Six more new business pitch ideas for agencies, from the client perspective

Last week, I posted on a conversation I had with an agency principal and their successful pitch techniques. In a similar vein, an article was recently brought to my attention that I missed back in December and I think is worth sharing.

The piece is called Making New Biz Pitches Nearly Painless and is by Antony Young, CEO of Optimedia. Antony hits on some interesting big-picture topics, as he says, “from the viewpoint of the pitchee,” that we plan to touch on in the future here on this blog.

So for the moment, here are those six points in brief and I’m going to leave off our perspective initially, but would love to see some first-thoughts in the comments if you’re feeling the urge. You can also click on the link at the end to read the entire piece.

1. Start by not pitching: Even the best agency partnerships go through their fair share of ups and downs. Before entering a pitch, give your incumbent agency an opportunity to turn things around. An early call to your agency's CEO to say, "Things are not going well" will resolve your issues nine out of 10 times.

2. Don't invite the incumbent to re-pitch: If a concerted effort to get the agency back on track doesn't produce results, then you should call a pitch. You might think you're doing the right thing to give the incumbent a chance to defend the business, and for agencies, it's hard to turn this chance down. But few agency executives are great statisticians. They believe that even 5 percent chance is a chance.

3. Don't provide a brief for the introduction meeting: Agencies are very good at playing back your brief or responding with very slick responses to an RFI. Let the agency decide who should attend and what to present. It will tell you a lot about the agency by whom and how many people they bring, how they conduct the meeting, what they present and how good they are on their feet.

4. Have lunch with the CMO: There's nothing more thrilling than the glitz and drama of an agency pitch presentation. But when the lights and curtains come down, what you're really left with is how you work with these folks and that's when the personal relationships and chemistry with an agency really counts. Just before the final pitch meeting, organize a lunch with your CMO and agency CEO.

5. Negotiate compensation terms before the final pitch: Understandably, clients don't want to overpay for agency services. Equally, an agency will want to put strong people on a potential new account. Usually it's only after the final pitch when the clients start negotiating the fee. The potential for an agency and client being disappointed down the line is high.

6. Get the right team: I'm actually a fan of doing the big pitch presentation. But let's face it: most of the time, what's presented in the finals is rarely executed and therefore is quite wasteful. I once participated in a pitch where the client's emphasis was just in finding the right team. They insisted on only meeting the account director, creative team and the media planning director. They also insisted that they didn't need people with category experience, just a proven team.

Antony's entire article here.