When a project's missions truly resonates with you, the excitement can make you feel that you are destined to bring your concepts to fruition. This is often immediately followed by moments of uncertainty. Will the client feel same way?
Not only do you have to overcome the challenge of pitching to a client with limited information about who you are as a Creator, but also demonstrate that they can trust you based on the materials you submit in your pitch. In most cases, unless you are a popular Creator with an established portfolio that the client has already previewed, this will likely be the scenario for many Creators.
Truth be told, there are millions of ways–if not more–to approach an open Tongal project, but two big questions remain. Does your submission communicate that you are the best choice to move forward with and? More importantly? Does your method makes a lasting impact?
Informed by my personal experience, here are three things to consider when making your pitch a unique experience for a client.
Does the client have brand colors you should utilize?
The Tongal treatment template provides great opportunities to customize in clean, minimal ways. This helps a client visualize how your ideas align with their brand. By incorporating a company’s style guide for color, mood board graphics, and verbiage, Creators can help clients see themselves in the pitch, ultimately making the Creator a more obvious choice to approve.
Often times, the open project brief provides style guides for creators to reference. Taking the initiative to go through it before you are even greenlit demonstrates to both Tongal and the client that you are thorough, reliable, and can anticipate what a client needs. There is a time and place for being a Creator who stands out as your unique, artsy self and for being a Creators who shines by bringing out the best of a brand in new and interesting ways to push the pre-established messaging.
Have you customized your artist bios to reflect relevant information to a client?
If a client is looking for fun, out-of-the-box pitches, you should show why you and your team are out-of-the-box. If a client is serious and looking for credibility, you need to effectively communicate the depth of your skills and why your team’s combination of skills will make this project work well. Customizing the bios for the treatment is as important as customizing your resume before applying to a job. Make it relevant, no matter what that means for the brief.
The Tongal treatment template allots space for a short description of each team member. You can adjust the description layout if more space is needed, but if you struggle with summarizing a team member in two to three sentences, you should ask yourself if what you have written truly reinforces what a client needs to know about this team member.
Are you showing the client that you are passionate about the project?
Make it hard to say no to you and your ideas! Demonstrate how well you understand what they are asking for. If you have the time to effectively make a video pitch, an animatic, concept art, or a rough script, do it. Show that you can take initiative to provide what they are looking for. As a Creator, you should look for ways to increase your pitch’s value off the bat. Investing time in your pitch to make it the best proposal for a project will pay off when you are greenlit.
Pitching is a stressful hurdle to jump over for a lot of creators. Help keep a cool head and set yourself up for success by considering these three questions as you begin to assemble a project treatment. “Well thought out” and “most qualified” are not synonymous with submitting walls of text on each treatment slide or reinventing the wheel every time a new open project pops up. Nobody wants complicated; they want skilled and efficient talent creating something that aligns with their brand in ways that elevates everything they have already built. You and your work are enough, as you’ll prove with a clean and effective treatment. If you’re pitching for projects in your wheelhouse, have faith in your capabilities and don’t be discouraged by not being selected every time you try for a project. Each treatment submission is practice to figure out how to best present yourself to clients. You’ll get there!
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Note From Tongal: This blog is part of a series of Tongal Community-written blog posts that were originally sourced in the Tongal Blog Open Call Project. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Tongal. Read more Tongal Community-written posts here!
