Pitch Tips

This blog is all about increasing the odds of winning the pitch, one tip at a time - Will Burns.

[pitchtips]

Pitch Tip #17: Or Just Call The Hotline

I been preaching the Pitch Tips for two years now. You remember Pitch Tip #1: Lose early, it’s cheaper. Or Pitch Tip #16: Enthusiasm wins. Or even Pitch Tip #3: Find your obsession. 

Yeah, yeah, yeah, all well and good. But new business happens in realtime. What if you’re in a new business pinch (not a typo) and need fast advice on the spot?

Just call my Hotline.

I’m realizing this is sounding like an infomercial and for that I apologize. But for the past two years I have had retainer relationships with two agencies: Heat San Francisco and North Advertising in Portland, OR. The service is called “The Hotline,” and means these agencies can call me anytime about anything related to new business.

(cue applause) 

I have room for one more agency.

(cue more applause)

Flexible access when you need it.

I can attend status meetings by phone, help my agency clients think through pitch strategies, getting the most theater out of their creative strategy, or how to handle a certain pitch consultant’s request. 

Or more urgent needs, like help thinking through a tough question from a prospect in the capabilities round, or how to approach a cover letter that goes out tonight, or whether or not to even bother pitching this one.

And it’s as much my experience coming to bear as it is the outside perspective. Sometimes you just get too close to your agency and can’t see it in all its glory like I can from a distance.

Room for one more agency.

To get some personal reactions to my Hotline service from Heat president, John Elder, and North founder and creative director, Mark Ray, click on this link to a pdf. 

Or just give me a call at 617-304-3268. You won’t always like what I suggest, but to me it’s all about increasing your odds of victory.

(cue long applause and then fade out to create the illusion that the applause continues indefinitely)

[pitchtips]

Enthusiasm Wins

Have you heard about the Italian agency Le Balene who decided to walk 125 miles to their pitch? Here’s a link to the Adweek article. I suggest you read it because it’s an excellent example of showing smart enthusiasm in a pitch. 

Here’s the short story. The team of three - a copywriter, an art director, and an account director - were pitching an unnamed mobile accessories account and decided the best way to win would be to walk from Milan to Reggio Emilia, 125 miles. They are recording their experiences, shooting videos, editing at night, and generally working on the pitch as they go.

Though they don’t say, as the pitch is ongoing as of this writing, I suspect there’s a smart strategic reason for this pilgrimage tied to the prospective client’s business. And it’s this strategic enthusiasm a stunt like this shows that will win the business.

Why does enthusiasm for a client’s business matter? 

Enthusiasm is emotional and unquantifiable.

In any pitch, every tiny percent advantage you can muster counts. How tight your strategy is, how great your creative idea is, who’s presenting, how well you listen in strategic work sessions, etc. 

But when a client witnesses bonafide enthusiasm for their business - like the team walking 125 miles to the pitch - there’s an emotional connection made to that agency that can’t be quantified, nor shaken. 

And if you believe like I do that you should approach every pitch as if you will tie the other agencies on all the quantifiable stuff, then you see how important something as intangible as enthusiasm can be in tipping the scales your way.

The great lengths the agency goes makes it hard to say no.

No other agency in that Italian mobile accessories pitch is going to walk 125 miles to get to the pitch. None of them will have the stories that the Le Balene team will have. None of them will be as memorable during deliberations. 

In short, none of the other agencies will appear to have worked as hard as Le Balene did to win the business.

That fact creates an interesting dynamic with the prospective client. It will now be very difficult to say “No” to Le Balene. Their strategy may not be as tight. Their creative may not be as right. But all that is weighed against the idea of calling Le Balene and saying, “Sorry, we know you guys walked 125 miles, shot hours and hours of video, wrote these elaborate travel logs, and all that. But we’re giving the business to Le Boring instead.” 

Of course, it’s possible Le Balene will have a terrible strategy and/or creative, in which case all bets are off. But, again, if we’re assuming a tie on those fronts, Le Balene is poised to win.

But not all enthusiasm is created equal.

Enthusiasm is best when it’s strategic. I suspect La Balene’s trek was relevant to this mobile company, perhaps deploying the company’s accessories, testing them out, or whatever. But it wasn’t empty enthusiasm, it was making a point.

