The Mediaweek Academy will host its sixth session, which will explore pitching to win.
MFA Hall of Famer and Mediaweek contributing editor Greg’ Sparrow’ Graham will lead the session, featuring a Legend of the industry sharing their career development wisdom and a Superstar discussing their insights.
This month’s Mediaweek Academy Legend is Graham Webster from Enth Degree, with Superstar speaker Joe Frazer, the founder of Half Dome.
Frazer is specifically the managing partner and digital lead at Half Dome as the media agency specialises in digital media centralisation and activation, ad-tech consulting, brand business growth strategy and website and data commercialisation.
Frazer spoke to Mediaweek about how he got his start in the media industry, what he has learnt about the process of pitching throughout his career, and how he individually and as a team deals with a setback in or after a pitch.
MW: How did you get your start in your career?
JF: I was fortunate enough to get an opportunity to interview at Amnet, which was the programmatic trading desk for Dentsu, when it was a team of just four people in Melbourne. I showed up in my dad’s suit, which was a full five to six sizes too large, and claimed that understanding and influencing people’s emotions was a passion of mine.
The truth? I had a mounting HECS debt and a sobering realisation that my Commerce/Engineering degree would only hold so much value considering I hadn’t attended many classes.
I was lucky to be part of these early days at Amnet, a business that quickly grew to a sizable team of 70 and allowed its young team to contribute to that journey. Amnet was highly profitable and experienced all the normal growing pains we’re currently dealing with at Half Dome. Admittedly, our bottom line hasn’t quite mirrored the impregnable profit fortress of a late noughties to early 2010s trading desk…
It came full circle when the same General Manager, Catherine Smith, who hired me at Amnet all those years ago, joined Half Dome as our own GM 18 months ago.
MW: Half Dome has had a string of wins – as a result of those wins, what have you learnt about the process of pitching?
JF: 1. If it isn’t sorted a week out you have already lost.
When we started Half Dome, our pitch approach saw us working until 3am the night before the actual pitch making sure all the content was done and everyone was prepared. I remember comments like “this is what pitching is about” and a general sentiment that this is just how it is and nothing will change that.
The reality is a pitch process should be an extension of your existing product, and that product should be replicable and delivered to deadlines well ahead of time. If you work at an agency that doesn’t believe that you probably aren’t winning many pitches.
We call it being the most professional pitchers in market and it is something everyone should aspire to.
2. 10 Slides
It is cliché these days, but I know for a fact not many agencies religiously follow this rule. Honestly… if you are up in the 70 and 80 pages, the only person listening is the Head of Strategy, and they are generally listening to themselves.
3. Put someone in charge
This one is also fairly intuitive, but you won’t win any pitches if you put the Head of Strategy in charge of the brief response, the Head of Client Service in charge of commercials, the Group Business Director in charge of the service model, and the Head of Digital in charge of the technology recommendation.
One, you are sure fire to break rule 1, and rule 2. But also, you will forget the only thing that matters, and that is you should be pitching to the client and the two to three things they care about. Every aspect of the pitch should link back to those value propositions.
Put someone independent in charge who has the authority and confidence to overrule everyone else.
MW: If you’ve had a setback in or after a pitch, how have you dealt with that individually and as a team?
JF: Will Harms (Half Dome co-founder) and I once pitched together to one of the top 20-25 CMOs in the industry – who will remain unnamed. We would have pitched 30 times together, and our product was a good fit.
At the time we didn’t really have a well-defined pitch process, we were just winging it and in hindsight, we broke every rule. Tonnes of slides, missed deadlines, spoke about ourselves for an hour and missed the brief completely.
It was a car crash. Bottom three meetings I have been part of.
I often laugh to myself about that marketing team and if they ever see us growing and think to themselves – “Geez I wonder how they win anything”- I wouldn’t blame them.
Luckily, we are both pretty competitive people and this was exactly the kick up the arse we needed. Three weeks later we implemented a pitch process, it included a few things I think everyone should do;
• post pitch survey to all
• internal deadlines
• a group of “shadow” pitchers who challenge everything
Plus a gamut of other initiatives that we will cover in the Academy. In this sense, failing miserably (honestly, so badly) was better that being the bridesmaid three to four times in a row, as we learnt the most from it.
MW: What do you hope attendees take away from your session, and what is your industry advice to them about pitching to win?
JF: If I had to isolate one thing, it would be giving people the confidence to be themselves in a pitch. At the end of the day, people pick people they want to work with, and if you have a team you are proud of, let them shine.
I tell our Domers all the time to embrace their weird. Don’t pitch or present like I do, or another presenter they like, just be themselves. Clients tend to like that.
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Top image: Mediaweek Academy Superstar Joe Frazer