Digit 2005-04 - Clevernotions.com

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pitch design Do anything you can to put yourself in the shoes of that brand’s customers,” says Paul Mallett, managing director of digital marketing agency Swamp. Vox pops He says before going into a pitch, he and his colleagues often go out into the street to speak to the public about what they think about a certain brand or company. They record the street interviews and then edit them into a vox pop linear film to show the client during the brief. This is a good way of breaking the ice, as well as showing the client that you’ve done your research – plus you can place some funny, anecdotal comments from Joe Public. Glyn Britton, managing partner at the communications agency Ingram Partnership, says once you know you’re pitching for a piece of business, you should get cracking straight away. “Two weeks is regarded as plenty of time but it’s not unusual to be given two days. It’s really important not to sit on the brief – start work on it immediately. Rehearsal is absolutely key. Understanding the client’s business is important but you’ll never do it better than them.” Ashley Friedlein, chief executive of E-consultancy, says: “The most important thing is to understand the client’s market, customers, and competitors. The classic mistake is for agencies to go into a pitch meeting and tell the client what it needs.” Once you’ve done your homework and 36 d TOO MANY PEOPLE ASSUME THE CLIENT’S BRIEF IS SET IN STONE MARK CHALMERS the time comes to pitch, it’s important to send the right people to meet the client. Chalmers at Strawberry Frog says never send any more people than the client is sending, otherwise they’ll be outnumbered. “You’ll dominate the talking and have a couple of spare parts. Quality client time is precious, you need to hear what they have to say. “When we pitched for the European Ikea business there were three of us in a room of twelve. It was great because the focus was on our work. You could have heard one of their elusive alun keys drop.” You should avoid sending in the big guns to pitch for work. The danger is that clients will be disappointed when they find that the people working on their business day-to-day won’t be the people they trusted their business with. “The team who will do the work are sent in – that is a pitch basic,” says Britton at the Ingram Partnership. In terms of environment, some agencies encourage clients to go to their offices when they’re pitching. This gives the agency more control over what the client hears and sees as part of the pitch. This isn’t always a luxury that’s available, though, and if you’re pitching in a client’s office always get there early to give yourself time to set up and avoid fiddling around with laptops and projectors when the client’s in the room. Once you’re in the room, a lot of your success will come down to the chemistry you have with the client team. Ultimately, the client reps are looking for someone they’re going to enjoy working with. It’s important that you like them too – you must try and gauge whether Above: These mood boards were made by Random Media for Creativity Incubator, a site aimed at engendering creativity in the work place. Using mood boards in your pitches gives you something physical to hand to clients, and gives you visual material to refer to. An over-reliance on PowerPoint-style presentations can be boring for the client. TOP TEN TIPS from Ashley Friedlein, chief executive of E-consultancy. www.e-consultancy.com 1. Most important of all, you must show the client that you understand their market, their customers, and their competitors. For example, you could do some independent market research on their customers to show you understand them. 2. Question their brief but also address all questions in briefs to the letter and then give more than they asked for. 3. When it comes to the creative, don’t present three finished options. Focus on demonstrating your creative process, your creative insight, and your creative thinking. Don’t rely on PowerPoint, but use multiple media including mood boards, environments, paper, and models. Mix it up. Get them inspired with your approach and abilities. Present just your strongest single concept and how you got there rather than pre-done variations. 4. Be transparent about costs. The cheapest cost is not always the project winner, but transparent costing is very important in building trust, and trust does win pitches. 5. Have an opinion on how they compare to their competitors, be strong in your opinions, be challenging, be brave. If they really need help, don’t be afraid to say. Often the bravest and strongest opinions win through. 6. Flag up your relevant experience – clients need reassurance on your abilities, strategically, technically, creatively, and in your process expertise. 7. Talk about return on investment (ROI) and being on-time, on-brand, and onbudget. Use testimonials to prove your claims. 8. Remember you operate in an oversupplied market and clients tend to choose on personality whims. Therefore do as much soft research about personalities in the pitch as possible. If the client has women on their pitch team, then make sure you do too. Phone several times before the pitch to ask questions and get to know them better. 9. Be animated and inspiring. Be keen, look keen. Be confident, but never arrogant. 10. If offered a choice, early slots are better as the clients tend to be fresher. If you are allocated a slot at the end of the day, make sure you are quick and concise. In any case, keep the whole presentation down to 45 minutes at the very most, anything longer than that and you risk boring everyone.
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