Pitch: Rhetorical Outline & Pitch Submission
Rhetorical Outline:
Proposition: The legendary soap deserves a modern look
Claim: The current user experience for the long-running popular British soap opera EastEnders on the streaming platform BritBox is outdated. The show deserves an updated, modern user experience which matches the drama and excitement of its storylines.
Takeaway: Modernizing the experience signals an immediacy, frequency and consistent stream of fresh content published four days a week, targeted towards unlocking a potential growth opportunity to attract new subscribers.
Audience: BritBox executives and key decision-makers with governance over the user experience of BritBox for international streaming audiences. Specifically BritBox’s CEO (Robert Schildhouse), Head of Growth (Lily Cloake Marchewski), Chief Marketing Officer (Diana Pessin), and Head of Editorial Content (Jon Farrar). I am connected to each of these executives on LinkedIn and have the opportunity to message them my pitch directly. I have done this with two of them in the past, unsuccessfully.
Problem Solved: In early 2024, BritBox ended its content relationship with British broadcast network ITV, removing hundreds of shows from its content library. And while it continues to enjoy healthy subscriber growth, primarily in North America, the unique value proposition of daily, habituated users who return frequently and engage for lengthy periods of time ensures subscription retention and ultimately revenue growth.
How Is This Helping? The key to unlocking this growth is to build the daily audience by leveraging the frequent cadence of a show like EastEnders. This starts by merchandising the show more effectively for current subscribers, but also bringing the show’s user experience more in line with the show itself.
Outcome: Motivate a positive decision to update the user experience for EastEnders on BritBox.
Rhetorical Strategies:
My appeal to the executives is not as a peer, even though I am a similarly-leveled executive at NBC. I am appealing to them not as a corporate equal, but as a fan. My language and register will reinforce my ex-pat’s love of the show, but also of their product. I am a fan of both but see a misalignment between the current show and the current user experience which I am appealing to them to close and consider as a growth opportunity. I will use my own experience of watching the show for over forty years to illustrate the highly habituated daily nature of the EastEnders audience, and connect it to the need to pull more engaged viewers into the product through compelling, unique content. My close must include the important call to action of asking for their team to update the designs.
I will frame the pitch in the form of a letter of enquiry and appeal to these executives, something which will be sent via LinkedIn which includes a greeting and a sign-off, but deliver it in the form of an informally spoken video. It is important they hear a fan’s voice and the passion for the show. A rhetorical strategy I also want to include is to use the language of the show’s fandom. I need to demonstrate my love of the show through my use of the often vey specific cultural slang and language the show uses. For example, the phrase ‘doof doof’ refers to the dramatic drum beats which always open the show’s titles but also signal the ending cliffhanger moments which keep us coming back.
Pitch Script:
Subject: The legendary soap deserves a modern look
Hi BritBox,
For almost forty years I’ve been a fan of EastEnders. And ever since it began to air on BritBox, I have been a subscriber who tunes in four times a week. I love the show, and I love BritBox.
But every day I see the same photos of EastEnders which have been used for years. Photos of characters both long dead or departed from Walford. My appeal to you is to update the photos and the graphics to match the show. To show those who don’t watch what they’re missing. And to use them to drive up the number of deeply engaged, retained subscribers so critical to a streaming product’s business. And showing that one of the best British shows has fresh content four times a week might just unlock a tremendous growth opportunity.
That’s what’s in it for you. What’s in it for me is to see a show I love get the design treatment it deserves. I’m a deeply invested fan who loves your product, and is asking for better.
In hope and doof doofs, your fan,
Matt
