Have you ever lost a pitch to the incumbent? Here’s why.

A lead comes in. It looks like a great opportunity. You throw the kitchen sink at it. You lose the pitch. Worse than that, you find out the prospect is sticking with the incumbent agency. Anger and frustration fester at the wasted time, effort and resource you’ve invested. For nothing.

Sound familiar? I’ve seen a few comments recently on LinkedIn about this very scenario; when you are invited by a prospect to share your expertise and ideas, unbeknown to you that the prospect has no intention of actually changing agency. You’re ‘pitch candy’, as one of my clients eloquently put it.

I’m not condoning this behaviour. But like it or not, it happens. And whilst you can’t stop it, there are steps you can take to give yourself a better chance of not being caught out.

And before you act the innocent, we all play this game to varying degrees. Think about how you negotiate your mobile phone, broadband or gas contract – if you’re not playing these companies against one another, you’re missing a trick. I know it’s a very different setting. But the principle is the same.

Kicking you whilst you’re down

Back in agency land, whilst the prospect invariably gets all the blame for their deceitful ways, here’s the rub. If you find yourself in this situation, I’m afraid the fault lies with you. Sorry…I know that’s going to hurt (when you’re already down) but it’s true.

In most cases, it’s down to you because you’ve failed to ask the right questions, at the right time. You’ve also failed to ‘own’ the pitch process, as far as you possibly can. Instead, you’ve allowed the prospect to lead and you’ve taken the bait; hook, line and sinker.

Agencies are often far too eager to present their ideas and solutions. But by doing so, they bypass key steps in the information-gathering and qualifying process.

Many small ‘yeses’ = one BIG ‘yes’

As one of my mentors taught me, qualifying is about gaining lots of small ‘yeses’ from the prospect, for example:

‘Yes, we will give you our time and share insight with you.’

‘Yes, we will explain the process we are working through, who will be involved and why.’

‘Yes, we will invest the appropriate budget.’

‘Yes, we will review your proposal and provide feedback regardless of our decision.’

‘Yes, we will follow through and actually implement your strategy and ideas.’

Ultimately, ‘yes, we are going to make a change.’

Gaining lots of small ‘yeses’ means you stand a far greater chance of hearing the big ‘YES’ at the end. A ‘no’ at any stage is a red flag.

Incumbent in the mix? That’s another red flag

In a situation where a prospect is already working with another agency, you should double down on your qualifying efforts. You’ll start by seeking to explore where the prospect is trying to get to, the problems they are facing and what success looks like. But fairly early on, you will also want to ‘test’ the prospect on just how serious they are about making a change.

This means understanding how they found you and what encouraged them to get in touch.

It means finding out who else they are speaking to and why.

It means exploring their criteria for shortlisting agencies.

It means explicitly asking if their existing agency is re-pitching.

It means finding out what they are looking for in a partner and what they have seen in other agencies that they like / dislike.

This is not an exhaustive list. Every scenario is different and needs to be treated as such. But it should act to highlight just how robust and detailed your approach to qualifying should be, especially in a competitive pitch situation, and even more so when an incumbent is involved.

It’s not a perfect science

Qualifying involves leaving no stone unturned. It means avoiding assumptions. It’s about being in control and only moving to the next stage when you are confident you have gained the necessary ‘yes’ from the prospect.

Big caveat. I’m not saying that by mastering the art of qualifying, you are never again going to lose a pitch to an incumbent. Sometimes they win fair and square.

However, a process that you follow consistently, combined with the confidence to ask the right questions, at the right time, means you’ll certainly be far better at spotting the red flags earlier (and then politely declining the opportunity to progress things further).

On the flip side, you’ll also arm yourself with the skills to stand a better chance of winning the ‘right’ opportunities.