I remember we used to have a little ritual at a former agency of mine where we’d get the whole agency into the lobby so that when the prospect entered we’d get everyone to cheer. Big, hardy welcome. But in hindsight it was pretty empty enthusiasm.

I also remember other ideas that worked very well. When pitching a cruise line, we sent the team on a cruise and had them film the whole thing. When pitching an automobile brand we went out and interviewed parking attendants to get “current perceptions” of the competitions’ drivers. When pitching Lo-Jack, we stole the art director’s car and filmed the poor dude’s reaction from the trees (client loved that, the art director didn’t).

All of these examples were strategic ways to show enthusiasm for the brand we were pitching. And all of them gave us a leg up.

I will be shocked if Le Balene does not win that pitch. But if they don’t, it won’t be because they didn’t show the right kind of enthusiasm.

[pitchtips]

Get The In-house Agency's Vote

Did you know that according to a 2013 ANA survey, 58% of all brands have an in-house agency? Compare that to the 2008 number of 42% and we see a serious trend. 

So it's not too surprising that a pitch consultant recently pointed out to me in an email about new business trends the influence of in-house agencies in AOR pitches:

"[The nature of a pitch] will also be impacted by whether there is an in-house agency. We see that more and more."

Okay, in-house agencies are the outside-agency's reality when pitching. How, then, should agencies approach this touchy dynamic in a way that allows the candidate-agency to strut their stuff, but do so without alienating the in-house agency?

In short, how do we get the in-house agency's vote?

To answer that question, I asked two Ideasicle clients of mine, both of whom have gone through relevant pitch experiences, and both of whom are creative directors of their respective in-house agencies, to get their advice.

Jamie Graham, Creative Director at Constant Contact.

Jamie Graham is in a very unique position, in that he has a long creative-directing career at outside agencies like Arnold, Y&R, Grey, among others. But was also at the helm of Constant Contact's in-house agency when they transitioned from having an outside agency to bringing it all in-house. 

His advice for us starts with the practical:

I think the dynamic which would benefit all is this: The in-housers have the advantage of knowing their product, their prospects and their internal politics. The pitchers have the greater advantage of not being indoctrinated by these ‘guardrails’. The two teams can help one another.

Well put. In-house agency creatives know things about the client that you don't, and, better yet, know things from the perspective of a creative person, which makes their insights doubly valuable. 

Graham goes on to give us the finer, more subtle influences and motivations:

Treat the in-house creatives as equals. (Even – perhaps especially - if they clearly aren’t.) So yes, involve them, pay attention to what they’re doing, but don’t pander to them. Chances are, they would love to ‘up their game’ and whatever is holding them back, the smart pitching agency can help remove. 

I find this insight fascinating because rather than being a threat to the in-house agency, your agency could be their creative liberator, if you play your cards right. 

And if the in-house agency believes your agency is the ticket to their own creative liberation, you are more likely to get their vote.

Jane Scanlon, Associate Creative Director at Staples Advantage.

Jane Scanlon recently lived through a major AOR pitch for the Staples business and so has fresh insights for us. She sent me a list of bulleted points, so let me just post them all, exactly as she wrote them, and then comment:

"Understand that your in-house counterparts may have a vested interest in their company and want to do what’s best for the bottom line.

Weird phenomenon: Inside clients may give more credence to ideas provided from an outside source. Be mindful of this potential bias.

Treat the Agency team as subject matter experts. But offer to provide additional data or research — there’s always room for more customer insight.

Helping in-house creatives look good helps you look good. And that means more potential business with your mutual client.

Fresh thinking from outside is exciting and inspirational for in-house creatives so bring it on!

Sense of humor. Mutual respect. Nuff said."

Lots in that list. Very encouraging to see that she welcomes fresh thinking ("bring it on!"). Love that, and it could mean when presenting the most "out there" ideas in your pitch, look at the in-house creatives in the room when you present them. They are the most likely to get the ideas, and visibly appreciate them.

I think her first point about in-house counterparts having a "vested interest" in their company and a sensitivity to their "bottom line," tells me they could be a short cut to your agency's best ideas. Meaning, their opinion is laced with respect for their business AND for doing great creative work. 

But the point Scanlon makes that really pops out at me - if not screams out at me - is the idea of helping in-house creatives "look good." Not because it's the right thing to do, but according to Scanlon it might get you more business down the line.

