What Is Forrester and What Does the Company Do?

Updated

Forrester is a global market research and advisory company that helps organizations make decisions about strategy, technology, and customers. It serves business and technology leaders through a continuous guidance model that combines research, consulting, and live events, rather than delivering one-off reports. It is best suited to organizations that want ongoing, decision-oriented insight across the enterprise, not a single data purchase.

What Forrester actually provides

Forrester positions itself around three connected offerings:

  • Research — proprietary studies and frameworks drawn from surveying more than 500,000 consumers, executives, and technology leaders annually, according to the company.
  • Consulting — analysts and consultants work with client teams on specific challenges, from strategy to technology investment to customer acquisition.
  • Live events — convenings that let leaders compare notes and hear current findings.

The company describes the combination as a "continuous guidance model," meaning the value is in repeated, tailored interaction rather than a static library of documents.

What problems it is built to address

Forrester frames its audience around executives facing recurring decisions: crafting strategy, choosing where to invest in technology, and attracting and retaining the right customers. The premise is that these problems are common enough that other executives have already worked through them, and that structured research plus direct access to analysts shortens the path to a decision.

A client quoted on the site, Jen Burns of Dun & Bradstreet, describes the relationship as Forrester integrating into the organization rather than simply supplying benchmarks and statistics.

Forrester AI and where it fits

Forrester now offers an AI capability delivered inside Microsoft Teams, intended to put research-grounded advice, data, and frameworks into the tools teams already use. The company says the system is built on its proprietary research and governed by transparency and trust principles.

This matters if your constraint is access: the pitch is that teams get guidance at the moment a decision is made, without leaving their workflow. It is a delivery change, not a new category of service.

Who it is for, and who it is not

Your situation Fit
Enterprise or function leader needing ongoing guidance on strategy, tech, or customers Strong — matches the continuous model
Team that wants research embedded in daily tools (e.g., Teams) Relevant — Forrester AI is aimed at this
Buyer wanting a single report or one-time dataset Weak — the model is subscription-style guidance
Small team without budget for advisory relationships Unclear — the site does not publish pricing or access terms

How to evaluate it before committing

  1. Define the decision you need help with. Name the specific strategy, technology, or customer question. Vague goals make advisory relationships hard to judge.
  2. Check coverage of your function. Forrester describes support "at every altitude" — enterprise alignment, function acceleration, and individual leader development. Confirm your role and industry are represented.
  3. Ask about delivery format. Clarify how much is research access, how much is analyst interaction, and whether Forrester AI in Teams is included or separate.
  4. Request a walkthrough. The site offers a "Become A Client" path and an option to explore Forrester AI in Teams; use these to test whether the interaction style suits your team.
  5. Set a success measure. Since the model is continuous, agree in advance what a good outcome looks like — a decision made faster, a framework adopted, a benchmark applied.

The main practical caution: the site does not publish pricing, contract terms, or login requirements, so treat cost and access as questions to resolve directly with Forrester rather than assumptions.