How to Price Your Services to Make a Profit

Experienced marketers know there are all sorts of pricing strategies designed to lure in customers. But if you’re new to the sales game or if you are wondering whether or not you can afford to open your business, you may be wondering how to set a price for your services.

You could simply take a survey of your competitors and then try to undercut their prices, but not accounting for all your costs can quickly lead to financial disaster. Most businesses fail because their expenses exceed their income and they don’t manage their cash flow.

There is a basic formula for setting appropriate prices. It’s sometimes called a “cost plus” formula, and here it is:

Cost of Services + Overhead Costs + Buffer + Desired Profit

The Cost of Services should be easy enough to figure. That should take into account the hourly rate of the worker(s) who will perform the services, plus the cost of any goods consumed or delivered by the service.

Overhead Costs get a bit trickier, because those are the ongoing costs of running your business. In this category, you need to include a percentage of expenses such as leasing or purchasing buildings and equipment, maintenance and utilities, salaries of support staff, taxes and insurance, and so forth. After you know your annual or monthly cost for overhead, then you should divide this total cost into an hourly cost and assign that to each hour of service to fill in the Overhead Costs in the formula above.

So now you have your basic costs defined: Cost of Services + Overhead Costs. What’s the Buffer? A buffer is a percentage of the total expenses, added as “padding” or “insurance” to account for unplanned problems that even the most experienced businesses encounter. These might include scheduling issues, unexpected component price increases, accidents, illness, and so forth. The percentage you choose for a buffer is up to you and depends on the type of business you’re in. Some businesses add a buffer of 20%; others add 100%.

And finally, you need to determine your Desired Profit percentage. In other words, how much profit do you need or want to stay in business? Now, adding all these figures together, you should arrive at a price for your services.

After you have worked out a price that guarantees you will not lose money, it’s time to compare that price against the local competition. Is your price much lower than the competition? Then you may want to examine your costs again to be sure you’ve included everything. Many new business owners forget to include the costs of processing the paperwork for a job, for example, or they haven’t made the buffer percentage big enough to cover unanticipated events.

If your price came out higher than the average, don’t panic. Keep in mind that customers may not always choose the lowest price. Compare your services to your competitors. Do you offer additional services, have more experience or industry awards, or offer a guarantee or a warranty that your competitors don’t? If yes, then these may serve as "value added" components to justify a higher price, but then you need to highlight these benefits in your service proposal to inform your potential customer about why you are the best pick for the job.

However, if your price calculation came out with a total that is significantly higher than your competition, you may need to consider where you can cut costs. You may be able to balance the below-cost sale of one service by combining it with a profitable additional service. (The product or service sold below cost in this way is known as a “loss leader.”) There are all sorts of strategies for expanding markets and attracting customers, but it’s crucial to always keep your eye on the bottom line. Knowing your financials inside and out is one of the keys to running a successful and sustainable business.

If this all sounds a bit overwhelming, you should know that you don’t have to start from scratch. There’s a product that can help you determine prices and create proposals and other materials to market your services to your customers. Proposal Kit, like the name implies, is designed for writing business proposals of all kinds. You can use it to fire off simple job descriptions and estimates, or to plan and bid on complex projects with multiple deadlines and subcontractors and such. The product contains multiple checklists and spreadsheets you can use to help capture all the fine details that sap your profits, such as hidden overhead costs you might not think of adding.

Proposal Kit’s checklist worksheets include a Bid/No-Bid Checklist, a Proposal Development Checklist, and a Task Assignment Progress Report, just to name a few helpful ones. And here are just a few of the dozens of spreadsheets contained in Proposal Kit: Price Structure Calculator, Fee Structure Calculator, Quote Calculator, Estimate Calculator, Purchase Order Calculator, Services Cost Calculator, and Project Cost Summary Calculator.

There are also calculator spreadsheets you can use to project cash flow, to figure profit and loss, to analyze return on investment, to create invoices, and so forth. Each financially oriented template in Proposal Kit has an associated spreadsheet for you to fill in.

Proposal Kit has over a thousand topic templates so you can include all the information you should to convince a prospective customer. For example, there’s a template for a Warranty and one for a Guarantee, and templates for Company History, Testimonials, Referrals, and almost any other topic you can imagine. Each template contains suggestions and examples to help you efficiently describe that topic in your proposal.

Proposal Kit not only helps you create a complete business document, but the product helps you assemble an attractive one, too, because the template pages are professionally laid out and come in various design themes, so you can choose the perfect style to represent your business, or use your own logo.

As well as offering you hundreds of templates and spreadsheets, Proposal Kit also contains over a hundred sample proposals, so you can see what a proposal for your type of business might look like. You’ll find that Proposal Kit has already done a lot of thinking and planning for you—all you need to do is supply the specific facts and figures for your business and your project. It’s a great tool to help you not only figure out the right prices for your services, but to ensure your business success.

How to Write an Instruction Manual or Handbook

Have you been assigned the job of creating an instruction manual or employee handbook? Are you wondering how to go about accomplishing this task?

Don’t panic. You probably already know all the information you need to include, or at least you know where to find it. Now all you need to learn is the process and the structure.

To start, write a description of the audience your manual or handbook is intended for. What do they know already? What do they need to learn? What are their goals? What are the goals of the manual or handbook? You may want to discuss this audience description and goals with colleagues or your boss to make sure you’re including everyone and planning to meet the needs of the organization.

Next, make a list of all the topics you need to include. Do these topics need to be in a specific sequence to be understood or learned? In other words, does one section build on information learned in the previous section? Or do topics / procedures need to be grouped by category, such as “Employee Benefits” or “Troubleshooting Procedures”? If so, order your topics accordingly. Then share your outline with others and request their input to make sure you’ve thought of everything. Get approval if needed. This outline will become the basis for the table of contents in your manual. Now you’re ready to get started writing the body of your manual or handbook.

Although you could write in any sequence to fill in your outline, we’ll start at the beginning. First you’ll need a Title Page with a descriptive name, like “How to Use the ZYX Printer” or “Smith Corporation Employee Handbook.” Next should be a copyright page, which should contain the date of printing and information about ownership by the author, company, or publisher. This page sometimes includes disclaimers, such as a statement saying the publisher and author are not responsible for misinformation that might be included or for any information that was left out. If you find you have a lot of disclaimers or a lengthy legal explanation, you should put that on a separate Disclaimers page.

