Tendering and pitching – Key ideas and actions

November 8, 2025|Accountants, Kim's Blog, Lawyers, Management Skills, Marketing, Selling|

There was a variety of delegates at a recent workshop by MBL on “Pitch Perfect – How to prepare and present winning pitches and tenders”. From trainees to partners, from beginners to marketing and business development experts, from private client to commercial services and from large and smaller firms. I’ve summarised their key insights and ideas. Tendering and pitching – Key ideas and actions

The delegate aims in tendering and pitching

Develop a smooth and straightforward process
Ensure the client is always in the loop
Demonstrate brand values and client-focused and proactive service
Identify and respond to the client needs
Craft interesting and engaging content
Anticipate and remain ahead of any potential hurdles
Innovate pitching approaches
Improve conversion rates

Key insights from workshop delegates on pitching and tendering

Cultural and mindset shift

Client focused mindset Shift your thinking from the firm’s services to focus on the client’s needs. Consider client need from their role, team, organisation, region and sector. What they want (problems to resolve, opportunities to realise), what they need and the risks they need to be aware of and manage

Processes

Processes and policies Explore what policies, processes and resources your firm has to support those producing pitches, presentations, credential documents, tenders and sales relationships. Particularly with regards to research resources

Project management (and version control) Ensure it is clear who is responsible for what and when. Align expectations across the firm, sectors, services and offices

Support younger professionals Tendering and pitching may have been the domain of partners and seniors in the past, but increasingly more junior fee-earners are being asked to adopt an active role in pitches and tenders to win work from existing and new clients

Support teams Enable the team assembled to manage the pitch or tender to work together, access the information required, identify the clients needs, create a differentiating value proposition and win the work

Research Assemble internal and external information to support tendering and pitching. Subscribe to commercial research resources. Guide everyone in the research processes necessary to support each client communication and interaction

Use technology There is evidence of people starting to use artificial intelligence (AI) in supporting pitch and tender documents and presentations. But care must be taken with confidentiality and accuracy. Clients may also scan documents to detect the use of AI. Because of AI, clients may place more emphasis on presentations and interactions

Rehearse Ensure the team is practiced and confident in working together – and able to switch approaches if the client indicates that their interest has changed or developed

Track Establish systems to monitor pitch and tender invitations, submissions and success rates. Monitor the progress of pitches – and the amount of time invested by marketing and business development professionals and fee-earners

Documents, presentations and materials

Align Integrate a client-focused tender response with the firm’s brand position and personality and reflecting the team’s personality and approach

Structure Adopt a suitable structure that reflects the client’s interests and priorities

Benefits and value proposition Demonstrate that the firm properly understands the client’s challenges and concerns and has the experience and capability to help them find a suitable solution

Brand and image Understand the relationship between the chosen words, the selected images and the overall impact of brand and identity on documents and presentations

Use simple language Avoid jargon and unnecessary technical jargon that will confuse rather than educate and reassure the client

Brevity Keep things concise, brief and clear

Visual communication Use images, photographs, charts, diagrams to answer succinctly and with impact and to enhance understanding and engagement

Compliance Adhere to the client’s requirements and specifications – yet think beyond the brief to identify additional opportunities and threats and craft a differentiating value proposition

Connect emotionally Use stories to make an emotional connection and demonstrate how the firm has succeeded with similar challenges from similar clients

Interaction Use presentation time to spark interaction and communication

Anticipate Be prepared to respond well to anticipated and unanticipated questions. Be ready to manage questions from clients: stay calm, listen fully, and answer concisely. Anticipate reasonable and unreasonable objections and be ready to respond confidently

Delegate key ideas and actions at the end of the session

Image

Impact of the design and words from different firms
Executive summary format
Visuals that attract clients

Key idea

Dog, cat and bear personalities
ABCDE preparation work
Shrek introduction structure

Key action

Make copy more client-focused
Adopt different structure for documents
Greater research into the client at all stages

Information sources supporting UK professional services pitches and tenders

Public sector tenders

Find a Tender Find information on UK public procurements and contracts

UK – Law Firms Contracts UK public sector contracts

UK – Professional Services Framework Contracts BidStats UK Professional Services Framework Contracts

Tenders for legal aid contracts – GOV.UK (July 2025)

Transforming Public Procurement – GOV.UK (June 2025) Changes introduced with The Procurement Act 2023 which came into force on 24 February 2025

Legal market analysis (competitor analysis)

Strategic analysis – PWC’s UK Legal Services Market Report 2025 (September 2025) Overall competitive context for law firms competing for work. Particular focus on the impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and automation

