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37 Business Proposal Writing Tips

Editor — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 22:24:00 +0000

This short course on proposal writing reminds us that our business proposal does not stand alone. It is process of a larger process that involves planning, research, writing, editing, proofing, submission and acceptance.

This list gives 37 ways to improve your next proposal. Scroll through it and tell me what I missed.

Show that your response is logical and organized

Make the information easy to find. Cross reference against the Request For Proposal
Include a table of contents for proposals over 10 pages in length
Ensure that your Proposal is in compliance with the RFP
Arrange material in order of priority
Arrange everything in the order that’s most important to the client
Arrange the response in accordance with their requirements
Number pages and sections consecutively; do not re-number each section
Use headings
Each section title should stresses the main benefits
Each section title should help readers orient themselves
If possible, express the key point of the section in the headline, or immediately after it.
Highlight important points
You can emphasize the most positive points by using bold, underlining, different fonts, spacing, titles, bullets and summaries
Content – Sell the Message
Respond completely
Answer every question in the RFP. Failure to respond correctly to the RFP may disqualify your proposal. The client put these questions in for a reason, and expect an answer.
Avoid banal headings and titles
Rather than say “Development Section,” say “Ten Ways to Improve Your Processes”
Use action verbs in heads, especially verbs that stress a benefit for the client
Avoid boilerplate
Don’t recycle resumes and corporate profiles from previous proposals; modify them in accordance for the proposal at hand. Using old, tired resumes will be perceived by the reader, and will count against you when they can making the final judgments.
Avoid hype, padding and other self-congratulatory drivel. Remember that the proposal is a legal document that becomes part of the contract if you win
Support your recommendations
By giving specific details and quantifying the benefits whenever possible
Don’t just say that you will comply with a requirement — say how we’ll do so
Don’t attack competitors. Refer to rival products if you must.
Point out the weaknesses of alternative solutions.
Use a strong closing statement
Ask for their business; tell the reader exactly what you want him or her to do
Remind the reader of the benefits of taking action
Avoid business cliché’s
Avoid hackneyed openings and closings that clients have read a thousand times. Avoid “I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for considering the enclosed . . .” Get to the point: “Here is your proposal.” Avoid “If you have any questions, please feel free to call.” That closing has been done to death, so avoid it and write something more genuine.
Make your proposal easy to understand
Use the same terms and jargon that appear in the RFP. Don’t try to impress the client with your own special brand of buzzwords or TLA (three-letter acronyms)
Use simple, direct language
Wrap up the Proposal with confidence

What did I miss?

About the Author: Ivan Walsh is a left-handed technical writer who writes business proposals for clients. He also shares business writing tips for smart people at Klariti.

Business Proposals Format, Style and Presentation Tips – Part 1

Editor — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 12:24:00 +0000

What’s the best way to format your Business Proposal? Should you use a Style Guide? I’ve been writing and reviewing Business Proposals for over fifteen years and, while there are exceptions, the following guidelines will help you improve the look and feel of your next Business Proposal.

Business Proposals Formatting Guidelines

Your Business Proposals should ‘look’ familiar to the reader. Don’t choose strange fonts, designs or paper that distracts the reader from the bid.

A familiar proposal is a friendly proposal.
Look at the materials issued by the sponsor.
Note their use of fonts, style, layout, white space, and headers.

Consider structuring your proposals to match their publication preferences; if appropriate, use the same type size, style, layout, and headers as they do in their publications.

Business Proposals Content Guidelines

You can improve the impression of your proposal by following these content guidelines.

Before Starting

Read the Request For Proposal before beginning any work – twice!
Get clarification on any points that are unclear
Submit questions back to Request For Proposal issuer.
Print the RFP out for review
Print your Proposal on A4 Paper
Print one copy in Color and Double Sided. Print the other support documents in black and white.
Check for smudging, paper-jams, blank pages, and color resolution issues.
Check that the page numbers are in the correct sequence.

Business Proposals Templates

Start every project with a clean template. Don’t modify previous Business Proposals or other business documents. Be very careful when you cut and Paste as references to previous tenders and other documents can creep through without being noticed.

Use the Reader’s Language

Write the document in the language of the client. Check that UK or US English is used in all Microsoft Office documents, including Microsoft Visio and other image files.

Avoid Trendy Fonts

Make sure you use the same font families across the document.

One suggestion is to choose Serif or San Serif and then stick with these across the Proposal.

For sure, if you chop and change, it will distract the reader and give the impression that you didn’t spend time formatting the final draft.

On Tuesday, we will look at other ways to make your proposal document sparkle!

Any ideas, please let me know.

About the Author: Ivan Walsh provides business proposal writing tips, tutorials, and templates on the Proposal Writing Course every week. Get his free proposal writing newsletter here.

How to Write a Concise Executive Summary for your Business Proposal

Editor — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 02:30:00 +0000

I evaluate Business Proposals. I do this every week. In the last fifteen years, I’ve seen hundreds of business proposals ranging from the large Consultancies to one-man/women businesses. Part of evaluating a proposal is checking that the numbers add up but also to see if the project in question is worth investing in. How do we know that from a fifty page document? We don’t always know, of course. But, we can make certain deductions just by looking at the first ten pages. Or even the first five. To be honest, the Executive Summary is the first hurdle you need to master if you want to get investment. Let’s look at how to do it right.