You can increase the odds of winning a pitch by connecting with the in-house creative.

Find a way to talk to the in-house creatives during the pitch process. Even if you're not supposed to due to pitch consultant rules. Find a way at the dinner, before a strategic workshop, or even just call them.

When you've got their attention, use them as a secret sounding board to preview ideas. Doing so will do two things: one, show them huge respect, which they will appreciate (and remember); two, will give you a more informed opinion than from a more business-oriented client.

In short, the respect you show by reaching out will improve your pitch and your odds of earning their important vote.

[pitchtips]

Stop Doing Cold Calls

Let's talk about prospecting. If you're a small-to-medium size advertising agency, you are likely not on the radar of most national pitch consultants. That's not their fault. You just haven't proven yourself to them yet. But it means the single biggest channel for new business is unavailable to you.

Which means you have to get creative to get anywhere. 

It's called "cold calling" for a reason.

Getting creative does not mean cold calling. Think about the odds. You call a marketing director and get him or her on the phone (odds 1/3, say); of those you get on the phone and ask for a meeting, you happen upon someone who needs exactly what you're selling right now (odds 1/10); you have the meeting and they hire you (odds 1/5).

To calculate the probability of all three happening you get this:

1/3 X 1/10 X 1/5 = 1/150

That's right. If you buy my odds along the way, the odds of success cold calling is 1/150. That's 150 calls for every hit, and who knows whether or not the "hit" will even be worth it?

Instead, be interesting.

A while back I wrote a piece on the Pitch Tips blog called, "Find Your Agency's Obsession." In it, I recommend that agencies differentiate themselves by finding their obsession about the business. What is your definitive take on advertising, on culture, on whatever, that can give you an identity beyond just "ad agency."

If you think about it, the people in life who know who they are are the most interesting people. Same is true for ad agencies.

So stop being an ad agency and start being interesting. The first step to which is to find your obsession.

Interesting as prospecting.

Now that you've got your obsession, mine the hell out of it. For example, the obsession for one client of mine, Heat Advertising in San Francisco, is "surprise." They believe strongly that surprise is a necessary ingredient in communications, but also in the act of developing communications.

One of the first things Heat did, once their obsession was uncovered, was to get an article from Heat Planner, Scott Redick, in Harvard Business Review, "Surprise Is Still the Most Powerful Marketing Tool."

That, my friends, is a good example of being interesting by mining your obsession.

If you find a potent, true, meaningful, obsession for your agency, the content you create around it won't be about agency chest beating, but about valuable insight. And valuable insight is sought out by marketers. 

Your obsession, when manifested in the marketplace through content, behaves like a magnetic field that attracts clients not because of your agency's name or reputation (yet), but because of your idea, your point of view, your obsession on the marketplace.

Suddenly, you're interesting and prospects are interested.

Now, get out there and obsess with your obsession.

Here is what I would do about prospecting, if I were you:

Find your agency's obsession.

Redo all of your agency's "core materials" around this singular idea - web site, presentations, creative briefs, case studies, everything.

Create a blog. Avoid news about the agency. Just mine the obsession. Talk to psychologists and get their points of view. Point out examples in the marketplace. Pontificate. Do some research. Whatever, just obsess with your obsession.

Your blog as fulfillment. Any prospects that find your site will look at the work, "about us," and your blog. They may not read a single post from the blog, but they will see a long list of blog posts all having to do with your agency's obsession. Client thinks, "Man, they are really onto something here." That's all you need. You are now interesting.

Your blog as prospecting tool. Instead of cold calling people, send nice warm links to your valuable content. Know something about the prospect's business so you can make it relevant in the email. Send to cold contacts, but also to contacts you want to "keep warm." 

Post blog posts to all social channels - FB, Twitter, LinkedIn especially. 

Bundle up your posts into a monthly newsletter. If you're creating blog posts - even four a month - you can bundle them up into a newsletter and issue that once a month. Seeing multiple posts in one place really shows a commitment to the topic. You can see my Ideasicle Newsletter here.

Build your database. All along the way invite people to join your mailing list. Put this call to action in the email signature of every employee, in every blog post, in every newsletter. Build that database of people interested in your obsession. 

With this kind of strategy, your prospecting starts with your obsession, turns into content, and then works its way out from there. Clients will start finding your content interesting and then they will find your agency interesting.

