FAQ - Holding a Pitch for Ideas

What is a 'Pitch for Ideas'? A pitch allows Members to get good ideas fast by holding online pitches and inviting Creatives to come up with solutions that fit their specific requirements. We provide an online briefing form which will help you create a combined strategic and creative brief. You may provide as much information as you like you can, for example choose to keep the brand name confidential and create a generic brief. Alternatively you could choose to be completely transparent, including your brand name and adding as many background files as you like to the briefing form. You can offer cash prizes for the best idea, but you are under no obligation to license or use them in any future campaign. As a pitch holder, you also set the deadline. After the deadline has passed the ideas will be in your pitch portfolio within 48 hours. OpenAd.net guarantees that a minimum of 20 ideas will be pitched to you. Pitch responses remain in the Member's portfolio for 30 days after the pitch deadline. The Member may decide to license any of those ideas in that time. After the 30 day period, ideas may be de-branded and transferred to the relevant Gallery category. Membership packages specify the number of pitches for ideas you may hold in the twelve month membership period. Additional pitches may be added by contacting membership@openad.net. Why should I hold a pitch on OpenAd.net? Holding a pitch for ideas on OpenAd.net offers Members the opportunity to get Creatives from around the world working to their specifications. It is much like the conventional pitch concept that is familiar to all advertisers. However, the key difference is that the pitches are for conceptual ideas rather than executional ones. That is to say, the ideas may not be worked up to the visual level you would be accustomed to in a pitch situation. Pitches are held entirely online and can attract large numbers of creatives, all working to match the Member's brief. By staging a pitch, Members will have a selection of ready-to-produce ideas at their disposal, and an overview of the creative community either worldwide or in a specific region. This gives Members a unique insight into how its brand or product is currently perceived. Members might even find freelance creatives whom they wish to hire on a project basis. Can other Members see the contents of my pitch portfolio? No, only the Member holding the pitch has access to the ideas submitted in response to it. After 30 days unlicensed ideas may be de-branded and transferred to the Gallery. Who can hold a pitch for ideas? Every membership package allows at least one pitch for ideas on OpenAd.net, although the number you can hold in a 12-month membership period varies according to the package. What is a creative brief? A creative brief contains an outline of the pitch holder's requirements. This includes all the information a creative needs concerning the pitch holder's brand, product or service, the target market, the pitch deadline, the media to be used in the ideas, the message that the pitch entries should convey, and any award the pitch holder wishes to offer the author of the winning idea. How do I hold a pitch? Simply compile an online brief that defines your brand and communication requirements, set the deadline and wait for the ideas to be entered into your account. This usually happens within 48 hours of the deadline. Who sets the value of cash prizes? Am I obliged to offer a prize for the best idea? As a pitch holder, you are free to set a prize sum as an incentive, or to offer no prize. Is there a minimum prize sum? No, the sum is at the entire discretion of the pitch holder. What are the main differences between ideas in the Gallery and ideas entered in response to a pitch? Ideas submitted to the Gallery are ideas for generic products or services, which is why the Gallery is organised into fourteen product/service categories. Gallery ideas are not permitted to have brand names, trademarks or other copyrighted material (logos or visual representations of actual branded products, positioning statements, etc). The decision on which media elements to use in an idea for the Gallery, (TV ad, web design, packaging, etc) is left up to the creative. Ideas entered in response to a pitch are different. They will fit your specific requirement as they are answering the brief which you wrote. The media elements of the idea are predefined in the brief, and the Member may require their brand name or trademark to form part of the ideas entered.