brand’s credibility and influencing the purchase behaviors of procurement teams.
Gartner Magic Quadrant
Let’s start with Gartner’s famous Magic Quadrant reports, available for over 40 functions, including data governance, SaaS, and HR. These reports classify competing vendors into four categories based on the ‘completeness of their vision’ and their ‘ability to execute’:
- Leaders: They lead the market well and are well-positioned for tomorrow
- Visionaries: They have the vision, but their execution is not consistent
- Niche players: They cater to a small segment but do not out-perform others
- Challengers: They execute and dominate well but lack the vision for market evolution
Gartner assesses vendors based on how it views the market and validates the results with user reviews to draw bias-free conclusions. The Gartner Critical Capabilities report, coupled with the Magic Quadrant research, gives readers additional perspectives into each vendor.
However, you can’t purchase individual Gartner reports. You must become a Gartner client before you can access them.
Forrester Wave
Unlike the Gartner Magic Quadrant, the Forrester Wave series focuses only on the Software-as-a-Service(SaaS), hardware, and related technology landscapes. Vendors are scored based on their current capabilities and market presence.
The series also provides spreadsheets readers can use to create custom shortlists and draw up vendor evaluations. This is a great marketing analytics tool for product marketers, giving them a better understanding of how they compare to their competitors.
What makes Forrester stand out is its unbiased approach toward vendor research. Not only does it score vendors on pre-defined criteria, but it also invites clients to demo their products and customer references.
Moreover, Forrester denies consultancy services for vendors currently being considered for the Forrester Wave reports to ensure transparency and avoid conflict of interest.
You can purchase individual Forrester Wave reports at $2995 each.
Gartner Magic Quadrant vs. Forrester Wave: The Winner
While both reports have advantages and limitations, Forrester Wave emerges as a clear winner as it’s more transparent in its methodology and allows individual report purchases, thus making them affordable.
The Gartner Magic Quadrant and the Critical Capabilities reports make for some of the most detailed research available on the market. However, a Gartner membership can cost tens of thousands of dollars annually and might not be affordable.
Consultancy services
Now, let’s examine which of these two analyst firms provides better research and advisory services.
Gartner
Gartner caters to various industry segments. With tools such as Gartner BuySmart and Digital IQ and its leadership expertise, the firm offers top-notch insights and value to its clients.
Forrester
Forrester aces the customer experience segment of their services. The firm focuses on customer research and provides two valuable services:
- Workshops and webinars to educate in-house teams about the pain points and purchase behaviors of their ICP
- Strategic advice on running marketing, sales, and IT functions
Gartner vs. Forrester: Which consultancy is better?
We’ve got a clear winner—Gartner. With all its proprietary methodologies and services, it serves as a one-stop solution for all business strategy needs.
Events and communities
Let’s move on to compare Forrester and Gartner’s event services. Which research firm benefits clients better?
Gartner
The primary audience for most Gartner events comprises C-level and senior executives, whether it’s their annual conferences and summits or invite-only communities, such as Evanta. Also, while their in-person events are paid occasions, they do run free webinars frequently.
Gartner also hosts many regional events in Spanish, Japanese, and other languages, tailoring their events to a worldwide audience.
Forrester
The primary audience for Forrester events comprises experts from the customer experience and technology sectors. Forrester has a more varied event roster that addresses diverse topics such as CX, B2B marketing, and security and risk.
The Forrester community—The Analyst Relations Council—also runs many peer networking events, and its coveted annual awards ceremony is a favorite among brands.
Gartner vs. Forrester: Who does events better?
Both Gartner and Forrester cater to different target audiences. However, Forrester not only organizes events and awards ceremonies but also allows speaker proposals. Forrester is a clear winner here since they have a more focused and engaged community.
Summarize this article for me pleaseForrester vs. Gartner at a Glance
| Feature | Forrester | Gartner |
|---|---|---|
| Offerings | Market research Consulting Events | Market research Consulting Events |
| Key sectors/industries covered | Marketing, CX, Sales, Technology, Government, Digital Business, Product Management | Financial Services, Government, Healthcare, Education, Manufacturing, Retail, Energy, Telecom |
| Pricing | Custom pricing Trends reports start at $1495 Wave reports start at $2995 | Custom pricing Single reports not available |
Summarize this article for me pleaseForrester vs. Gartner on Reddit
We went to Reddit to gauge what Redditors thought about the Forrester vs. Gartner question, and the general opinion was mixed.