Without any cold calls from you. 

What are the odds of success? I have to think it's better than 1/150.

[pitchtips]

The Last Mile To Victory: Tone

My palms sweat when I recall this story, but I will recall it once more if it means you can avoid my fate. I won't say which pitch, but it was when I was biz dev director at Arnold. It was a huge account - $400 million, if memory serves - and, if I may say so, we had set this one up perfectly. The client loved the core team, they loved our strategy, they even started to love lobster despite not being from the East Coast. 

Nothing could possibly get in our way. The client told me as much privately. It was ours to lose and only the final presentation left to go.

You can probably see where this is going.

We got into the room and started our presentation to about ten clients. The laptop froze up after about five minutes. Wouldn't work. But not to worry, we had a second laptop under the table with the same presentation ready to go. I sprung from my seat, cracked a joke or two, unplugged and plugged some cords, and we were up and running again. 

We went through the strategic story from beginning to end. All good so far. But then we got to the creative.

Ah, the creative.

It was at this moment that I wished that laptop, the second laptop, and every laptop within 20 miles spontaneously combusted into flames.

As our creative director presented the first campaign, I could see our main client (the one I knew best) start to squirm in his seat. He was a little Type-A anyway, so any discomfort immediately showed. By the third and final campaign, this client was up and out of his seat nervously getting water. 

To make a long story short, we lost. And we lost because, while the creative was technically "on strategy" it was not "on tone." Breaking the unbearable news to me on the phone, the client said, "I thought you guys were kidding and that you would finally get to the real creative. But you never did." 

Dammit. The wrong tone killed us.

It's not enough to have good momentum, a great relationship, a great strategy, and a deep understanding of the marketplace. You have to discuss and articulate  the appropriate tone for the brand. We presented work that, tonally speaking, would have been appropriate for Budweiser, but not for the serious institution we were pitching.

By getting the tone so wrong, the client's confidence in everything else about the team, the strategy, and the lobster, fell down like a house of cards.

How to nail the tone.

If the creative brief is the boat, then tone is the rudder. Make "tone" an official part of your agency's creative brief. What are the 4-5 words that best describe the tone the creative must take?

In the pitch, make tone a part of your strategic work session with the client. Use flashcards with words on them if you have to. But force the conversation with your prospective clients now. Don't leave the room until you've all agreed to those 4-5 words.

If there is no creative work session, force one. Don't let the final presentation be the first time the client sees the work. I could have avoided the loss described above had I forced a check-in with the client - even a web presentation. If I had, the client would have course corrected us, for sure.

My palms are all galvanic right now, but I must admit I feel a little better turning this horrible loss into something potentially positive for you.

Getting the tone right won't necessarily win the pitch. But getting it wrong will most certainly lose it.

[pitchtips]

Insights. How Is As Important As What.

I don't need to tell you that the insights behind the campaign you're pitching are important. But consider this: every agency you're competing against is reading the same secondary research, talking to the same clients, pulling the same competitive analyses, and on and on. It's possible you'll uncover a unique insight that no other agency identifies. But don't plan on it. In fact, if you want to increase your odds, assume the other agencies will have the exact same insights as you. 

Then how do you stand out?

Well, the pressure moves from what the insights are to how you got them. If your insights method is more dramatic and profound, then the same insights everyone else is presenting suddenly seem more dramatic and more profound. Let me give you three quick examples.

Volvo. When I was at Arnold we pitched Volvo and a key question in the RFP was to help Volvo better understand and profile the typical customers of competitive brands. Now, we could have done a survey of consumers, focus groups, and all the normal stuff (some of which we did). But our team came up with a better idea. The lead account person and the creative team hit the streets of Boston with a camera man to interview true experts on the subject of automobile drivers: parking attendants. Who better, right? They see people coming out and getting into their cars all day long. So we cut a video of these interviews and showed it at our first capabilities meeting. The client loved it, not only because it was insightful, but because we had come up with such a creative way to get at these insights. It was such a hit that this video made it all the way to the final presentation.

