The same company that coached Sydney’s Olympic bid team is now trying to use the same magic on Toronto’s 2008 Olympic bid.
It seems the key could be cardboard cutouts of the Olympic committee members that are voting for the 2008 host city.
Barry Snetsinger’s consultant group Rogen Canada used the device on Sydney’s group and it worked. Perhaps the same tactic will help Toronto.
Snetsinger coached Sydney’s team to look directly at the cardboard cutouts of key members of the committee as they made their final preparation.
Snetsinger, a Canadian, told the Toronto Star, “what we really did with Sydney and what we’re doing with Toronto is essentially what we do with corporations — help them in a new business pitch. The Olympics for all intents and purposes is a business pitch; it simply has greater magnitude”.
Snetsinger said, “you never pitch to strangers. You have to say to yourself, ‘Look, who are these people we’re presenting to, what do they need to know, what are the issues, what’s their culture?'”
John Bitove, TO-Bid president and CEO said, “part of the reason we have had so many people on the road for so long is because you’ve got to understand voting members. You don’t get that by sitting in an office in Toronto; you don’t get that by hiring the world’s biggest ad agency. You get that by talking to them and trying to understand what issues are important to them”.
Snetsinger said Toronto bidders will haved a regular game plan in mind in Moscow, where the vote is being held. But they’ll also have a Plan B and even a Plan C should something go dreadfully wrong.
He said one of the toughest things about putting together an IOC presentation is that people think 45 minutes is a lot of time. “The reality is it’s a very short time. There might be 20 things you want to say about Toronto, but what are the things you really have got to say?. We don’t tell anyone what to say; it’s more how do you say it. We talk about how you bring the emotion to this thing, how you paint an interesting picture, how are you going to be credible”.
Bitove said he’s watched a lot of presentations on video. “The amazing thing is some of the best ones didn’t win”.
Dick Pound, an IOC Canadian member, said he believes you don’t win with your presentations, but you can lose with it. “If someone’s is weaker than yours or somebody blows it, you may benefit from that. But standing alone you probably don’t persuade anyone who wasn’t already persuaded to vote for you”.
Snetsinger said his company is doing its work for Toronto for free. Bitove said he wouldn’t say how much the Moscow presentation will cost, but he told the Star that TO-Bid may send close to 200 people to Russia for the July 13 vote.
“All I can say is that if a private business did this it would cost several million dolars; we have a lot of donated goods and services”.