Next will be your Table of Contents, but the odds are that you will need to create and insert that after you have completed writing your manual, so for now, just keep in mind that it belongs here.

The first page you will probably want in the body of your manual is an Introduction, where you’ll explain the purpose and goals of the document. You can also include here any assumptions you are making, such as that all your readers are using a specific operating system or that they are familiar with standard medical devices, for example. If you need to list a lot of Assumptions, include them on a separate page.

Now you’re ready to write the main content of your manual or handbook, with all the procedures or topics your readers need to know. After you’ve written all your topics, you may want to end with a Conclusions or Summary page, and perhaps include an Index to help readers find easily find topics.

Does that sound like too much work? Keep in mind that you don’t need to start off with a blank word processing screen to do all this. There’s a product that can help tremendously: Proposal Kit. As the name implies, it’s perfect for writing proposals, but it’s designed for all sorts of “how-to” and informational materials, too. Its templates can give you a big jump start on creating your manual, and help you at each step along the way. Each template contains suggestions and examples of information to include on that page.

There are more than a thousand topic templates, including templates for all those pages mentioned above. You can probably find precisely the topic you’re looking for, but if by chance you don’t, Proposal Kit contains blank templates that you can adapt for any purpose. For employee manuals, there are many company-oriented topics like Mission Statement, Organizational Structure, and Ethics, just to name a few. The templates are Word documents, so you can easily adapt them for your use, and you can insert graphics like charts, illustrations, and photos.

Any manual or handbook is likely to be read by a large audience, so you want to be sure that the grammar and spelling are perfect. It’s always best to use a professional editor if you can, but if that’s not in the budget, then enlist someone who is not familiar with your manual’s content to proofread it. Testing is an essential component of finalizing any “how-to” or informational booklet, too. You want to be sure that your instructions are clear, complete, and useful for your intended readers. You might also need to get the approval of your company’s legal department before publication, too—corporate attorneys and personnel departments are often concerned about employment issues, trademarks, and all sorts of consumer information that may cause legal issues in the future.

Proposal Kit is perfect for assembling any kind of Word document. Using the included Wizard software, you simply pick the templates you want and fill them in, and then let Proposal Kit do the page numbering and create a table of contents for you, as well as take care of the cover page and any appendices. The product handles the layout and design of your manual, so Proposal Kit not only helps you write like a professional, but also makes your finished work look professional, too.

Your final manual or handbook can easily be printed and bound, or transformed into a PDF file to send via email or read on any electronic device. You can even use various tools available on the internet to translate your masterpiece into an e-book for use with Kindle or other electronic devices.

You’ll find that Proposal Kit is great for producing and organizing any kind of document. It’s a powerful addition to your arsenal of office tools.

How to Write Your Way into the Job You Want

Here’s a great use for Proposal Kit that our clients have recently alerted us to, and that many people may not have thought about. You can use Proposal Kit to land a new job.

It’s tough to break into business these days, even when you’ve finally received your college diploma. You may have great grades, but you also have great competition, even when you’re just trying to land an internship. Hiring managers are looking for the ability to think like a pro, no matter what field you’re entering. But how can you get a chance to prove you have that ability when your resume is stuck in a pile with hundreds of other applications?

Maybe you need to write more than a resume. No, I’m not talking about including pages of personal references, although those are nice, too. I’m talking about writing a business proposal.

Yeah, right—I can hear you saying it now. You’ve never written a business proposal; you probably don’t even have much in the way of business experience to offer. But like I said, hiring managers are looking for the ability to think like a pro, and you have ideas, don’t you? Prove it with a proposal.

Here’s the basic structure of any proposal: introduction; description of the needs or problems, description of the solution, the benefits, and what the solution will cost; and finally, an explanation of why you’re the best person for the job. And here’s the most important thing to remember: this proposal is about what the organization needs, not about your need for a job.

A company usually has a job to fill and many possible candidates to choose from. All else being equal between candidates do you think they would choose the candidates who just supplied resumes or the one who showed even more potential by proposing something that could further improve the company or their products or services.

It would be best if you already know something about the organization and what they do and what they’re looking for. You could even target a particular project or product. Then your proposal can be more specific, like “Proposal for New Label Designs for the XYG Product Line” or “Proposal to Efficiently Landscape Creek Banks.” So, do some research if you need to. But even if you can’t be specific to a product or a process, you can still describe the need for the position you’re applying for, and how you can fill it better than anyone else. We didn’t say this was going to be easy, you may have to put some serious thought and research into this strategy.

Let’s drill down a little further in the structure of the proposal. The first introduction page should be just a letter explaining who you are and why you’re writing this proposal, and including a request for an interview or a contract—whatever you want to happen next. Next, you’ll want a title page for your proposal. For heaven’s sake, don’t use “Why You Should Hire Me” or anything lame like that. If you can’t come up with a specific project, at least refer to the job position and name your proposal something like “Recommended Candidate for the Telecommunications Sales Manager.”

Now for the first section. Put yourself in the hiring manager’s shoes and describe what he or she is looking for. You probably have all that information in a job advertisement, and perhaps you even have more information after talking to the potential employer. Describe why the company needs those skills and experience; this may not be written in an ad, but you can usually guess the reason behind a requirement. This section is not about you; it’s about showing that you understand what the company wants and needs.

The next section should be all about how you can provide the solutions to those needs. Be as specific as possible about how you can meet the needs of a specific project or job position, and what the benefits to the company would be.

Then, finally, it’s your chance to explain why you are the best pick for the position. Here’s where you can put your transcript, your references, and your experience. If you’ve won awards or worked on any similar projects in the past, put them in here, too. Keep in mind that volunteer work and even hobbies might count toward management and team building and aspects like that. And remember that anyone can sing their own praises; it’s always more credible to list a recommendation from a third party.

Finally, make sure your presentation looks and sounds professional. Of course you’ll use spell-check, but you need to proofread, too. Or best of all, get someone who has excellent language skills to do it for you. You may not think the placement of a comma or using the correct plural form is particularly important, but the hiring manager just might, and using correct grammar might make the difference between landing the position and staying unemployed. Be sure the pages of your proposal look attractive, too—consider using headings in different colors or adding unusual bullet points or page borders. Just keep the overall tone professional.

Proposals impress managers because they prove you are ambitious and have the ability to think like a pro who sees a broader picture and not just another employee. Even if you don’t get the specific job you have targeted with your proposal, the hiring manager will remember you and she may recommend you to another manager, or hire you for the next position that comes up.

