Getting inside a clients head

A key requirement of winning a pitch is understanding that the client really wants. What are their key drivers, what are they basing their decisions upon?

Some RFQ’s list clearly what the selection criteria are, this is great although, a word of caution, their understanding of the criteria may still differ to yours. If the RFQ doesn’t tell you, ask them. What do you have to lose?

The other key fact to try and ascertain is who is the key decision maker?

I recently ran a pitch with an Automotive OEM in which I had built up a great relationship with the Senior Marketing client. The Pitch was a digital transformation project around moving from a traditional content creation approach to a digital one. We really had a meeting of minds, and they shared my vision 100%. The RFQ asked for a written submission with no presentation.

This made me nervous as if felt that things were going to be very much down to quantitative not qualitative factors.

We received a request for a call with the purchase lead. We had a short call where she asked that we submitted our BAFO, ‘best and final offer’.

Normally in the this industry the right creative/tech partner is found and then the negotiation begins, but with this client it was purely on price. We put in a fair discount, but we lost the pitch.

Good news is that I’m still in contact with the marketing client so who knows.

by Richard Wright