In many respects we’re a relatively young company, we don’t aggressively target potential new clients and our growth so far has relied mainly on recommendation and word-of-mouth. We like the romantic idea that producing good work will attract good clients.

So we don’t chase the numbers and we aren’t happy to adopt a one in three mentality, meaning we can commit quality time and effort into a new pitch opportunity because if it’s worth doing, then it’s worth doing your best.

Secondly, we’re quite choosy about the projects that come our way. We’ll listen to opportunities, do a bit of research on the people and the challenges of the company in question, and do a lot of chatting before we decide whether they would be a good fit for us and ‘the thing we do’. As we progress, we’re finding that there is a certain personality and ethos in a business which we are really attracted to, and in turn – the feelings are often mutual.

Finally, having the right ‘fit’ with a potential client’s personality doesn’t mean that we need to have had much (or any) past experience in their particular line of work. We are constantly looking for, and thrive on, new challenges – we don’t want to pigeonhole ourselves into a certain type of work and we absolutely do not want to be seen as ‘market experts’… if you’ve been there and done it, time and again, you’re less likely to bring anything new, fresh or surprising to the table.

So, if we’ve not got too much on our plate already and the timing is right, if the personality of the business fits with the way we see the world (as people), and if there’s a really toothy problem to solve – we’ll jump in with both feet.

The caveat to all of the above is that we don’t participate in creative pitches, but that’s a different conversation all together.

Why are we losers?..

Well, we’ve just lost one…. a pitch I mean. We’re pretty philosophical about the competitive nature of what we do, lovers rather than fighters, that kind of thing. But, it’s not an enjoyable feeling to lose out on a project that you’ve put so much effort into. Perhaps this is why a lot of agencies take a pragmatic approach, play the percentage game and don’t get too tied-up in the emotion of it.

But we’re emotional people, and we don’t like the feeling at all.

Why did we lose?..

After some very attentive and well-considered feedback, in the end it came down to not having sufficient market sector experience and being pipped to the post by a competitor who had (more) experience in the client’s sector – and of course we sent our heart-felt congratulations to the winners, as it’s nice to be nice after all.

So whereas recently we’d been winning work based upon our fresh approach and our overt commitment to new challenges and new ways of approaching those challenges, our ethos became a bit of a barrier in this instance (for this potential client anyway).

We respect their decision even if we don’t really agree with the reasoning. We don’t agree because we can apply our approach and thinking to any brand and comms challenge, developing our knowledge by using thorough research combined with our own creative intuition to become (in a small way) experts in each market sector we explore.

And don’t get me started on all this B2B marketing nonsense. Businesses are run by and for real people, not machines – so why would the people in a company who construct oil rigs be any less emotional than the people in a company who sells flowers? People are people, you’ve just got to get under their skin and find our what makes them tick, whether that’s the aroma of crude oil or fresh lilies.

Anyway, I digress.

I suppose this is me making myself feel better by writing about our loss, like some unrequited love. We could have been great together, I know we’d have enjoyed a great adventure and perhaps a really prosperous long-term relationship, but alas, it wasn’t to be.

Yes, there’s plenty more fish in the sea – but we’ll miss the one that got away.

_____

Written by David Thompson