“The Pitch” was a custom program we created for our client, a major office furniture company, to provide interactive entertainment during one of the evenings of their national sales meeting.  “The Pitch” was patterned after the popular television show “The Voice”, complete with a popular television emcee, video DJ, company executives serving as celebrity judges, top sales employees serving as the talent and the rest of the employees serving as the audience and voting public.

For this event, we were responsible for the following elements:

• Concept Design and Adaptation – We took the idea of “The Voice” and then adapted the concept to fit a team of sales people, pitching different items in the company’s furniture line in a competitive format.
• Set Design – We worked with both the hotel and a rental / decor company to replicate the set of the voice, complete with lighting columns, revolving chairs for the judges with buzzer systems and a video DJ, utilizing flat screens to display the competition rules and categories so the audience could continually follow along with the program.
• Talent – We procured an emcee to host the event that worked for popular television shows like Hollywood Extra, TV Guide Channel and various other celebrity red carpet shows as well as a video DJ to serve as the side man, video graphics and sound effects coordinator and entertainment in between rounds, keeping the audience engaged by spinning top hits.
• Script Writing – We wrote the entire script for the host as well as the executives serving as the celebrity judges.
• Logo and Graphic Design – We designed the custom logo for “The Pitch” that was present throughout the entire program.  The graphics were utilized to introduce each contestant, judge, title of each round as well as the rules and voting requirements.
• Costuming and Makeup – We coordinated the costuming and makeup for the four executives that impersonated the celebrity judges.  Each judge transformed into Blake Shelton, Adam Levine, Christina Aguilera and Ceelo Green. The audience enjoyed seeing their top level executives in this fun and relaxed setting.
• Production and Calling the Show – We executed all of the production elements, making sure the Video DJ had all of the correct tension building music during the judging and decision making process, all of the correct graphics displayed at the correct time as well as executing the final round real-time text voting system so the audience could use their iOS devices to select the winner.

The objectives of the event were to create an interactive experience that would allow the executives and top sales people to serve as the talent, while speaking on different product lines and about the overall vision and mission statement for the company. To do this, we worked with the company to determine the topics for each of the four rounds that their top sales people would pitch to the audience (their colleagues). The first three rounds were three top selling products and the fourth round was talking about the power of the company’s brand. This gave the audience a chance to see what points of emphasis and approach the top sales people in the company would take for this competition. This would translate into the top sales people educating their colleagues in a fun and interactive way. With the executives serving as the judges and mentors, the audience would also hear the feedback of the executives as it pertained to each pitch, which furthered the audience’s education in a fun and creative way.

While the concept of “The Pitch” was based on the show “The Voice”, it was still both original and creative. It was challenging to take a loose concept of a singing competition and adapting it to sales pitch process. Additionally, trying to recreate a multi-million dollar television set on a fraction of a budget also presented a challenge. Crafting an adaptation of the rules and format of the show required many hours of writing and revisions with the client. We tried to ensure that we captured all of the popular elements of the show “The Voice” while making it conducive to the time constraints and layout of the hotel ballroom.

The company’s meeting objective was to educate their team on strategy, planning and sales techniques. “The Pitch” allowed the audience to watch the top 16 sales people and 4 executives speak and educate the rest of the sales team in a fun and interactive way. “The Pitch” allowed an educational element of the conference to be a major source of entertainment at the same time.

To execute the event we created four rounds of competition. The first round was the Blind Audition. Our host introduced our celebrity judges, dressed as the stars of “The Voice”. After the introductions, the host brought out the 16 contestants one by one to give their opening sales pitch on one of the company’s products. The judges all sat with their backs to the contestants for the Blind Audition Round. Once a judge decided they wanted that person on their team, they hit a buzzer and spun their chair around to reveal themselves to the contestant. That judge would then serve as a mentor to the contestant for the remainder of the competition. The round concluded with each judge having 4 contestants on their team.

The contestants were then given their topic for the Battle Round which would take the field from 16 to 8 contestants. They all met with their mentors in a conference room for a brief period while the host and Video DJ entertained the guests in the ballroom.

During the Battle Round, each of the 16 contestants gave their pitch on one of the company’s products. At the end of the round, the audience used their iOS devices to vote for the top 8 contestants moving forward. After each pitch, the host would interview the contestants in front of the audience to give them a chance to tell something about themselves both personally and professionally.

After the Battle Round, the Top 8 contestants again met with their mentors to prepare their next pitch. Again, they pitched on a popular product line for the company. At the conclusion of the round, the judges gave their feedback and the audience used the text voting system to select the 4 contestants that would participate in the Finale.

The Finale pitted the top 4 contestants against each other on the topic of the power of the company’s brand. This gave the contestants a chance to deliver their take of the company’s mission statement. At the conclusion, the text voting system was used to determine the winner.

The winners each won some prizes for their efforts and in the end accomplished the objective of educating the employees in a fun and entertaining way.