Carnival Fun. Also at Arnold, we pitched Carnival Cruise Lines. The uber task was to help them better understand and leverage the concept of "fun." For years Carnival had claimed that their ships were more fun - remember those Kathy Lee Gifford sing-alongs (gag)? We needed to understand how we could make Carnival's fun more valuable. But fun is such an abstract and subjective concept. We put the question out to the agency through my "Innovation Station" crowdsourcing platform and someone posted the idea to "interview clowns." Yes! Clowns were the experts of fun. That idea inspired a series of interviews with various fun experts. A comedian on David Letterman's staff, a roller coaster engineer, a video game designer, a cognitive anthropologist, and others (no clowns, though, we decided they were too creepy). The video became the backbone of not only our communications strategy for Carnival, but our identity as an agency in the competition. We became "the agency who did that cool video talking to Fun Experts."

Stealing cars. This one happened when I was at Mullen, where we were pitching LoJack anti-theft devices for cars. We wanted to prove to the clients that we understood what consumers go through when their cars are stolen. So we rigged cameras in the surrounding woods of our agency parking lot, stole the creative director's car (Chris Poulin, poor guy - his wife gave us extra keys), we dropped broken glass on the ground where the driver's side would have been, the whole thing. Then we waited until he came out and we filmed his reaction. At first he thought he mistook where he parked. Then he saw the glass. Then he was visibly pissed, but a good sport. Just before he called the cops (phone was in his hand), we stopped him. And we used that video in our pitch. Beat the heck out of charts, graphs or focus group videos.

So, next pitch, try to find a research methodology, a stunt, something that is totally unique and that can inject energy into your insights, making them feel more profound, giving your presentation more theater, and, in the process, proving your agency thinks different. 

[pitchtips]

Stay On The Consultants' Radar

Fact is, the pitch consultants of the world are an important gatekeeper in the competitive world of agency new business. There are just too many agencies in the world for any one client to keep track of them all. So pitch consultants like Pile, SRI, Ark Advisors, and others, are enormously helpful in getting a client to a smart short-list of about 20 agencies. That's a lot of power, so getting your agency on the consultant's radar is critical.

I've worked with, and interviewed, many pitch consultants over the years. Here are a few things I found out as it relates to staying top-of-mind.

Think of it as a campaign.

I advise the agencies I work with to get systematic with pitch consultants. It takes time for consultants to remember your agency, its capabilities, and identity. So put a "media schedule" together with your planned activities with each consultant mapped out. Then stick to it. Thinking of it this way will help ensure that you don't over, or under, communicate with them. Or worse, forget a consultant altogether by mistake. And that you will have a consistent presence that will shape the consultants' view of your agency.

Be known for something.

As part of this campaign, and like any campaign you create for your clients, think about your agency's single most important message and hit it over and over with every interaction. If you're not sure what that could be, then Pitch Tip #3: Find Your Agency's Obsession is a great place to start. But then every interaction - from an email to an in-person meeting - becomes "further proof of our obsession." Eventually, your agency's obsession will be known in a "second nature" way to the consultants. That's gold. Because you need to be remembered if you're going to recommended.

Include live events.

You'll want to get in front of the consultants, in person, at least once a year, if not more, to have an official meeting. Have your top brass fly out to them, or invite them to your place. It's worth it because a human interaction is far more impactful and memorable than an email will ever be.

Pitch consultants will only recommend agencies they know will impress their clients. They do not like "wildcards" in pitches. So if a consultant has never seen your agency in action, put on a show. Show them you have the presentation chops (and that you will not embarrass them in front of their client).

Then, throughout the year, if you happen to be in the city of a consultant, invite him or her out to lunch or dinner. Keep the lead warm. And for god's sake pay the bill.

Use email as continuity.

Pitch consultants hate physical, high-impact mailers. Don't bother. I was told by one consultant that he throw them out. Too bulky, hard to file, and they get too many of them. So don't waste your money. 

Every pitch consultant I spoke with said that email was their preferred method of communication with agencies. And it's not surprising. It's light weight, easy to consume, and easy to file. One said she creates a new email folder for each agency she's following so it's easy for her to keep communications organized.

They truly want to hear from you, so don't be shy. 

It's their job to know about your agency. As such, pitch consultants are highly motivated to understand you. They will take an in-person meeting if you plan ahead. They will go out to lunch if they can. And they will actually read your emails you send. But one last thing. Only email them if you have some news. Could be something like a new strategic hire, a new account win, a new blog post, a new capability, or a new campaign. But do not waste their time or annoy them (ever, not just in email) or it could work against you.

Now, get out there and start getting on radar.