Check out Proposal Kit and get started writing your own proposal.

How to Score A Promotion With This Clever Trick

We were recently made aware of this use of Proposal Kit by a customer who told us how he had used our product. He described it as a “trick” to get a promotion, but we think it’s a clever strategy, so we want to share his great idea with you.

We all want to move forward in our careers, but unless you have a flashy job where you regularly stand in front of the decision makers, it can be hard to get noticed by upper level management.

Most employees who have worked for the same company for a few years have good ideas on how to improve a process or a product within that organization. After all, those employees are usually on the front lines, whereas upper management often spends most of their time in meetings, removed from the daily operations of the business.

You might have a great solution for improving a product or service, saving costs or streamlining operations, or making customer support more efficient and friendly. But how can you communicate your ideas and get credit for them, too? Talking to your peers won’t do it. Often talking to your immediate manager won’t get you more than a pat on the back and maybe a year-end bonus, and there’s always the risk that someone else will claim credit for your idea.

Talking with you peers or supervisor informally about your great idea is a great way to have someone else run with your idea – and get the credit for it.

Why not take the initiative and put your idea in writing? Don't just mention it to a colleague or even to your supervisor. Write up a detailed proposal that outlines the problem, and then offers your solution, explains the benefits to the company, and includes your recommendations. This sort of proposal is similar to a sales pitch to a potential customer, but it’s called an internal company proposal. The purpose is more or less the same, however; you are making a formal presentation to someone and asking them to take action on something you are proposing.

Upper level management will notice that this proposal is not all about you. You are not just asking for a promotion at your yearly review. Instead, you are demonstrating that you have the company’s best interests in mind; that you see the broader picture of your organization; and that you have great ideas on how to improve the company. And by putting your thoughts down in a formal presentation that can be passed around and up the chain, you will get the recognition you deserve for your work.

You may have never written a proposal before, but it’s not particularly difficult. I already mentioned the basic structure above: introduce yourself and explain the need/problem, then describe your ideas for the solution and explain the benefits to your organization, and finally, summarize your recommendations and explain how you can help make your vision come true.

Now let’s break it down a bit more. Your introduction depends on your relationship with whoever will read your proposal. Put yourself in that person’s shoes and ask what that person would want to know. Explain who you are, what your experience is, and why you’re making this proposal. Describe the need or the problem, using all the specific information you have to offer: numbers, statistics, case studies, customer feedback. For example, you may have noticed that a lack of materials often causes delays in your manufacturing process; that your organization’s high fees are causing customers to go elsewhere, or that when one key employee is absent, the whole group ceases to function.

Now, we all know that anyone can simply whine about things that are wrong. Managers do not want to hear only about problems; they want to hear how to fix those problems. The next part of your proposal is what will make you stand out from the complainers because in this section, you will describe the solutions to the problems. Think this section through very carefully, and do any research you need to do in advance of writing it down. Be as specific as possible about what needs to be done. Describe the benefits of your solutions to the company, and explain all the steps and the costs for implementing your solution. Try to account for everything: money, time, training—anything that will be involved. The big bosses will be impressed when you show that you can think like a high level manager.

Now, sum up your proposal by explaining how you can fit into the proposed solution. And then, proofread, proofread, proofread—or better yet, get a friend with good language skills to do the final check. You want to sound like a professional problem solver. You want to look like one, too, so make sure all the pages look great, too. You might want to consider colored page borders or headings or bullet points to add a little flair, but keep the style professional and preferably in your own company’s style.

Finally, gather your courage and deliver your proposal to the person you want to impress, and be sure to follow up a few days later to answer any questions and receive feedback. Even if the company can’t give you a big promotion in the next round, rest assured that you will be favorably remembered for future opportunities.

Check out Proposal Kit for writing your own custom proposal.

How to Write Your Proposal for Different Kinds of Readers

Different types of people absorb information in different ways. And people holding different jobs may be looking for different types of information. So when you write a business proposal, you should always consider that it may be read by multiple people, all of whom want to see your information presented in the form that best meets their particular needs. You can improve your odds of success by making a conscious effort to appeal to the different types of readers discussed below.




A.    The Executive - The "Executive Summary" section in a proposal is targeted precisely to this person. A top level executive may only read the Executive Summary at the start of the proposal to judge whether or not to consider your proposal at all. Make it clear how your ideas will benefit the client, that you have a detailed plan to deliver on your promises, and that you are the best pick to complete the project or deliver your products or services.

If the potential clients you want to pitch to seem less formal than CEOs or top-level officials of a major corporation, you may want to use a more informal Client Summary page. But the point is that for this type of top-level person, you need to precisely and succinctly summarize all your major points up front. Also, consider using other summary pages throughout your proposal for these readers. If your summaries pass the executive test, then your proposal will likely be handed off to lower level people who will study the rest of the pages and analyze the details.

B.    The Skimmer – Today we all live in an age of information overload, and every business person has less time than ever to sift through a long list of electronic and print documents. Not many people will take hours to read and consider dozens of pages of details, particularly if vital information is buried in lengthy paragraphs of text.

Include enough white space on each page to help readers quickly scan the information there. To appeal to skimmers, break long discussions into multiple short paragraphs, list lots of short bulleted or numbered items, and highlight important phrases with bold colored text.

A reader should be able to visually distinguish the most significant points on each page in your proposal. A professional Proposal Kit package will contain many templates with bullet points and bold headings already incorporated into the page design designed for skimmers.

C.    The Manager – This person is concerned with personnel issues. The manager will want to know who is responsible for which task, how long the task will take, what each person’s qualifications are, and so forth. The manager will study your proposal to determine how many people will need to be assigned and how much time it will take to accomplish a project.

A Proposal Kit package contains many templates to describe personnel, teams, staff, responsibilities, qualifications, education, experience, resumes as well as issues like liability, training, education, safety and scheduling.

D.    The Number Cruncher - The number cruncher will be most interested in the financial and statistical information in your proposal. Make your financial pages clear and easy to understand by using tables and columns instead of burying numbers in paragraphs. Ensure that your calculations are obvious, take all important factors into account, and double-check that the totals sum up correctly.

Number crunchers want to know precisely who is responsible for paying for all aspects of a project, as well as when payments will be made. Include enough information on these pages for the number cruncher to make a decision without having to sort through all the text in the proposal to tease out the financial figures they are looking for.

If you discuss testing, statistics, market share, or prices for goods and services, you may need to explain how you arrived at the numbers you present in your proposal. If you guarantee your financial figures to be accurate for only a limited time, don’t forget to provide that important date or time period.