Business Plan – Executive Summary

Executive Summary Checklist

Like we said above, first impressions count. For this reason, you need to pay special attention to the Executive Summary. If your clients or investors don’t get past the Executive Summary, then the rest of your document will go unread.

This also raises the question: Should you write your Executive Summary before or after you’ve written your Business Proposal? Some business writers prefer to do it first, others write it after the entire document is completed. I write it at the end as I want the complete text before me. That way, I can digest the document and write the Executive Summary based on what I’ve read.

The following is one suggested approach for an Executive Summary. Change this to suit your needs. In the Executive Summary, include the following:

Introduction

Brief description of your product or service
Identify when, where, and how the company was established
Provide the current status, including funding, of your organization

Problem Definition

What problem does the solution solve?
How important is it to users over the next [x] years?
What is the business and/or technical road map?
Who are the customers and their needs?

Market Opportunity

What is the market size?
What is the timing of market development?
What are the key market drivers?
What are the inter-dependencies of this market to other markets, businesses or the government?
What are the supply and distribution channels?
Has the market been validated by a customer / partner?
What is the marketing and sales strategy?

Competitive Analysis

Who are your competitors?
What are your advantages and the competitive products/services?
What business models have been successful?

Management Team

Who are the key management personnel? Cross-reference to Appendix if necessary.
What is their track-record?
How will you complete the management team if all the key members are not yet identified?

Technology

How unique is the technology?
Can any parts be patented?
What is the current development status of product/service?
How will the products be tested?

Financial Analysis

Summarize projections for revenue, cost and return on investment
Describe funding required to achieve the next milestones

Conclusions and final writing tips

While this looks like a lot of work, the key is to select the parts that you want to highlight in the Executive Summary and move the rest to the main document.

Most Executive Summaries are one to two pages max.

With this is mind, write the text and get all the information down first. Then revise the material and see where you can refine the wording to reduce the word count, for example, by merging points together and remove filler text. Also, look for phrases that can be pruned and made shorter. For example?

Instead of

In the event of

Write

If

Instead of

We have come to the conclusion that

Write

We decided

Instead of

The purpose of this document is to

Write

This document… (The purpose of is redundant)

Look for ways to remove these fillers. You’ll sharpen the prose in the process and give your document a nice, polished tone.

What have I missed?

About the Author: Ivan Walsh provides Business Tips for Smart People on Klariti.com. His also runs the popular Business Planning Blog at http://www.ivanwalsh.com. Follow him on Twitter at ivanwalsh.

PS: You can get the Business Plan Template from our partner Klariti.com here.

How to Fix Corrupt & Damaged Microsoft Word Documents – Part 2

Editor — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 11:23:00 +0000

Post by Ivan Walsh. Follow me on Twitter.

Last week we showed you how Bullet Lists can crash MS Word. We outlined some techniques to reduce the file size, mostly by creating pre-formatted bullet lists in advance. But what happens if you’re given a User Guide that’s already bloated to massive proportions. It’s too late to create new styles at this stage.

Here’s what to do.

1. Open the User Guide in Microsoft Word.

2. Cut and paste every graphic from the file into an image-editing tool, such as Snagit.

Create a naming convention, (e.g. Page1-A.gif, Page1-B.gif etc) and name each graphic using the same naming convention.

WARNING: DON’T SAVE THE FILE YET!

3. In Word, select File, Save As HTML.

Name the file with an HTML extension, e.g. Proposal.html and then close Word.

4. Re-open Word. Select File, Open and select the Proposal.html file.

5. Select File, Save As and save Proposal.html with a .doc extension, e.g. Proposal.doc.

TIP: This process of converting the Microsoft Word file into HTML and back into Word, removes unnecessary (i.e. corrupt) code in the file and will significantly reduce the file size.

6. Insert the graphic back in the correct order.

I’ve seen Word files larger than 20 MB reduced to less than 3MB in less than one minute by using this technique. Might be worth a try! The reason you don’t save the file at Step 2 is because this would trigger Word into action (e.g. I WILL now save this file etc) and as it struggles to save the oversized file, will probably crash the application.

I hoped you enjoyed these articles on fixing corrupt or damaged documents. What’s been your experience using Word?

About the Author: Ivan Walsh shares Action Plan Tips at Klariti. He also creates Business Plans for SMEs

Sherlock Holmes Guide to Finding Hidden Styles in Microsoft Word 2007?

Editor — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 01:21:00 +0000

Post written by Ivan Walsh. Follow me on Twitter

Sandra wants to know where is the Styles menu option in Microsoft Word 2007. She wants to update her new business plan and add Notes, Messages, Quotes and other pre-formatted styles. The Styles in Microsoft Word 2003 and 2007 seem to be different.

He’s right. The Microsoft Word user interface in 2003 and 2007 is very different.

1. The best way to add Styles, such as Notes etc (2007) is to go to the Home tab. It’s the default.

2. Click the little arrow button under Change Styles.

3. This opens the Styles menu along the right-hand side of the page.

4. Select the text you want to change.

5. Scroll down and find the Note style, for example.

6. Change the text.

Does it work?

Do you see the little arrow under Change Styles. Click this and the Styles will appear! If not, drop me a line.

PS – if you’re looking for tips on writing user guides, then check out I Heart Technical Writing.