The Existential Threat to Analyst Relations We Aren’t Talking About

Over the past year, I've noticed a pattern. Every quarter, around the time Gartner and Forrester release earnings, LinkedIn fills up with "Is Analyst Relations in trouble?" think pieces.

The narrative is usually the same: earnings are down, we spend a week or two batting around the question of whether buyers are really using ChatGPT to replace analysts, and ultimately we reach the comfortable conclusion that in the end these firms will adapt with their own AI tools and everything will be fine.

I think we are asking the wrong question, and it means we're missing the actual threat.

The real threat to the major analyst firms isn't really AI, at least not in the way we've been thinking about it.

It's the changing way enterprise software is bought and sold.

(As always) Let's Start with Why Analyst Relations Exists

Before we talk about what's changing, it's worth remembering why Analyst Relations exists in the first place.

My view? Analyst Relations was built to de-risk software purchases.

During the golden age of SaaS, buying software was a career-defining decision. Companies signed three-year contracts worth millions of dollars. They spent the first year just implementing—custom integrations, internal rollouts, training—all before seeing any ROI.

When that's your reality, you need someone to bless the choice. Your CFO needs it. Your board needs it.

That's exactly what Magic Quadrants and Waves are for. You take one to your CFO and say: "We looked at the Leaders. This one's the best fit." Everyone feels good that the diligence was done.

Analysts don't just give advice. They provide cover.

But the Risk Profile Is Changing

Software buying has become faster, smaller, and safer over the last several years - in part due to AI, but also because of other trends. And that shift is going to create massive pressure for the analyst firms (and by extension, for AR).

Three big shifts are driving this change:

1. Product-Led Growth

Product-led growth fundamentally rewrites the risk equation.

Adoption starts small with one user, one team, or one workflow. Implementation isn't a million-dollar project. It's a self-serve trial or lightweight deployment.

Once you've tested the product in your own environment, you don't need a report to tell you it works. You've proven it yourself.

It's absolutely true that no CFO will accept a printout from ChatGPT as proof of diligence. But they will accept results from a proof of concept, or a small implementation in another department. That's de-risking in action—happening inside your own walls.

2. Shorter Contracts Mean Lower Stakes

Hand in hand with PLG, deal structures are shrinking. G2's research shows that over half of software contracts now last fewer than six months. Only 11% extend beyond two years. Ask anyone in VC and they will tell you the same. Interpreting ACV growth has gotten much trickier for investors now that so many contracts are really short term experiments.

But for buyers? Shorter terms mean lower perceived risk. And when the risk is lower, the analyst's traditional role in de-risking shrinks with it.

3. AI and the Build-vs-Buy Shift

The real AI disruption in my opinion isn't its potential to replace analysts. It's its potential to replace software categories.

Tools that once required large vendor ecosystems are becoming things teams can build themselves. Mid-range categories—$50K to $250K spend—are increasingly feasible to build in-house using either AI-assisted development or by connecting AI with tools the business already purchased.

Not every company will replace every SaaS vendor. But as more organizations build bespoke solutions, entire vendor categories may contract. In the end, that will likely leave analysts with fewer software categories to map. For example: Will 'AI-assisted coding tools' even be a category in two years, or will it just be something every IDE does natively? How many other categories are like that?

So Where do the Firms Go From Here?

I believe all three trends are likely to meaningfully reduce the number of software decisions that benefit from analyst validation. This won't erase Gartner or Forrester overnight. But it will narrow their influence as more purchases move from "trust me" to "try it."

And the pressure is real. Gartner's stock price has been under heavy pressure because their revenue growth and contract value growth have both decelerated into the single digits. They're still a healthy business generating over $1 billion in free cash flow, but the trajectory has changed.

The firms don't break out vendor versus enterprise buyer revenue in their public filings, so we can't definitively say which side is pulling back. But the overall pressure suggests someone is finding less value. My bet? It's enterprise buyers who can now de-risk through trials and POCs instead of analyst research. If my hunch here is right, then the vendor side of the AR equation may already be overspending relative to the buyers we are here to reach.

As I've socialized this uncomfortable thought to smart Analyst Relations folks I trust over the past few months, I tend to hear the same things:

"Even if what you're saying is true, people will still need Analysts to tell them how to right-size procurement" Probably true to some extent - but PLG has also driven demand for overall pricing simplification. The firms themselves have too (see Forrester awarding 5s for pricing simplicity).

"Won't the firms switch from recommending software to recommending best practices and even doing more direct hands-on consulting?" With regard to consulting, the data doesn't support this. Gartner's consulting business has stayed flat at 8-9% of total revenue for years, even as overall revenue grew. At 35% gross margins versus research's 70%+, consulting can't scale the way research does - it's a complement to the core business, not a replacement for it. As far as offering best practices, that's a much more crowded market, and generally speaking the vendors are incentivized to do that for free.

"Can't they just AI their way out of this problem?" This is where the quarterly thinkpieces usually land - content per analyst is up! Publishing time is down! The firms will just use AI to write more stuff to justify their existence and then sell seats to a proprietary AI chatbot! We feel it as practitioners: we are getting longer vendor questionnaires more often, feeding newly invented AI generated reports. This feels to me like it will hasten the demise rather than solve anything... Now instead of ChatGPT replicating Gartner we are talking about Gartner replicating ChatGPT. Not good.

Where Analyst Relations Still Matters

Don't get me wrong—AR isn't dead now and it won’t be anytime soon. But I can’t talk myself out of the idea that the bullseye where it matters is slowly shrinking.

High-stakes categories still need analyst validation: regulated industries, mission-critical infrastructure, enterprise-wide platforms with high switching costs. The higher the operational risk, the more useful Analyst Validation will remain as a de-risking tool.

Everything else? The ROI calculation is going to keep shifting.

If buyers in your category are increasingly de-risking through trials, POCs, and growth over time, analyst influence is likely decreasing to become one influencing signal among many—not the primary one anymore.

So What Should You Do?

If you're a CMO, CPO, or CRO weighing your Analyst Relations investment right now, here's my advice:

Be honest about your category. Are you in a high-risk space where analyst validation moves deals? Or are you in a category where buyers are already proving your product works before they ever call an analyst? This was always the case, by the way. Question 1 has always been "How will this investment drive revenue?" I just think the list is shorter now.

Don't blindly follow the playbook. Most AR programs are still optimized for 2018. They over-index on briefings and evaluations while under-investing in the proof points that actually move deals today—customer stories, community validation, peer networks. You might very well be better off with an extra PMM hire focused on these things and a part-time AR approach.

Question the ROI. I've turned down AR clients this year because I genuinely didn't think the company should be investing there. I've also told clients to double down when it clearly made strategic sense. The answer isn't always "do more AR." Sometimes it's "redirect those resources."

The analyst's monopoly on trust is ending, or at least shifting. The question is whether your AR strategy has adapted.

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If you're trying to figure out whether your AR investment still makes sense, I'm happy to talk through it with you. You can grab time here.

I can't promise I have all the answers (I don’t!). But I’ll always be honest with a seller’s eye toward where your dollars are best spent.

The market is changing. Let's think through it together.

Up (and to the right!)

-Elena