[pitchtips]

The Pitch Is Equal Parts Dictatorship & Democracy

Good pitching is as much about coming up with ideas quickly as it is about good decision-making. In fact, I'd argue that having the confidence to make key decisions liberates the ideas. Here's why.

The democracy keeps the ideas flowing. The pitch team should be encouraged to stretch their official capacities at all times. It doesn't matter if a PR person comes up with a great tagline. It's still a great tagline. It doesn't matter if a creative person articulates the key strategic statement in the brief perfectly. It's still a great strategic statement. In this way, the pitch team operates like a democracy because ideas are allowed to come from anywhere. We're all in this together.

The dictatorship keeps the ball moving. At the same time, a pitch has harsh deadlines. For that reason, I recommend that agencies assign a pitch captain to every pitch. Let the pitch team continually come up with lots of ideas on research, strategy, go-to-market ideas, messaging, even presentation ideas. But all the while the pitch captain is empowered to make the key decisions every step of the way (short of creative decisions, which I believe should still fall with the creative director).

Those decisions will unleash further thinking and ideas, but only if they're made. What I do that combines democracy and dictatorship is pin the best idea so far - from the democracy - on the wall for whatever you're working on at the moment and tell the team, "This is it until someone beats it." That way, the team can move forward developing the idea in the short term, but you've also let the team know that they can still try and beat it if they want. 

Without the dictatorship, too many paths will be followed needlessly. Worse, no decisions will be made until the night before the meeting - when you absolutely have to make them - and that means the delightful liberation of a smart decision can't possibly be realized in time.  

[pitchtips]

If You Lose, Stay Close

If you lose a pitch, get mad, do a post-mortem, analyze all the "what-ifs" and "if-onlys," but then stay close to the client. Not obnoxiously close, but stay on the radar. Here's why.

The second-to-most stressful time in an agency/client relationship - behind only the dreaded final days of a doomed relationship - is the ramping up immediately following a victory. A lot can go wrong. The winning agency made a lot of promises, negotiated way too aggressively, and had a second team waiting in the wings to pick up where the pitch team left off. Cynical, I know, but for this to work the optimistic loser must assume the worst for the winner. 

Your opportunity, assuming you were one of the finalists, is this: if things go sour with the winner, it's in your interest for the client to know you're ready and willing to save the day. You become the client's unspoken insurance policy. Their escape hatch.

Now, it's a fine line between "sore loser who can't take a hint" and "staying on the radar." So consider light-weight but useful communications, like emailing relevant articles about the client's business once a month or so. Just something to let them know you're there.

The client may tell you to get lost. But the more promises the victor breaks, the more the client may appreciate the fact you're keeping their escape hatch warm.

[pitchtips]

I have a new product we are trying to develop. When should we begin thinking about pitching, we don't have a prototype (mobile application) yet, but we have market research that is going into the MVP. Is it necessary to have a BETA before pitching?

Man, tough to know without know the category you're in. But ask yourself these questions and see if it helps you decide:

Can the power of the idea come through fully, or even 95% fully, through 2D animations? If so, then start pitching without the prototype.

Is the audience you're pitching really literal or are they visual people? If they are visual people, they are less likely to need a prototype. They'll be able to visualize the idea in their minds with the help of your 2D animations.

How long will it take to sell the idea into the organization, regardless of how you present it? If it's a long sales-cycle, then it's better to get out there and start pitching with whatever you have. And tell the folks you're pitching that  you're working on a prototype and would be happy to schedule a second meeting to show them (second meetings create the illusion of momentum).

Hope that helps!

[pitchtips]

Hi, How do I, or who do I pitch a new idea to JCP. Have called and sent e-mails.

Totally depends on what you're pitching. But generally speaking, try these three things to start:

Find the right person - if it's an advertising thing, then the marketing person; if it's an in-store idea, then maybe the merchandising person; etc. 

Send him or her a simple letter that flatly states the problem you are solving and then how you solve it. Ask for a meeting and see what happens. 

Meanwhile, go to your LinkedIn account and search JCP for anyone you might know there, or friends who know people there. Contact those people and ask if you can share the idea with them. They may want to champion the idea for you inside the organization.

Of course, none of this will go anywhere if it's not a great idea. If you do not have an idea, and only want to pitch your company or yourself in general, then still do the above three things, only instead of identifying a problem your idea will solve, identify a problem that your company can solve. Then ask for a meeting.