When you use a Proposal Kit package, you’ll find many table templates already laid out in which you can insert spreadsheets or numbers. Each finance-related template will come with a matching pre-designed spreadsheet to help you calculate your numbers correctly. A Proposal Kit will contain many templates to describe all of this numerical information.

E.    The Detail Person - The detail-oriented person will want to see the fine details of the proposal. This person looks for lists of features and benefits, definitions of technical terms used, detailed specifications and project methods, exact timelines, product or service warranties or guarantees, and so on.

All this information should form the body of your proposal after your summary pages. It’s not good enough to simply state that you plan to do a project; you need to describe how, where, and when all tasks will be accomplished, as well as who will perform the tasks, who will provide equipment and supplies, etc. Describe the project milestones and how and when they will be judged as completed. Explain the qualifications of your personnel. Describe similar projects you’ve accomplished, and/or list your clients or awards and referrals you’ve received.

Be sure to provide as many specifics as you can, writing in concrete terms instead of vague generalities. Choose the best way to portray details, which might include figures, charts, and spreadsheets. Whether you are describing a technical project, writing a complex grant application, or pitching any other idea that is project-, service-, or product-related, you need to explain how your client will benefit, how you will accomplish each step of the project, and why the client should have confidence in your ability to successfully complete the project or deliver on your promises.

A Proposal Kit package will contain hundreds of appropriate templates where you can insert all the specifics you need to describe the benefits of your proposal as well as how you plan to fulfill all your promises and why the client should have confidence in your ability.

No reader likes to search through dozens of pages to locate bits and pieces of crucial information. One of the keys to writing a successful proposal is crafting a well structured document that allows all types of readers to easily find the information they want. Make sure all the sections have appropriate descriptive titles that are listed in a complete Table of Contents so everyone can quickly navigate through your proposal.

Proposal Kit is a professional package designed to automatically organize and format your proposal to appeal to all of these types of readers, all within the same document. You’ll find all the types of templates mentioned above, as well as automatically generated Tables of Contents and professional graphic designs for a clean and consistent look on every page.

An organized and structured proposal that appeals to everyone who will read it is a key factor in writing winning proposals. People will do business with people they trust and giving the right people the right information the way they want to see it will generate trust in you to deliver on what you are proposing.

10 More Business Writing Mistakes to Avoid

Social media is now a vital component in the marketing strategy of most companies and growing every day. This means that knowing how to write compelling, professional business articles and instructional guides can be crucial to growing your business. But the word “professional” is key in this context. Your writing advertises your company, so be sure to make it the best it can be. Here are a few common “gotchas” you can avoid with only a little effort.



1.    Don’t write in a style that will alienate readers. Consider the audience you want to appeal to with your writing. What do they already know, and what do they want to know? Don’t throw in vocabulary they may not understand. Nobody likes to read articles that sound like they’re written in a foreign language, so be careful not to throw in too many acronyms, jargon, and technical language if it is not required. Write at a level that is easy to read, using common everyday terms if possible. You should be able to explain your business to a potential customer who is not an expert in your field. If you confuse your readers, they are likely to go somewhere else and you will lose opportunities for your business.

2.    Don’t wander off the topic and annoy readers by throwing in details in the wrong places. For example, if you’re writing about how to download an app to a cell phone, there’s no need to compare that app to its competitors. Save the sales pitch for another document, or a different section within your document. Write as concisely as possible, and keep your information clear and to the point. If you’re writing instructions, simply list the steps and associated information needed to accomplish the process, and be sure to test it all to make sure you didn’t leave anything out. Keep it clear and as simple to follow as possible up front, then provide details for those who need additional information.

3.    Don’t rely on your word processor's spelling and grammar checking abilities to catch all errors. Spell checkers cannot catch the wrong word (such as ‘there’ instead of ‘their’ and ‘it’s’ instead of ‘its’), and if you don’t pay strict attention to each correction a spell check program suggests, you can accidentally insert the wrong term. Spelling and grammar errors can cost you clients who might suspect that you will be as sloppy in your business dealings and what you may produce for them as you are in your writing.

4.    Don’t include a lot of stock graphics. Yes, they’re inexpensive, but they’re also everywhere. Many readers can easily spot stock business graphics, such as images of generic business people smiling, shaking hands, holding meetings, and so on. You want your most important business documents to specifically represent your company, so whenever possible, use custom images to ensure that your proposal or brochure looks unique and matches your existing company brand.

5.    Never include text or graphics from another source without a license, written permission, or authorized attribution. If any part of your writing is posted online, plagiarized content could easily attract the attention of the content owner and result in DMCA takedowns, cease-and-desist orders, online comments about your business practices that will never go away, or even worse, legal action. Because social media is so popular now, anything posted publically has the potential to be quickly duplicated many times online, and online content may be searchable by competitors or original content owners. The text or graphics you ‘borrow’ may contain unique markers that make searching for appropriated content easy. Nothing is more embarrassing for your business image than being accused of plagiarism and copyright violations.

6.    Don’t include images with elements that could cause your reader or client to question your attention to detail or your professional qualifications. For example, if you are in the automotive or safety industry and you use an image of a driver talking on a phone or not wearing a seatbelt while cruising down the road, this could injure your reputation. You don't want your client’s first impression to be ‘this is a safety violation,’ when you only thought that the photo was a nice image for the page. If the photos you use show behavior that is contrary to your business practices or your clients’ practices or beliefs, you could lose potential sales and clients.

7.    Don’t include stock images that contain another company’s logo, trademarks, or products. You don’t want to advertise for other companies.

8.    Don’t send the document out before checking to be sure that everything is correct. There’s nothing more annoying to readers than clicking a link that doesn’t work or takes the reader to a location that seems illogical. If you’re referring to Model 947 and the device the reader is holding says 948, the reader will be confused. Make sure labels in graphics match the discussion in the text. It’s always a good idea to have someone who is unfamiliar with your company or product check everything you write to be sure it makes sense to the average reader.

9.    Don’t forget to account for all the pieces before you send or print out your document. This sounds obvious, but how many times have you received an email message discussing an attachment that is not actually attached? It’s human nature to think “I’ll insert this figure later,” and then forget to do it. Make sure steps and figures and pages are numbered sequentially; it’s common to end up with skipped numbers when multiple users have created or edited documents. If you’re sending a printed document, make sure all pages are there, too, and if you have a table of contents or an index, check all the page numbers to make sure they are correct.