Strategic sector insights for the legal profession in 2025: mid-sized firms | The Law Society (January 2025) Study in association with MHA accountants capturing key rends and insights from decision makers of mid-sized law firms. Key threats and opportunities examined. Greatest areas for growth: private client, litigation, property (especially commercial real estate) and family law

A wholly subjective (but nonetheless definitive) guide to law firms from a $300m client on how to make a successful pitch* – Legal Business (April 2023)

BigHand 2025 Annual Legal Pricing and Budgeting Trends Analysis

Preparing an effective tender presentation | Legal Guidance | LexisNexis (June 2025)

Artificial intelligence (AI) and tenders

CIM’s hype-free guide to AI agents for marketers – Kim Tasso (September 2025) Insights into how marketing and BD teams might use AI agents to improve efficiency

Arup and GHD pitch automation and AI (October 2025) case studies of how engineering businesses adopted artificial intelligence to improve their tendering processes

Accountancy sector

Getting real value from the audit tender process KPMG Board Leadership Centre (2018)

Property/real estate sector

Practice Standards RICS guidance note – Tendering strategies (January 2015)

General tendering guidance

Business Growth Through Tendering: Complete UK Guide 2025 (June 2025)

How do I find private sector tenders? – Tracker

Selected delegate poll results on tenders and pitches

Key points when introducing yourself:

Tailor to the interests and needs of the audience
Be concise and to the point
Minimise “busy” details
Maintain audience interest and engagement
Convey personality and set the tone

Pitching and tendering experience	Training or experience in selling
1 50%	50%
2	17%
3 17%
4
5
6	33%
7 17%
8
9 17%
10

Topic of most interest:

0% Pitch planning and processes
20% Preparation, early client contact and sales strategy
40% Creating the pitch or tender document
20% Preparing pitch presentations
20% Delivering pitch presentations
0% After the pitch

Delegate pitch process highlights:

Public Contract Scotland (alerts of tenders)
Trackers to monitor tenders coming up
Emails to relevant teams
Research into clients
Kick off meetings with team
Create bid plan
Team allocation
Drafting WIP

MBD team primary role:

0% Part of sales team (client facing)
50% Strategic support
0% Content development
0% Process support
50% Information/administrative support

(One delegate reported MBD team involved in all stages)

(Two delegates indicated that they were not aware)

Pitch metrics used:

Number/volume of pitches
% Value of pitches received/submitted/won
Gross written premium
Win/no win
Fee value
Client feedback

Criteria for deciding to pitch/not pitch:

Research into company
Value – is it economically worth it
Check we have the expertise
Team capacity
Views of key team members (gut feel)

Extent to which sales strategy and value proposition reflect the competition

20% Entirely on competitive positioning
60% We consider the competition carefully
20% We hardly think about the competition

Do you have specialist writing/editing resources?

100% No, we manage with our fee-earners’ writing skills

Key takeaways on documents

Structure
Approach
Be more client focused (“you” rather than “we”)

Do you contact the client to ask about their expectations for the presentation?

% Only if the client offers the opportunity
% If there is a particular reason for doing so
% Yes – always

Best speakers:

Barrister during mooting session – assertive and confident – delivered his point in concise manner
Man talking about professional burnout and breakdown – personal experience, set the scene, great storytelling, explained concepts clearly with images – memorable
Really engaging speaker who knew how to work the crowd

Do you contact the client to ask about their presentation expectations?

25% No, never
50% If there is a particular reason for doing so
25% Yes, always

Pros of using PowerPoint	Cons of using PowerPoint

Enhances engagement	Small when sharing over Teams
Easy to use	Distracting
Common interface – widely used	Limited creativity
Efficient	Detracts from speaker
Brief	Static images
Visual aids reinforce key points – include multimedia (videos, animations)

(alternatives to PowerPoint – Canva, using handouts)

Methods to avoid nerves or stress when presenting:

Breathing techniques
Pause, reflect and continue
Being (overly) prepared
Practising and rehearsing

What types of rehearsals do you arrange?

50% For the technology and presentation materials
100% Individual rehearsals if requested
50% Team rehearsals

Personality assessment dog, cat and bear personalities – Better business relationships

50% Cat
50% Dog
0% Bear

Questions after the presentation (Internal debrief and client debrief)

Pitch team
- How it went
- Where we did well or poorly
- New insights about client
- Views on client selection criteria
- Follow up points
Client
- Open ended questions about their thought process/conclusions
- Views on our pitch (compared to others)
- Any outstanding information needed
- Particular areas of interest from our presentation
- New needs emerging as a result of other presentations
Other follow up actions
- Thank client
- Schedule next steps

Metrics used

50% Number/volume of pitches received, submitted and won
50% Value of pitches
50% Profitability of pitches
50% MBD time on pitches
50% Client rankings of pitches
50% None