Hope that helps!

[pitchtips]

Your Gut Is Your Cheat Code

The enemy of every pitch is time. There's never enough. So, I want to propose something to you. Think of your team's collective "gut" as your own personal cheat code. Here's what I mean.

I often see agencies start their pitches with a research plan. We'll do focus groups in two cities, a quant study with the target audience, we'll do a deep-dive competitive analysis to find the white space, etc., AND THEN we will come up with our strategy. I'd like to propose the exact opposite.

Get your pitch team together on day one and come up with a brand idea. Just do it. Then use research to validate the idea, not to come up with it.

That's right, trust your guts. Your pitch team members are likely very experienced and know way more than they think. Too often this valuable collection of experience is put on hold for a week or two until the research can uncover what are probably obvious, intuitive insights to begin with. Not to put down the planners, but what earth-shattering insights can anyone come up with in a week? I'd argue they'd be the same insights your team would come up with in ten minutes, if you give them the chance. Fact is, there are many, many obvious truths surrounding any pitch that, at this point in the process, you can assume are true. Enough truths to make your team dangerous, anyway.

Now, in this kick-off meeting, have some of the easy stuff pulled - competitive ads, spending, any business analysis you can Google, stuff you can pull in an afternoon - and then talk about the brand, talk about its competitors, throw ideas onto the wall. And don't leave the room until you all agree on your "starting point" brand idea. 

I say "starting point" because you may learn things along the way that shift it, nudge it, or outright kill it. But your research (that you are paying for) can be much more focused because it doesn't have to start from square one. More often than not, your first idea is 90% right, and now you're two weeks ahead of all your competitors. 

But you have to trust your gut. It takes too long not to.

[pitchtips]

New Business Is Your R&D Department

I believe that “New Business” is a group that should be encouraged to experiment, try things, and present in new ways using new technologies. It’s an ideal place to cook up new products, articulations, and research/planning methods. And a team that is ultimately conditioned to keep what works and shelve what doesn’t after every pitch. The result: constantly evolving, constantly improving, constantly increasing the odds of winning.

The world is changing faster than agencies are.

Injecting a culture of “R&D” into your new business group will help your agency keep up with the times. Besides, where else are you going to do it? It’s risky to do too much innovation with existing clients. They hired you (probably within the last two-three years) because of who you are right now. So hitting them with new approaches all the time could come off as unstable.

New business is the land of first impressions.

Unlike existing clients, your prospects don’t know any better. They have no benchmarks for, nor preconceived notions of, your agency’s behavior. So you’re starting fresh every time. Take full advantage and be who you are in exciting new ways.

Then, the stuff that works can be thrown over the fence to the existing client teams with confidence. And your agency will evolve through its lifeblood, new business.

[pitchtips]

Make Your RFP Skimmable

Here's a scary fact. Hardly anyone reads your RFP or RFI. At least, hardly anyone reads the whole thing. They do a fly-by, they skim, and they may read parts of it in full. But no one reads the entire document. 

The client wants a short cut.

When a client is staring down the barrel of twenty RFPs piled on a desk, they do what any normal human being would do. They find a short cut. They start skimming, in super fly-by fashion. You know, to get the gist of each agency and to make a quick first cut to, say, 10 finalists. At that point, the client may read more, but still not all of each RFP.

Design your RFP with hierarchy.

Level One. If your RFP is too copy-heavy, it will be impossible to skim and could get tossed for the wrong reasons. Make sure you design the RFP with hierarchy, so that anyone can pick it up, skim, and still get the key, compelling points about your agency. Let's call that level one, and it can be accomplished through bold headlines and images on each page, sort of like a children's book.

Level Two. At this level, the reader may choose to take in sub-heads, captions, call-outs (bolded quotes or other major points), smaller images or diagrams, etc.

Level Three. This isn't so much a "level" as it is the sorry fact that you still need to write out each section completely because you don't know which sections the client will fully read (although it would be hilarious to drop in Greek copy in a section just to see if anyone notices).

Think of it as a magazine. 

All three levels of hierarchy need to happen within this one document. But a good designer will know how to create hierarchy. It's like a magazine or a newspaper - designed to be skimmable. And, for the pitch, it just might be the difference between in and out.

