August 2015: Reading the tea leaves

Sometimes, in hindsight, I am happy to concede that I was wrong, but that doesn't necessarily lead me to doubt myself ─ it simply means that the judiciousness of the decision was found to be wanting. 

In publishing, like all other industries, we're forced to make tough decisions from time to time ─ that goes with the territory. But it's especially satisfying when a trying decision is met with approval or an "endorsement" ─ directly or via association ─ by the industry. This is especially the case when it comes to our various awards programs, where we are all too aware that the decisions we make might impact individuals or entire organizations.

Such an endorsement occurred recently by way of this year's Waters Rankings and the outcome of one of the 30 categories on offer. Waters readers voted S3 Partners' Blacklight data analytics platform as the best data analytics tool for 2015, and by so doing endorsed last year's Buy-Side Technology Awards judging panel's decision to award the New York-based firm the newcomer of the year award. Prior to that accolade ─ as far as I can ascertain, its first-ever industry award ─ S3 Partners' media profile was modest at best.

Now, however, the data analytics specialist appears to be well on its way, thanks, in part, to its pair of Waters awards, the first of which was decided by a panel of journalists and buy-side-focused technology consultants, while the other was determined by Waters' readers. I doubt that Waters would be able to "make" a technology firm, but I have heard such innuendo during the course of the past decade.

In fact, I recently had lunch with the head of marketing at a European buy-side technology vendor, where she claimed that prior to the company winning its first (of many) Buy-Side Technology Awards, its sales cycle was particularly drawn out, with prospective asset management clients exercising prudence and even reluctance to sign with a relative newcomer, irrespective of the quality of its services and technology. That all changed, she said, once the firm had bagged its first award, and, as they say, the rest is history.

It's impossible to quantify the "Waters effect" on the third-party technology industry, but it's something we're aware of and take seriously in terms of our responsibility, not only to the industry's vendors, but to our readers, too. Which is why we always enjoy the results of the Waters Rankings ─ they allow us to assess how well we're reading the market.