10.    Don’t distribute documents saved in original word processing formats. When you send your documents to clients via email or links in an online site, use PDF format. This allows readers to easily print out or read your document online without display problems. Documents created with word processing programs may not display or print correctly if the recipient is not using the same program, and your graphics, fonts and formatting could wind up looking like a sloppy mess. Using PDF makes it easy for all readers to access your document on their terms (online and offline, digital and print) and see it the way you intended.

Using a pre-designed package of proposal, contract and business document templates will help keep you on track. Pre-written templates will help keep your writing organized, structured and on-track.  Proposal Kit packages are designed to help you create easy-to-follow proposals with lots of bullet points along with summaries and detailed topic pages.  With a large content library of completed sample proposals and business documents you can see how to write structured and organized documents.

How to Pick Your Business Proposal Writing Solution

Looking for a solution to help you write business proposals contracts, RFPs or grant applications? There are three main types of proposal writing systems available on the market:

• Desktop software and template-based for PCs and Macs
• Monthly paid subscription web-based services
• Expensive enterprise class solutions

The prices of the various products vary; so do their features and how many add-on services you may have to purchase to make use of the system. How do you know which system is right for you? Here are basic descriptions and pros and cons of each system to help you decide.

Template-based products (i.e. Proposal Kit) generally contain a variety of Microsoft Word documents that will work in many platforms and word processors, along with instructions, samples, and sometimes additional software to help manage the assembly or other processing of documents into a final polished proposal. To use a template-based proposal writing product, you simply download the product to your personal computer, and then use the templates with your word processing program to put together a proposal and print it or save it as a PDF for electronic delivery by uploading to a web site or sending via e-mail.

Template-based products are generally the easiest solutions to get started with, because most people already know how to use their word processing software. If you work remotely or while traveling, you can use a template-based product on any laptop or tablet with a word processor, regardless of whether you have an Internet connection at the time.

The license fee for a template-based product is a one-time license fee, and you can use the product as many times as you like, and as often or intermittently as you like without incurring additional costs. There are no ongoing subscription fees to contend with (which will substantially increase your total costs beyond the costs of template-based products within a couple months); you have complete control over the product material and you manage your proposal content (when you deal with trade secrets and confidential data you don’t want to be giving access to all of that material to an unknown entity that may not be able to keep your information secure).

The main issue to consider in template-based products is that the different offerings vary widely in quality, so carefully compare the actual contents of packages to be sure you’re getting the best value and a quality product. Look at packages carefully to avoid the low-quality knock-offs and don’t be afraid to ask questions and review demos.

Web-based proposal writing systems are exactly what they sound like: you type your proposal information into a web site to create your proposal online and your potential clients look at your web based proposal online. Advantages of using a web-based system are that it usually has a low starting cost (but those monthly fees add up quickly and quickly surpass the cost of a PC/Mac template package) and you don’t have to download and install a program to your personal computer, so it may initially seem cheaper and faster to use. Also, after your proposal is posted, you may have access to some analytics, such as the ability to track how many people view your proposal. However it is typically better to simply reach out to your prospects with the personal touch of a phone call or e-mail and you will gather more-or-less the same information.

A big disadvantage to using a web-based system is that the proposal software and your business information are stored on the web. A web-based system is potentially more at risk from hackers, because the data from thousands of businesses presents a high-value target for hackers seeking confidential business information. Also, a web-based solution may not be available when you need it, like those times you can't log in when you are flying or on the road. You should also consider whether or not you can easily extract your proposal data from a web-based system for use elsewhere. Most web-based solutions are new business ventures without proven track records - and if you read some of their support blogs you will find out which ones have frequent web site outages.

Web-based programs generally offer users less guidance and formatting and styling options than template-based packages. Web programs typically favor more of a “blank slate” approach and are usually much more limited in the amount of actual proposal writing content (templates, samples, etc.) than a template-based package. Current web-based solutions do not offer many basic features or the layout, design, and graphics capabilities of word processing systems available on PCs, Macs, and tablets. You may be very restricted in how you can create, format, and lay out your proposal, so you might not end up with the most polished looking proposal when you use a web-based system (or even a web-based word processor).

Web-based systems are not very well designed for responding to RFP’s or grant requests. Most of the time you have to follow strict guidelines for how proposals are to be written, formatted and submitted that cannot be done with web-based subscription services. While it may seem they offer something "new" in a web-based interface they are typically 10 to 15 years or more behind the curve in creating proposal writing content and polished professional proposals versus other solutions such as that found in Proposal Kit.

While a web-based solution may initially seem like the lowest cost product, keep in mind that a web-based business model depends on extracting monthly fees from customers, using a subscription payment plan. Over the course of just two or three months, a web-based solution will generally cost more than a downloaded product - and the costs will keep rising.

Now for the third category: enterprise class proposal solutions. These products are targeted for the use of big businesses. Often you cannot find a price or place an order online to download an enterprise product; you typically have to schedule a talk with a salesperson to get started. Plan on spending thousands of dollars or even tens of thousands of dollars on an enterprise solution, plan on significant setup time, and plan on bringing in consultants to set up and teach your employees how to use the system.

Enterprise proposal systems may be the best solution for large corporations that need widespread collaboration for their proposal projects and large sales teams, but enterprise systems are not designed (or priced) for individuals or small businesses. Even within large corporations, an enterprise proposal system is sometimes not the most efficient choice for doing a quick custom proposal or a small team project. Low-cost template-based solutions are frequently used by individuals or small teams within a large organization for one-off project proposals or to prototype a very complex proposal.

The three types of proposal software systems are not necessarily mutually exclusive; they can also work well together. You may want to pick multiple solutions to cover a wide array of situations and needs. Many users consider a downloaded template-based package like Proposal Kit a low-risk investment and a great addition to their basic business toolkits.

Most large corporations use template-based solutions alongside other systems for quick one-off proposals and prototyping. A template-based system allows users to work anywhere, view more samples and get more writing assistance, and use formatting tools to create a polished proposal that can be delivered in print or PDF format.

Template-based Proposal Kit systems are generally more efficient for smaller projects and more cost effective in the long run.

How to Write a Travel or Tourism Business Proposal

Do you have a great idea for an adventure travel expedition, or do you want to develop the tourism appeal for your area? It’s generally not enough to simply talk about your ideas; if you want to get funding or management approval, you usually have to describe your vision in writing. That means you have to write a proposal. But don’t worry if you’ve never written a proposal before—it’s not as hard as it might sound, after you understand that all business proposals have a definite structure to follow for success.