[pitchtips]

In The Final, Go Back To The Beginning

In the final presentation of an agency pitch, there are at least four ways to win the pitch. Well, four big ones, anyway, and aside from intangibles like chemistry and politics:

Be the agency the client can believe in.

Have a campaign strategy the client can believe in.

Have a creative brand idea the client can believe in.

Have a bunch of creative tactical ideas the client can believe in.

You might win with just #1. You increase the odds substantially, if you add #2 and #3. But you can't win with #4 alone. You just can't.

Too often in final presentations, I see agencies forget to go back and restate why their agency is perfectly suited for this client's business. They short-hand the campaign strategy to the point where it's meaningless. Their brand idea is buried in the creative somewhere, but not dramatically or compellingly called out. And their emphasis is on all the creative tactics of the big campaign.

Here's the mistake. These agencies will say, "We covered all that other stuff in the work sessions." To which, I would say the client probably went to eight different work sessions (four agencies and two work sessions each), not to mention three other final pitches. Do you really think they'll remember everything your agency said in the work sessions?

The final pitch is where you go back and tell the entire story from beginning to end. It's the culmination of the 3-month pitch process. It's a performance. A multi-act play. It wants dramatic moments, big ahas, and dots connected.

To finish strong, go back to the beginning.

[pitchtips]

Eye Contact Is A Precious Resource

I call it a "resource" because I believe eye contact generates energy between people. Something human happens. Our chemistry changes on the inside. And chemistry between people happens on the outside.

But eye contact is not an easy resource to manufacture, given the short amount of time you actually have with a prospective client. So it's that much more important to maximize its generation every chance you get.

For example, it's ok to have slides in your capabilities presentation. But every time you look up at the flatscreen (at your slides), you're missing out on eye contact. So, know the presentation by heart so that you can constantly look from one client to the next and not to the slides for reminders of what to say.

Another way to maximize eye contact is when you're presenting your case histories. Maybe you create a collage of each case study on a wall, or walls, to set a "stage" for each presenter. Then have the presenter tell the story not from slides at all, but in front of the corresponding collage, pointing out various creative pieces as she gets to them, but all the while looking in the clients eyes. It takes more preparation and more memorizing of the case, but it pays off chemically.

(Quick note: I remember a team member of mine years ago stood in front of the room with his ass to the clients and read his slides. I couldn't believe it. Lesson: ass contact isn't nearly as good as eye contact.)

If eyes are the windows to the soul, then make eye contact your step ladder to the window sill. Doing so won't win you the pitch, but will certainly increase your odds.

[pitchtips]

Find Your Agency's Obsession

The most interesting people in life are the ones who know exactly who they are. Agencies are no different. Problem is, agencies are all the same. With some minor fluctuations here and there, they all have the same general structure, the same kinds of people, the same deliverables, the same ways of presenting, the same everything.

So, to differentiate, agencies try very hard to figure out what they stand for. But the problem with the old "stand for" question is that all agencies, because they are advertising agencies, stand for one of two things: getting results for their clients OR simply valuing great creative. Some try to stand for both, but it doesn't matter. None of this territory will ever be differentiating. Plus it's too rational. 

Instead, I tell my agency clients to differentiate emotionally by finding their obsession. I challenge them to think through what they do, how they do it, the end results, the types of clients they attract, etc., and then try to articulate the motivation behind it all (tip within a tip: scour your old RFPs for clues - that's where I tend to find little brilliant, but neglected, gems for my clients). Because in your obsession will be your differentiating point-of-view, and at least a fresh way to talk about all the same old stuff every other agency, including yours, must talk about in pitch situations.

Is your obsession about a specific psychological effect that truly makes a consumer change behavior? Is it something about your own unique approach that you really believe in? Is it something about how you unpack a brand for its consumer? Is it about a common marketing enemy that you've identified and are built to slay?

Whatever the obsession is, find it, articulate it strongly, and then BE it. Watch all of your communications - from RFP to the web site to the presentations to the agency's culture itself - suddenly galvanize around this obsession. You will likely see your agency's blog transform from news about the agency (not a blog) to an inspiring place that continually dimensionalizes, proves the importance of, and cements your ownership of, this obsession (a real blog).

More times than not, a pitch is about getting your prospective client to believe in you. And if you can convince that client that your agency's obsession will give their business an edge, you greatly increase your odds of winning.