After the sales pitch - the debrief

It is essential that you follow up after a sales pitch even if you have won.

Winning or losing is simply an outcome of a complicated decision making process that you want to understand in its entirety. By having a debrief it allows you to get inside the heads of the prospective client and understand more about what is driving them and their decision making process

Here are a few questions to consider:

• What did you like/dislike about our written submission?
• What did you like/dislike about our presentation
• What did you like/dislike about the way we handled the entire pitch?
  
• Do you think that we understand your business and the problems you are facing?
• What were the key factors in deciding who you would use?
  
• Who else was pitching and why did you select them to pitch?
• Having completed the pitching process, is there any other way that you might have considered doing it?
• Would you consider asking us to pitch for other projects?
• If yes, what projects are forthcoming?

There are more but the point that I am trying to make is that you carry out a formal debrief.

Done well it will build up the relationship with the prospective client and may even open doors for more projects.

Feel their pain - how to improve your sales pitch

When constructing your sales pitch it is vital that you prioritise the information you will present.

The most important and therefore the highest ranked is - what is the client looking for. What is their problem, their pain, their barrier to success. Be really diligent and use your experience and business acumen to discern what they want. Yes, they might want increased visibility for a new product in a new market. But why? What is the driver for that. What is pushing them to introduce a new product? Find out all you can

The least important pieces of information are your credentials. Assume they know enough about you by being asked to be in sales pitching process. Don't waste time telling people all about your past, they can find that out by themselves.

Be the Pitch Doctor and ease the clients pain! Do you recall the song " A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down"? Be the agency with the best bedside manner

Pitching bloopers

Credence is compiling a list of pitching bloopers such as these below. If you can add to it please let me know. They will be published so hide the details if needed

Cheeky!

A colleague of mine had successfully completed the pitch and was being entertained by our Middle Eastern hosts in Dubai. Half way through the meal he passed wind thinking it was a local custom. The head of the Jordanian delegation remarked "You might be thinking that you are engaging in a local custom. You are not. That is the sole preserve of children and animals.

Cheers!

After a significant pitch to a Japanese delegation, the MD turned to the Chairman of the Japanese conglomerate and offered the following toast "To Pearl Harbour!"

Tangled wires

At a pitch by Pratt and Whitney, the first speaker tripped over the microphone cable, knocked over the lectern, cut his hand on a shard of glass and tore his jacket on the upturned lectern. When his partner walked on to the stage a witty little wag said very loudly "Ah! Mr. Whitney I presume?"

Any more??

please email me on bloopers@Credence-uk.com

Perfect Pitching - rehearse it first

For many of us the idea of pitching is against all we stand for. For us the beauty parade should be a thing of the past. It is old fashioned, costly, time consuming and judging by feedback from clients it is not foolproof.

Ideally you should not be pitching for new work. If you get involved with the tendering process and or build a relationship with the prospective client there should be no reason to pitch. They should trust you to deliver the goods.

However, we do not live in a perfect world and culturally here in the UK we are all asked to pitch.

Here are the top 5 tips that will help you to maximise the chances of winning the pitch:

1. Understand what the client really wants. Delve in deeper. Ask the awkward questions. Challenge their thinking
2. Find out if you have a realistic chance of winning the pitch or are you making up the numbers. They will not answer a direct question but they might tell you who is the current incumbent, how long they have been in place and the quality of the relationship which might in turn tell you how likely you are to win it.
3. Make absolutely sure you know the budget. If they are not prepared to divulge it then walk away.
   
4. Get to know who the various people are in the decision making process. For instance who is the sponsor, the budget holder, the user, the gate keeper. They all need to be bought on board
5. Do a full dress rehearsal. Preferably in front of an independent but knowledgeable expert
   

We are willing to act as that independent expert. We will come along and see the full dress rehearsal after reading through the client brief.

Call me on 07956 532963