Meetdraw - The Art of New Business - A review

Held in Redweb’s Loading Bar and sponsored by Jimmy’s Iced Coffee, ‘The Art of New Business’ (@theartofnewbiz )Meetdraw (@meetdraw) event promised to inspire the art of great pitching and lead generation. With excellent networking opportunities and delicious White Russian cocktails, the event was lively and informative. There were four key speakers and a panel to discuss the new business process from initial contact to pitch. Topics included relationship management, the issue of free work before pitch and how to make your first touch point engaging.

Andy Edwards from @nine5three spoke enthusiastically about ‘Relationomics’. His talk made us think about consumer behaviour and about how our personality traits can be utilised when pursuing new business. Splitting the audience into four personality colours, it was interesting to see how our approach should be tailored depending on the colour of the client. I was Yellow, which means enthusiastic, persuasive and sensitive, but also frantic, self-centered and superficial. He suggested that instead of treating people how you would like to be treated, treat them how they would like to be treated. Build rapport, relationships, respect then the result is killer advice for contacting prospective clients!

(R x d) + (V x t) + A = Sale – A sale comes from deep relationships, that add value, are timely and have good attitude. Simple! To summarise Andy said, “The real currency in any organisation is not £, but it is relationships”.

Chris Head from @xopherhead talked about the use of comedy when pitching. The classic use of set up – punch to frame your point, give impact and drama. Far more memorable and impacting than just stating the point. The subtle use of comedy skills such as framing, context, misdirection and pacing, give pitches engagement. This vital for making your pitch memorable and successful. Duncan Cook from @3SIDEDCUBE discussed personalisation of contact with prospective clients. His anecdote about the personalised invitation, web questionnaire and app was inspiring! I would absolutely have followed the golden invitation, through the un-branded digital journey to find out what I was invited too and who had taken the time to understand me and my business. The results were clear, with an extremely impressive response rate and many pitch meetings in the pipeline. Duncan’s mantra is simple – be the best at one thing, not average at many.

Katie Streetwise and @randomapricot from @redweb pitch to win, believing that you should win no less than 80% of all pitches. If you do lose a pitch, in depth analysis is key to understanding why, gain feedback from the client and improve for the next pitch. Ensure your resource library is up to date, for easy strategy and collateral build for each prospective client. Show your workings and the creative journey rather than what you believe should be the end product. You don’t know enough about the client to give accurate end solutions at this stage, but a client can understand you process and how this way of working would complement them. Clients buy people, so asking them to view your team and office are important to set the scene for you as a business partner. Ensure your pitch is well prepared, know the room and key players to bring to your pitch, understand your audience and have key word on the slides, not the full pitch. Keep the conversation flowing after the pitch and challenge the brief to give the best result to client are all excellent tips from Redweb.

How many times have you been cold called by someone that has no idea about you or your business? Imagine a personalised point of contact that appeals to you as an individual, for example the supplier that contacted Jim from Jimmy’s Iced Coffee focused on their mutual love of surfing rather than ramming product in his face. He offered a surf meet, rather than a standard pitch meeting, and mention of his service offering was subtle and much further down the agenda. The result, the client agreed to meet for a surf and the start of a business relationship. The panel were bogged down with cold contacts, so much so that it impacted their ability to complete work. Do you want to be another irritation lost in the noise of cold contact? No? Well personalisation and research is essential!

Key advice from Cliff Van Wyk @bournemouthuni, Jim Cregan @jimmyicedcoffee and Jon Darch @farrowandball included not dominating the conversation with your agenda, don’t copy and paste and build the relationship first, the business can then follow. Don’t just accept any client if they are a bad fit for you organisation and strong creativity wins over in the end. The industry is so over populated with awards that clients never know which are worth noting and the impact of all awards is lost. Don’t shout about your noise, let word of mouth and your client portfolio shine through. Finally case studies are interesting, but aren’t the tipping point for a sale. Instead show that you understand your client and demonstrate strong working union.

Top tips from The Art of New Business are:

1. Understand you client as a business but also on an individual level. What is their context?
2. Personalise your touch points, use creativity and demonstrate your process to hook the client.
3. Focus on being great at one thing, be the best, be the experts and the awards, word of mouth recommendations and inbound enquiries will come organically.
4. Relationships come before business; nurture and prioritise them.
5. Research research research! Research the client, their business, the pitch and well everything!

This event was diverse and engaging. I picked up some great tips, insight from clients and research and perspectives I had not previously considered. The cocktails were delicious and the event had a great atmosphere with relevant speakers. My only negative was that as a newbie to the group, it was very difficult to network as everyone already knew each other, so thank you to those that came and chatted with me.

Maria Parker-Harris

Group marketing Co-ordinator

The SPS Group 

www.thespsgroup.co.uk

#pitch #TAONB #meetdraw #thespsgroup #retailmarketing #relationomics #setuppunch #touchpoint #redweb #jimmysicedcoffee #personalisation #3sidedcube #nine5three #whiterussian