Although individual sections will vary in content and length depending on the complexity of your proposed project and the types of information you need to supply, every good proposal should follow a standard four-part sequence: introduction,  reader-focused section,  description of your proposal plan, and finally,  a section that explains your credibility and ability to fulfill your promises.

First of all, consider who you have to sell your ideas to. In other words, who will read and judge your proposal? It’s crucial to always keep your readers in mind; all good proposals are focused on the recipients, not on the party submitting the proposal.

So, let’s start with the introduction section. The very first item the recipient should see when opening a proposal package is a Cover Letter—this is essentially an introduction to your proposal, so simply state who you are, why you’re submitting this proposal now, state what you would like the reader to do after considering your proposal, and provide all the contact information the reader needs to follow up with questions or approval of your request.

Now for the proposal itself: create a Title Page. Name your proposal something straightforward and logical, like “Proposal for New England Fall Foliage Tour,” “Plan to Create a Tourism Bureau for Whatford County,” or “Using Our Town’s History to Attract Tourists.” If your proposal is short, that may be all you need for an introduction section. But if your project is more complex, you may need to come back later and add a Table of Contents and an Executive Summary, which is basically a list of the most important points you make within your proposal.

Now for the reader-focused section. Consider the party to whom you are submitting this proposal—is this a town council? A potential business partner? A prospective client? The management team at a tour company? What do the readers want to know? What will their concerns be? Do they have a list of requirements to be met? In this section, you need to prove that you understand who you’re pitching to and what their needs and desires are.

Most important of all, you must explain how your proposal will benefit that party. In this section, you will include pages like Needs and Benefits, and if you’re answering a stated need or responding to an RFP, you might also need pages like Requirements, Budget, Schedule, Deadlines, and so forth. Keep in mind that in this section you are describing the needs of and the benefits to your potential partners, management, or investors, not your own goals and desires. A winning proposal should remain focused on the reader, not on the party proposing the project. If you are selling personal travel services to clients you can include topics such as What you Can Expect or It's All About You.

After this reader-focused section comes the section where you describe your proposal in detail and explain what it will cost. This will most likely be the longest section in your proposal, because it should contain all the topic pages you need to explain your ideas. Be sure to include all the details your reader will want to know. Depending on your proposed project, you might have pages describing Services Offered, Products, Costs, Timeline, Venues, Facilities, Tours, Tourism, Destinations, Transportation, Strategic Relationships, Customers, and Advertising—the list is endless because your goal is to include all the topics you need to describe everything you propose to do, how you plan to do it, and what your expenses will be.

You may need to include financial pages, such as a projected Return on Investment (ROI). As always, put yourself in your readers’ position—what questions will they have? The more specific you are, the more likely your proposal is to persuade the readers that you have done your research, have a good plan, and can fulfill your promises.

In the last section of the proposal, you get a chance to brag about yourself. Here, your goal is to include all the information you have that will convince the reader that you are trustworthy and can carry out the plan you detailed in the previous section. At the very least, you’ll want a Company History or About Us page that explains your background. You can use pages like Experience, Projects, and Clients Served to show your experience with similar projects. You might want to explain any special Training or Credentials you have, or list your Staff or Team Members, and even add Resume or Biography pages. If you have Awards or Testimonials, you should include them, because it always adds credibility when you can show that others value your ideas and services.

That’s it! Doesn’t sound so hard, does it? But after you have all the words on paper, you still need to do two things before you send your proposal out:  proofread it carefully to ensure there are no grammar, punctuation, or spelling mistakes, and inspect each page to make sure it looks neat and professional. You might want to add colored borders or special fonts or bullet points to add visual interest.

Want a head start on writing and formatting your proposal? Consider purchasing a dedicated product like Proposal Kit, which is specially designed for writing proposals. Proposal Kit includes all the topic pages mentioned above, as well as hundreds of others, and blank pages you can use for any topic. Each topic page (or template) includes examples and suggestions about the information to include on that page, so you’ll never be stuck looking at a blank screen and thinking “What goes here?”

The templates are professionally designed, so your proposal will look good, too. You can select from a variety of specialty design themes, or add your own business logo to personalize your pages. There are plenty of instructions for use, as well as helpful articles and tips on writing proposals. And to give you great ideas, every Proposal Kit package includes dozens of sample proposals, so you can see how a proposal similar to yours might look and what it might contain. If you want help with assembling your proposal and creating a Table of Contents, you can purchase the optional Wizard program. You’ll find that Proposal Kit is a great buy for writing proposals of all kinds, as well as reports and other general business documents.

How to Write Your Business Proposal in a Foreign Language

Many markets are global these days, so you may need to translate your business proposal into multiple languages. With the assistance of computerized translation programs or professional translators and the use of proposal writing programs that include multilingual support like proposal kits, translating or creating a business proposal in any language is not as difficult as you might imagine.

The basic structure of any proposal should be the same, no matter which language it is written in: introduction section (Cover Letter, Title Page, Summary, etc.); reader-focused section (the recipients’ Needs Assessment, Requirements, Deadlines, Budget, Concerns, etc.); project description section (your proposed Services, Products, Schedule, Cost Summary, etc.); and the provider-focused section (your Experience, Education, Recommendations, Qualifications, Capabilities, etc.).

When planning for translations, simply write the proposal in English (or your most-used language), using clear and concise wording and leaving out slang terms and examples that do not translate well. Also, it’s best to keep text out of graphics; save it for captions so words can be easily translated without needing a graphic artist to change the lettering. Many foreign languages require more words than English, so leave plenty of space on each page to accommodate that need.

If you are writing your proposal for a foreign language from scratch you will be doing most of your writing in your own language – instead of translating an English language version of the text.  You can use a pre-designed proposal kit  to assist in writing your proposal. While the stock text provided will be in American English to start, find one that can translate parts of the stock templates and phrases into a variety of foreign languages for you.

You will still use the stock layouts, logo designs, graphics, proposal assembly and overall structure of a proposal system no matter which language your final document will be in. Just make sure you use a package that does not lock you into a restricted environment that doesn’t allow complete customization of every single element of your documents.

The background art and page formatting found in Proposal Kit will easily transition to any language, because there’s no text involved in the background designs and many of the graphics.

