70% of clients say free pitching is way to go
Worrying figures have been revealed by a new study, showing that 70 per cent of clients believe that agencies should not, under any circumstances, be paid to pitch for pieces of business.
A recent survey undertaken by industry body BDI (British Design Innovation), delving into the pitching habits of clients and agencies alike, has exposed some staggering discrepancies between the views of clients and their design agencies on the contentious subject of free pitching.
Despite the average annual cost of pitching coming in at around £38,000 for an agency, of the clients polled 57 percent still insisted that they would withdraw an invitation to pitch from an agency that insisted on being paid to take part in the pitch process.
The creative industries pitch process has been a heavily-debated subject for many years, causing much angst between client organizations and agencies working in all marketing sectors. The research undertaken by BDI focused specifically on the design sector, however.
BDI claims that free pitching has given rise to inappropriate procurement procedures, unethical or whimsical pitches, poor etiquette, restriction of the creative process, barriers to relationship building and a negative impact on productivity, and the purpose of the research is to establish the cost of free pitching, its impact on productivity and to highlight poor procedures.
Other interesting figures highlighted in the study show that the number of man-hours spent on free pitching per annum is 608, with 65 percent of design companies surveyed selectively engaging in free pitching.
Sixteen percent of the agencies surveyed said they take-up every invitation to free pitch and 14 percent claim to never free pitch.
Interestingly, the average number of agencies invited to participate in a free pitch is six, this drops down to three in a paid pitch, suggesting that the initial agency selection process is far less rigorous in the free pitch process and thereby the chances of winning new business are significantly reduced.