While Gartner seemed to be the more popular analyst firm, people expressed concerns about the high costs of their services.
“I was a Gartner client for a while. The briefings are amazing. Their quadrant rankings were pretty lacking. I was asked to do some reviews on a big purchase I made of equipment and I found the questions they were asking were totally missing the point in a lot of cases. The people who wrote the review questions weren’t technology people but just analysts [sic].”
Some users also find the Forrester Wave reports (though cheaper) to be less informative when compared to the Gartner Magic Quadrant.
“I have used both and I vastly prefer Gartner. Forrester is cheaper but I tend to see a step down in the quality of analysts I speak to compared to Gartner, but they were still okay. They put out some decent research and the waves are solid but not quite as detailed as the Magic Quadrants.”
Other users appeared skeptical of the accuracy and relevancy of both reports, wondering if these reports were biased toward their clients or marketing departments that interact with their analysts more closely.
“Gartner basically occupies an “IT confirmation bias” niche that allows leadership to justify purchases to their bosses or boards. If people are using it for things outside that, it isn’t going to be valuable.”
Summarize this article for me pleaseMeet ClickUp—The Best Alternative to the Forrester vs. Gartner Debate
Organizations such as Gartner are expensive and work better for enterprises. However, if your company is in an early growth stage, a better option would be to manage market and competitor analysis independently, without depending on an external firm.
That’s where data visualization tools such as ClickUp come into play. ClickUp can help marketers swiftly organize their data and extract meaningful insights.
Plus, an added advantage here is cost savings as you won’t have to invest in an external analyst or spend money on costly subscriptions.
ClickUp can aid your procurement teams as well. Add your reports to ClickUp and use ClickUp Brain to visualize data using AI to find practical, actionable information.
Let’s explore how ClickUp can help marketers with data analytics and report generation.
Find answers with ClickUp Brain
Finding helpful information can be challenging when you have multiple dashboards and reports to juggle. This is where generative AI tools such as ClickUp Brain can help.
Marketing teams can use ClickUp Brain to ask questions, summarize reports, and create tables to extrapolate findings. Moreover, if you host meetings to discuss these reports, ClickUp Brain can be a trusty assistant, helping you create meeting minutes and transcripts.
Standardized data reports with templates
Setting up a structured format and framework for your analytical findings is essential. This also makes it easier for your team to read and interpret data. With ClickUp’s Data Analysis Findings Template, marketers can accelerate the report collection process and ensure that all reports are uniform and consistent.
The customizable Docs template helps you quickly organize information from multiple sources, analyze and visualize it, and derive insights for better decisions.
Moreover, ClickUp’s database templates come equipped with pre-defined Custom Statuses and Custom Fields to make data interpretation easier for your team. With these features, you can monitor the progress of your data analysis project and manage projects to offer visibility to your team.
You can build your workflows with Custom Views such as List, Gantt, Workload, and Calendar.
Build custom dashboards
With ClickUp Dashboards, you can create real-time dashboards for any business scenario. For example, you can create charts to explore trends in audience behavior, revenue flow, and more.
If you generally use a CRM tool or a marketing automation tool to track your business metrics, you can also add those reports to your ClickUp dashboard.
That way, you get a bird’s eye view of your business. You can also share these dashboards with others on your team, export them into PDFs, and share them with clients.
ClickUp pricing
- Free: Free forever
- Unlimited: $10/user per month
- Business: $19/user per month
- Enterprise: Contact for pricing
- ClickUp Brain is available at $5 per user per month with all paid plans
Summarize this article for me pleaseLevel Up Your Data Reporting with ClickUp: The DIY Alternative to Gartner and Forrester
We hope you found this Forrester vs. Gartner comparison useful.
Gartner and Forrester are the two biggest market intelligence firms. They offer expert industry analysis, which makes them a top choice for many businesses.
However, their solutions can be expensive for smaller or early-stage businesses—both in terms of cost and resources.
A more economical alternative is to handle research independently and create personalized market and competitor intelligence reports without external support.
ClickUp makes it easier for you to streamline these processes. You can leverage its many capabilities to master market research.
Sign up to ClickUp today and explore how our platform can help your marketing team organize data and generate meaningful insights in minutes.
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