The most common languages supported in a proposal kit are American English, Canadian English, British (UK) English, Australian English, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Italian, French, German, Romanian, Russian, Arabic, Chinese, Korean, and Japanese

Proposal Pack Wizard - Expert Edition software will assist in foreign language translations by auto-translating some of the elements of the documents for you, such as all the page headers and short phrases in the Cover Letter, Title Page, and so on. The software is there to assist you, but instructions are usually in English, so you’ll need to be comfortable with using commonly used proposal kits in English while you are use the package to create your final proposal in your own native language.

How to Write a Ranching Business Proposal

Do you run an eco-friendly, humane, free-range animal ranch and want to use that fact to help sell your beef, chicken, or buffalo? Or maybe you’re running a nonprofit international organization and you want to help the poor in other countries start a piggery or raise goats or turkeys. Perhaps you are working in the research or veterinary field and need to get a project approved or funded.

Whether you're already running a ranch and seeking new outlets for your livestock or meat, or whether you are seeking funding to start a ranch, expand a livestock operation, or fund a research project, sooner or later you will need to master the art of writing a business proposal.

If you can run a ranch, you can certainly write a proposal. You know ranching. You know what you want to do with your business. So you’ve already got a good start on the content for a proposal. Now, you need to add one vital element: knowledge of your potential customer or funding organization. You need to keep that person or organization in mind while you write your proposal.

Successful proposals are custom tailored for their recipients. So before you start writing, not only should you gather all the facts and figures and internet links you need to describe your organization and explain what you propose to do, but you should also gather some data on your proposal readers. For example, what’s the history of the organization you are pitching to? Have they approved projects like yours in the past? Do they have a particular interest, such as organic farming or humane treatment of animals? What do they already know about you? What questions are they likely to have? Knowing your prospective customers or partners will help you include the right sort of information that will persuade them to support you.

After you have all your information in hand, how do you begin a proposal project? By writing a Cover Letter. It simply needs to introduce your organization and your proposal, explain what you’d like the recipient to do after reading the proposal, and provide all your contact information. Next, create a Title Page. Choose a name that describes your proposal, like “Funding Request to Help African Villages Set Up Pig Farms,” “Plan to Add Buffalo and Ostriches to the High Country Ranch Operations,” “Pilot Program to Study Livestock Disease Resistance,”  or “Proposal to Deliver Fresh Free-Range Beef and Chicken to Cindy’s Down Home Restaurants.” The Cover Letter plus the Title Page, plus an optional Table of Contents and/or Client Summary (list of important points), makes up the first and shortest section of a proposal—the introduction.

The pages in the second section should describe what your potential customer or funding organization needs and wants from you, as well as any limitations, deadlines, or restrictions you know about. This section could also mention any opportunities that the readers may not yet have thought of. For example, local ranchers may not be supplying the demand for goats for traditional Greek Orthodox, Jewish, Hindu, or Muslim holiday meals in your area. Or perhaps you see a future need for more lean meat like beefalo, turkey, or ostrich. Or maybe you want to describe the need for milk, meat, and eggs in the diet of poor people, as well as the opportunity to make families self-sufficient with rapidly reproducing livestock. Pages in this section will have titles like Problem Statement, Needs Assessment, Market Demand, Opportunities, Requirements, and so forth.

If you are applying for funding or responding to an RFP, you probably have a checklist of information you need to provide, and you can insert your RFP Cross Reference and Compliance Matrix here, along with any other thoughts you have about future needs or challenges not addressed in the checklist.

The third section should be a detailed description of what you propose to do. This section could have any number of pages and topics, depending on your plans, projects, services, products and ideas. For example, if you plan to sell meat and poultry to restaurants or stores, you'll want to include pages describing your Products and a Wholesale Price List, and include Purchasing and Delivery Details. Be sure to include any details that help your plan stand out from your competitors, such as Organic or Environmental practices, your plan for Future Sustainability, and so forth. If you are starting a ranching operation, you should describe your Project Plan and Budget as well as your existing or needed Equipment, Personnel, and Real Estate. You might need to include a Return on Investment page.

If you plan to offer a service to existing ranchers, such as inspection, insemination, inoculation, castration, branding, transportation, butchery, veterinary, auctioneering or even bookkeeping services, then you'll want to describe all the tasks you will do. Each topic should describe how your project will meet a need or fulfill a demand and thus benefit all parties. Make sure you address all the needs, requirements, and opportunities mentioned earlier.

The fourth and final proposal section should explain why the reader can trust that you will fulfill your promises. This is your opportunity to brag about yourself, but remember that credibility comes from facts and recommendations from others, not from you simply saying you’re the best. In the final proposal section, you should have pages like About Us or Company History, Experience and Expertise, Team Members, and so forth. If you have successfully completed similar Projects, list them. Include pages describing any special Training or Credentials that would help to persuade the reader, and add Testimonials, Referrals, Awards, and recognition of Achievements from others.

That’s it—now you can see that the basic structure of a business proposal is introduce yourself and your proposal,  describe the needs, opportunities, and requirements,  describe in detail your plans and how they will meet the needs and requirements and take advantage of the opportunities, and finally  explain why the proposal reader should have confidence in your ability to successfully carry out your plans.

After you have all the information, facts, and figures in place, take the time to proofread each page. Simply running a spell check program is not enough. Polish the wording and the appearance of all the pages. You want the proposal to represent you at your professional best, especially if you have competition for contracts or funding.

Want to get a big head start on writing your proposal? Then consider using a proposal writing product like Proposal Kit, which comes with hundreds of professionally designed topic pages, including all those mentioned above. Each topic page contains instructions and examples of information to place on that page, so you’ll never sit looking at a blank screen. Proposal Kit includes dozens of sample proposals you can review to see which topics might go into a proposal and how the finished product could look.

Speaking of looks, you can choose different graphic designs with Proposal Kit, too, to make your proposal visually appealing. There are even a few contracts that you can adapt for your own use. Proposal Kit is great for general business use, too—you can use it to produce bids, reports, studies, and business letters as well as proposals. Proposal Kit can make even your very first proposal look and sound like it came from an expert.

Stay Out of Trouble Copying Proposal Examples – Win More By Writing Your Own

I received a packet of information recently in the mail. The introductory letter started off with some text in mismatched font sizes and types and the wrong salutation for my name.

