How to Get Into the Gartner Magic Quadrant and Forrester Wave: A Guide for B2B Tech Vendors

Short answer: you can't buy or request your way into a Gartner Magic Quadrant or a Forrester Wave. Each report has inclusion criteria, such as revenue from the market, customer base and product capabilities, and vendors that meet them are evaluated. What you can do is make sure the analysts know you, understand your product and customers, and have current evidence when the evaluation starts. Both firms say vendors don't need to be clients to brief their analysts.

Full disclosure: this guide is written by Joseph Tannous, founder of Jamco PR. Jamco PR doesn't run analyst relations; we recommend specialist firms at the end of this guide. The process details below come from Gartner's and Forrester's own published policies.

Why analyst reports matter in enterprise deals

In large purchases, buying committees and procurement teams often start their shortlist from analyst research, and some RFPs ask where a vendor sits in a Magic Quadrant or Wave. Being evaluated, even outside the leaders' area, puts a company in front of buyers who would not otherwise consider it.

How Gartner Magic Quadrant inclusion works

• Every Magic Quadrant defines inclusion criteria for its market, often including minimum revenue, customer counts and required capabilities. The thresholds differ by market and can change between editions.
• Gartner says vendors that meet the criteria are included whether or not they actively participate, and that vendors can't withdraw.
• Gartner says client status never influences inclusion or placement in its evaluative research.
• Vendors are scored on the criteria for each axis; the definitions are shared with vendors when the Magic Quadrant process begins.
• Analysts don't give feedback on vendor briefing materials or discuss scores with vendors.

How to brief Gartner analysts as a non-client

Gartner accepts vendor briefing requests through its online Vendor Briefing form; non-clients complete a one-time registration first. Gartner says analysts decide whether to accept a briefing based on whether it contributes to their research agenda, not on whether the vendor is a client, and that accepted briefings are typically scheduled two to four weeks out.

Paid relationships give access to inquiry and advisory time with analysts, which some vendors find useful, but they're not required to be briefed or evaluated.

How the Forrester Wave works

• For each Wave, the analyst sets inclusion criteria that determine which vendors are evaluated, such as enterprise-level support, revenue from the market and a global customer base.
• Invited vendors that return Forrester's questionnaire and give a briefing or demo on schedule are treated as full participants.
• Forrester says it can evaluate a product whether or not the vendor participates, using public information, briefings and independently sourced customer interviews, and won't remove a vendor on request.
• During a Wave, Forrester treats any attempt by a vendor to coach or contact its references about their responses as a violation of the methodology.

What to do 6 to 12 months before an evaluation

• Find the reports that cover your market, and read the inclusion criteria and evaluation criteria from the last edition.
• Map the analysts who cover your market and brief them on your product, customers and roadmap at least once or twice a year.
• Build customer evidence: referenceable customers who will speak independently, and case studies you can share.
• Keep public information current and consistent, because analysts use it: your website, product documentation, customer stories, press coverage and executive commentary.
• Assign one owner for analyst relations and plan the questionnaire and demo well before the deadline.

Where PR fits

Analysts and journalists are different audiences, and analyst evaluations follow their own process. But they overlap: Forrester's inclusion criteria sometimes reference mindshare, both firms use public information, and the buyers who read analyst reports also search for the vendor and its leaders. Coverage on publications they recognise, executives quoted on market topics and published customer outcomes make a vendor easier to find, understand and trust.

That's the part Jamco PR does: guaranteed placements on Business Insider, USA Today, Yahoo Finance, AP News and 35+ other outlets for the company and its leaders, the first live in as little as 24 hours. For the analyst program itself, use a specialist analyst relations firm.

Who can help

Specialist analyst relations firms run briefing programs, perception audits and evaluation preparation; some combine analyst relations with PR. Our guide to analyst relations firms compares Spotlight AR, Kea Company, Starsight, CCgroup, Schaffer AR and The Skills Connection, and covers analyst relations software. For agencies that run media and analyst relations together, see 10Fold, Merritt Group and CCgroup.