A marketing pitch is a pitch that is designed to sell a marketing idea. A good marketing strategy should be synergistic, comprehensive and compelling – just like a good product or a good service! As such, you can pitch a marketing campaign in just the same way that you would approach pitching a product. This is what you can use to summarise your plan to the rest of your organization or more likely, it is what a marketing company will use to get clients.
A smart business knows that a marketing campaign is much more than just an advert. A marketing campaign might include an advert, but it will also likely include email marketing, content marketing, synergistic marketing, affiliate marketing and more.
Ultimately, it will be designed to create a certain impression while raising awareness and visibility for the brand using particular routes to market. This is your campaign and with so many different factors, that means that there are of course countless different ways to approach it.
And this is why you might need a marketing pitch. The marketing pitch is designed to sell the marketing campaign: to make it sound appealing and interesting and to show how it can be used in order to help the product, brand or service.
This is what the marketing company will use then in order to encourage a client to take them on. Likewise, this is what you might use simply to understand your own marketing pitch better, or to sell it to the others in your business.
How to Pitch
No matter what the purpose of your pitch, there is a certain art and skill to putting it across in an effective manner.
Professionalism
First of all you need to make sure that your pitch is going to sound professional and confident. Of course, a client for your marketing company isn't really going to be investing in your ability to deliver pitches and speeches, but if you stutter and um and ah, then you aren't going to fill them with confidence, you'll lose the impact of your message, and you'll find that you undermine your own points.
Instead then you should aim to deliver your pitch in a manner that would make Steve Jobs himself jealous. Make sure that you are composed, that you speak clearly and that the whole script flows smoothly. And how do you achieve that? Practice! Make sure that you run through your pitch numerous times before giving it for real, and try recording yourself and watching it back in order to spot any potential problems/find areas that can be improved. Survey friends as well and have them tell you which aspects could be better.
This first step will help to present your ideas in the most compelling and professional way which will get things off to a good start. Next you need to instil confidence that you're a business man or woman who knows what they're doing and who can make money. To do this, make sure that you have fully researched the pitch before going in.
Principally that means knowing your numbers: how much will your advertising cost to produce? How much will it cost you to get certain influencers and creators on board? Likewise, how many people are likely to see your adverts? What is the search volume for the keywords you are looking for?
Also very important is to research the existing market. Not only will this show that you're the kind of person who thinks of everything, but it will also help to illustrate the opportunities that are there and to show that you aren't just taking a wild gamble with everyone else's money.
Lastly, make sure that you have researched the people/company that you are pitching to. What kinds of things do they sell? What is there budget? What have they been successful with in the past? If nothing else it is simply rude to give a pitch without knowing who you're talking to, so make sure you don't get caught out.
Passion
Now you have their confidence and you've outlined the business model clearly and in detail. On paper it all looks good, but in order to stand out from the crowd you're going to need that added extra 'spark' to give your idea its vavavoom.
This is going to come from what's known as the 'value proposition'. In other words, this is the 'end result' of your business or the business you represent - the way it will change lives and the reason that people will want it. A hat company doesn't sell hats, it sells warmer heads and great fashionable looks that fill people with confidence. This is where the heart of your marketing lies and it's the part that people will be able to get excited for. Show your excitement and understanding for it and you'll find that that's highly contagious.
