Tag Archives: pitchcoach

“PITCHES & TROUGHS”

A number of people have said it would be a good idea to start gathering and posting the truly memorable pitch stories. Brilliant insights, bizarre mistakes, bravura performances, brazen bullshit, bright ideas, bloody foolishness and any other that come to mind.

Mine, surprise, surprise, will be drawn from experience at Saatchi but every sector of business, politics, law, media, sport, entertainment, you name it, has great stories to be told.

What are your favourites? Let’s have them please, in about one to two hundred words. To send them you can register and comment, or email me whichever is easiest. They will be posted under the Pitches and Troughs category.

A distinguished panel, yet to be announced, will rank contributions by story interest and intrigue, rather than pitch success, giving us The 100 Best Pitch Stories-EVER!

To give you a taster of stories over next few days, Camelot playing to the Government’s fear of failure, London 2012 making the emotional connection and, as we saw last week, Labour blowing it in Crewe with the “toff” stunt.

Let the storytelling begin……………………

Lessons from Crewe & Nantwich

As expected the Conservatives won, things are not going too well for the beleaguered Gordon Brown, but the margin of victory was surprising. Much of this was down to the success of the pitch at the local level. Some lessons can be drawn.

The importance of leadership, in this case the candidates. Tory, Edward Timpson, bright, positive,optimistic contrasting with the reluctant Tamsin Dunwoody. Her selection a misguided attempt to gain the sympathy vote, since her mother had been a huge presence in the constituency, Tamsin suffered by comparison. Her body language signalled that she would really rather be somewhere else.

The value of a positive strategy, in tone and content. The Tory campaign hitting the different target audiences, their loyalists, Labour and LibDems with different but simple, positive messages. Contrast this with Labours “inept, negative and poisonous”campaign ( Labour MPs’ own Compass group).

Finally. the energy factor. In any pitch, business or political, the emotional impact of unbridled energy and exuberance can carry the day. The Tories have this, Labour don’t.

The Moscow pitch

My last post, the Post Match Interview, set the scene for reviewing the performances of Ferguson and Grant after last night’s final in Moscow. In the event, during four hours of ITV coverage, the state of the actual pitch got more airtime than either manager.

The pulsating game overcame the bland cliche-ridden commentary and the experts’ platitudes.The lottery shoot-out robbed Chelsea, in my inexpert opinion, of a deserved victory. It also denied Avram Grant some well deserved recognition.

His has been a tough path ( setting aside any fortune being paid) with the media and fans resentful that a nobody from Israel, not a mighty footballing nation, should be allowed to manage alongside the likes of Fergie, Wenger and our ‘Arry.

To put him in his place, much of the media say the team is effectively being run by the senior players, luminaries like Lampard and Terry. The alternative view is that his utterances are those of PR experts, with Matthew Freud’s name in the frame.

I don’t agree. Someone gave Chelsea one hell of a half-time talk and it wasn’t Freud.

Grant is a good example of someone who understands and plays to his strengths, not protesting too much. His quiet confidence as a communicator must, surely, be driving the team’s performance.

The post-match interview

For me, one of the intriguing aspects of television coverage of football is the post-match interview. Obligatory, to ensure exposure of sponsor identities, they give us an opportunity to witness the art, or not, of pitching under pressure particularly by the losing managers.

They have at least three tough audiences. First, there is the owner, as often as not obscenely wealthy and wildly capricious, who must be persuaded to keep on employing them. Sven, seemingly despite Man City’s good performance, did not come across in a manner that reflects the self-image of a former Prime Minister of Thailand!

Secondly, the players who, I assume, watch highlights like the rest of us. The way the manager defends even the most indefensible, must be a critical first step towards rebuilding confidence. Blaming the ref for everything is the unsurprising solution.

Finally the supporters, “keep forking out for the high price tickets, we will be worth it next time”.

It may be pitchcoach bias on my part, but it seems to me the top eight or so Premiership managers, win or lose, give stronger, more charismatic interviews than the rest. Does this, in part at any rate explain their success?

The “three tenors” were Ferguson, Wenger and the “special one”, Mourinho. With Jose’s departure, it seemed at first that the self-styled “ordinary one”, Grant, would be blown away in the interview stakes. He has found his own quietly impressive voice. Let’s see who performs best in Moscow, winner or loser.

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Pit(ch)fall 3. Casting based on input not impact.

Most pitches call for a response to a brief in the form of a written proposal, followed by a presententation to the key decision takers. Typically, the proposal is developed by the appropriate experts and specialists working night and day to deliver a great result.

So far so good. The common error, however, when it comes to deciding who will present in the final shoot out, is to assume these same people should, and/or deserve to present . Not so.

What matters is not the input of these people but what the audience ‘takes out’, what is their emotional response, on the day, to the presenters as individuals and as a team. The casting decision must be lead by understanding of the audience dynamics and the need to be ruthless in casting the team that will perform best on the day.

Some ‘rules’. Don’t outnumber the client by more than one; your leader must be seen to lead; the team should be a balance of interesting, contrasting individuals rather than a collection of experts. You are seeking the reaction that ‘ we would enjoy, and be stimulated, working with these people and they clearly get on with each other’.

The London 2012 Bid team cast for impact when they included thirty youngsters in place of VIPs; ex-prison officer Ray Lewis is interesting casting by Boris that suggests he will not be afraid to surround himself with personalities. Could Obama, if he wins, select Clinton as running mate? That would be interesting casting.

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