Pitch Imperfect

Let me tell you about the worst pitch I’ve ever been part of.

It wasn’t for a fundraising client, it was for a commercial one. Why be coy: it was NatWest. Their insurance division (you’re right, my life is glamorous).

We spent ages on the creative. And we developed something so sharp, nothing would ever be the same again. The sector would be redefined forever.

We’d even managed to convey the benefits of insurance without saying ‘peace of mind’. Impressive, I’m sure you’ll agree.

Anyway, we were at the office ’til about one in the morning. And then back in at eight the next morning for a final rehearsal. Me and the art director who’d worked on the creative had a bit of a show prepared, to bring it to life and make it as lively and interesting as possible.

So, with too little sleep, too much coffee and the smell of spray mount clinging to our clothes, we went in to the pitch. I always think pitches are exciting; you’re competing against other agencies, you want to be the best, and it’s the biggest adrenaline rush you get from an office job.

In some ways, a pitch is like an exam.

And this pitch was no different. Except it didn’t seem to be us taking the exam, but the client.

Because all eight of the people we were pitching to spent the entire time taking a multiple choice written test. Ticking boxes, choosing numbers, marking things off in a complicated, gridded series of pages.

They were using score cards.

Have you seen these things? Someone decides – in advance – what they want to see, and writes that out in as complicated and pseudo-scientific, faux-logical way as possible. Then everyone in the pitch uses the same score card, to, presumably, write down the same things.

Instead of seeing what answers the agency has come up with, what insights and ideas they have, you simply note down if what they’re showing you matches what you decided you wanted to see before you entered the room.

But the worst thing was, they spent so much time writing, they barely looked up. They didn’t make eye contact, they didn’t laugh at my (very funny) jokes and they didn’t utter a single word the entire time. They barely saw the creative work.

We held it up for as long as possible, waiting for someone to throw it a glance, but those A2 boards get heavy after the first 20 minutes.

Very depressing. Insulting actually, to have put all that work in only to be completely ignored.

We didn’t win the pitch of course.

They went with a completely different kind of agency – one that was part of a printing company and which did terrible creative work, but printed that terrible work very cheaply. Apparently ‘cheapness’ scored more highly than ‘value’ on their exam.

Why am I recounting it now, in a blog that’s about fundraising?

Well, although the agency I’m at specialises in fundraising, we have some commercial clients too – it’s really useful to see some of the things they do, their understanding of brands and so on.

And some of their thinking crosses over into the fundraising sector.

But, so far, no charity pitch I’ve been involved with has used score cards. And I hope it stays that way. No pitch, no piece of creative work and no important decision should be based on what some tick boxes say about an event you were too busy recording to actually engage with.

It’s like those people who go on holiday and video the whole thing the entire time. They record their holiday instead of experiencing their holiday.

And when you’re on holiday, and you see people like that, how do you feel about them? Probably the same way as I do about those guys from NatWest.