How Pentagram uses Pitch to power stronger client relationships

Pentagram’s portfolio spans five decades, countless industries, and clients big and small. They’re the only major design studio whose owners are also the creators, working with every client on every project. Pentagram was using a mix of different tools across teams to manage their pitching process. But the status quo wasn’t cutting it. They needed a single tool that fit their personalized way of working — one that could keep pace with their unique structure, fast-moving projects, and diverse stakeholders.

Tara Dabir, who leads new business at Pentagram in New York and works across the 12 partner teams based there, noticed a recurring challenge: file conversion. Merging all the different document formats and ensuring consistency across materials was taking over. “We were spending the majority of our time tweaking small design details around typeface and color as opposed to really focusing on the types of conversations we wanted to have with clients.”

One night, her team was racing against a tight deadline, scrambling to convert different file types for a client. To get it across the finish line, they ended up pulling in several other teammates after hours. “After that,” she says, “one of the partners was just like, ‘I can’t do this anymore.’” 

Desperate for a better way, they turned to Pitch — and never looked back.

Seamless collaboration and sharing

After switching to Pitch, file conversion became a thing of the past — now, Pentagram just sends clients a single link to a deck. And if the team spots something they want to tweak? No problem. Since everything’s in the cloud, they can jump back in and make edits that go live without touching anything on the client’s end.

They can customize premade templates to speed up ideation, while shared library collections make it easy to access and distribute assets. And for a hands-on team spread across time zones, Tara has found that “features like comments and recordings have been great for talking through specific parts of a presentation. They’ve helped us avoid endless check-ins and meetings so we can just focus on our parts on our own time.”

The embeds feature has also been a game-changer for designers, who can drop interactive Figma files straight into a deck. And the team embeds different types of project management tools, like meeting schedulers or surveys, to streamline new business efforts.

Pitch doesn’t just map to the way Pentagram works — it enhances it. But that’s just the start.

Using pitch rooms to tell a tailored story

When Tara first heard about Pitch’s digital sales rooms — or pitch rooms — she was all in. A single, seamless workflow for creating stunning decks and driving client interactions? Yes, please. The entire collaboration and feedback process happens right inside one easy-to-use tool so designers, marketers, and customer-facing folks can work together under one roof. Meanwhile, clients step into a polished, curated space filled with professional-grade decks and assets.

For Tara, “pitch rooms represent an opportunity to spend less time on logistics and more time delivering work that’s intentional, meaningful, and tailored.” And to her, “that’s what new business should be about.”

“It’s important to make sure each client really understands how we’re going to work with them,” she says. “What’s great about pitch rooms is that we can introduce the people behind Pentagram, who the client will be collaborating with day in and day out. We can share more about our team’s philosophy, their perspective on an industry, or their approach to a particular type of work. The pitch room unlocks so many ways to create materials that wouldn’t necessarily come up in a brief or on a call.”

Collating materials to control what clients see

The Pentagram team used to share Pitch decks via email, often with multiple attachments. Because the decks had to do all the heavy lifting, they were packed with slides, and Tara would worry about their length.

Pitch rooms solve that by gathering everything in one place. Instead of sifting through email threads for specific files, clients have a single reference point of beautifully displayed assets they can revisit anytime. And if they have any questions, they can use the convenient contact button to reach out.

Every Pentagram pitch room looks different. One room might spotlight a deep-dive case study deck that walks through a past client’s pain points, process, and final results. Another could hold idea proposals, methodology overviews, and curated slides that tell the Pentagram story, tailored to that potential client. Sometimes the room is copy-heavy. Other times, it’s all about visuals and motion. 

This flexibility is key. “Each time,” Tara, says, “the team can step back and ask: What will support the conversation we want to have? What does this client need to hear? What can we share to make this process as clear and compelling as possible? That practice is what should drive new business — not deadlines or file formats.”

Continuing the conversation in the cloud

Switching to a cloud-based tool like Pitch has given Pentagram more confidence in what they share and how they refine their content over time. Because everything lives online, there’s no need to download files, and clients can access materials from anywhere. “That’s especially important for our team, whose work is highly visual and motion-driven,” says Tara. “We know our presentations will always look polished and play flawlessly.”

But Pitch isn’t just helping them create sleek decks. It’s helping them win work. Before, Tara had no way of knowing how clients were engaging with the content, or in what order. Now, after generating a custom link for a room and sending it off to a prospect, the team is able to track real-time client engagement — like if someone visits a room, opens a deck, or clicks on an asset or call-to-action button.

From there, they fine-tune their approach. Instead of sending new files, they simply update what’s already there, adding or removing items and using features like slide-skipping to control what clients see and when. The links overview page keeps their rooms and shared presentations organized in one place, making it easy to monitor engagement.

The result? A smooth, efficient process that keeps the conversation going.

Digging deeper to create better solutions

If you’re stuck in a world where you’re focused on formats and pulling things together last-minute, it’s hard to engage with the bigger picture. Pitch has helped Pentagram move past just checking boxes, allowing them to dig deeper into the real questions and client needs — then actively address those needs through the content they create and share.

“At the end of the day,” says Tara, “it’s not always about winning. It’s not always about showing your studio in the best light. New business is about bringing people together and having conversations that are really meaningful.” 

“Often, there’s this sort of wash, rinse, repeat type of approach,” she continues. “But Pentagram has never worked that way. And we now have a tool that really supports us in a way that’s reflective of who we are.”

Want to know more about pitch rooms? Take a product tour, or feel free to reach out.