As a business owner, I file packets like this in my recycle bin. Why? Because I can tell that this is only a copy that is going out to thousands of other business owners. For one thing, I have multiple business licenses, so I got multiple copies. But even if I hadn’t, I could tell that the sender has substituted only a few words—my last name, the word “office,” and the name of my company—because he forgot to change the font so all the text would match. The sender clearly hasn’t bothered to check that I am a ‘Ms.’ not a ‘Mr.’ And most telling of all, the sender forgot to take out the word ‘construction,’ and why would my publishing company need a construction worker? Does Hard@Work even employ construction workers, or is this a copy of another company’s proposal that they found on the internet?

I recognize that the person who created this proposal was not a writer but a copier. I have no doubt that Hard@Work Temps is sending the same package to thousands of other companies. As a matter of fact, I’m sure I’ll discover exactly that when I get together with local business owners at our next networking meeting.

Did receiving this packet inspire me to use the services of Hard@Work Temps? No way. It makes me think that if the company is this lazy and careless in sending out proposals, they’ll probably be that lazy and careless in all their business dealings.

I’m a professional writer and editor, and of course I re-use formats and basic information where it’s appropriate, but I start from scratch when I write and I always proofread carefully to make sure that everything I’m sending out represents me and is intended for my specific client. Copying someone else’s proposal would be like copying someone else’s homework—it’s not ethical and it’s certainly not professional, and some telltale sign is bound to be left—mismatched writing styles, the wrong word, a name that doesn’t belong.

Proposal Kit is designed around best practices, and one of those is that copying samples is not recommended. Any proposal writing book will tell you the same thing.

Proposal Kit gives you all the tools you need to create good proposals and other business documents. The editable templates are full of suggestions and examples for you to follow. The sample PDF documents are not editable, but they provide you with great ideas of how to create your own proposal. Take those ideas and do what the sample writers did—use Proposal Kit’s templates to generate your own proposal.

Proposal Kit gives you a big head start, but you need to do the work of creating a document that represents you and is designed for your specific audience. A copied proposal just won’t cut it when your proposal is not the only one on the client’s desk. If you are absolutely in love with a sample proposal, you can copy and paste the text from the PDF file, but you run all the risks I mentioned above.

The competition’s tough out there. Use Proposal Kit’s features to create your own personalized proposal. Then at the next networking meeting, instead of laughing about the latest crummy copy they all received, your clients and potential customers will be raving about your fantastic proposal.

Boilerplate is Bad for Business - Templates without the Fluff

It used to be that most business was conducted face to face, or at least over the phone. Odds were that your prospective clients knew who you were, and your competition was from your own neighborhood - you knew who they were, too. In that local environment, it was possible to distinguish yourself from the competition by your personality alone. Others in your business community knew you by the reputation you had established there.

Now our world is global and we are all connected mostly by impersonal means via email and the internet. Whether you are vying for a job, trying to secure a loan or a business contract, looking for new clients or introducing your products to new customers, odds are that now your competitors will number in the hundreds - if not thousands - and they can come from anywhere around the world.

On the face of things, it seems easy to just find a “template” you can just put your name on, but unfortunately following that strategy results in proposals that contain a lot of fluff and wordage but deliver little in the way of useful data. Plus it won’t be in a writing style that matches the rest of your material such as your web site, brochures or other collateral.

And worst of all, when you use boilerplate forms, your proposal ends up looking and reading like hundreds - if not thousands - of others.

Imagine being the poor proposal reader who sees the exact same words over and over again; your eyes would glaze over in a hurry and all proposals would seem equal. But it's never in your best interest for your proposal to appear equal to everyone else's; you want to land the job or secure that loan. Using the identical form as your competitors greatly increases the odds that your proposal will end up in the slush pile instead of on the decision maker's desk. You need your proposal to stand out, not blend in.

Proposal Kit takes a different approach from this 'fill in the blank' style. Instead of giving you paragraphs of essentially meaningless boilerplate text, each of our templates provides you with instructions, constructive suggestions, and examples of appropriate information to put into each proposal page, as well as giving you a professional format to use to present your ideas. The words on each page come from you, and so does the tone and style of your presentation.

You may be worried that without a lot of boilerplate text, you will feel lost and sit staring at blank pages without a clue about where to start and what to include on each page. Without boilerplate text, will proposal writing be a lot more work? The answer is no. Don't fret! You're not starting from scratch.

Although you will be writing the words and supplying the information the decision makers need, you will never be perplexed about what to add to your proposal when you're using Proposal Kit. We have hundreds of template pages for you to choose from, and hundreds of suggestions on how to connect those pages and elaborate on important topics. No matter what type of business or nonprofit work you're engaged in, odds are that you can find the templates you need here. And it's easy to see how any page can be individualized for your specific requirements.

We understand that it can be difficult for a proposal writer to think of everything, so our templates recommend various items and ideas you might want to include on that page, as well as suggesting ways to structure that information. The suggestions not only include the text elements you might want to include, but suggestions for website URLs, graphs, blueprints, and diagrams, because we know that you want to present your information in the format that is most appropriate for your project and most useful to your readers.

We've designed Proposal Kit to be flexible enough to use for almost any sort of writing, too, so you can use our templates to create not only proposals, but in-house reports, scientific analyses, financial documents, annual reports, feasibility studies - almost any sort of document you might need in business. Even resumes are covered.

If you ever still feel stuck for inspiration, you can always get ideas from our samples. As well as hundreds of templates for proposal pages, Proposal Kit includes over a hundred sample proposals, studies, and reports from a wide variety of organizations for all sorts of situations. International shipping, manufacturing, software networking, child day care, food catering, nonprofit programs to house the homeless, publicity campaigns - almost anything you can name is in there. The list goes on and on.

Even if we don't yet have a sample proposal for the specific type of project you have mind, you'll be able to find one or more samples in the list that are similar enough to get you started on the right track. We've done our best to provide sample proposals that will show our customers - from the individual entrepreneur to the largest corporation - the wide variety of documents they can create with Proposal Kit. By exploring these samples, you'll see how our templates can be easily used and assembled into a unique package, and you'll also get ideas on how to best present your ideas and sell yourself to your readers.

You want your proposal to showcase your ideas and highlight your experience, exhibit your personality, and above all, stand out from the crowd. Those are our goals, too. When you use Proposal Kit, your proposal will be easy to write, the result will be professional, and your presentation style will be your own.

You'll feel like an expert as you put your information on the pages. Your finished product will be well structured, easy to read, and written in your own words. Best of all, it will be a unique proposal that actually represents you. It will be a proposal that the decision maker will remember.

It’s All About Trust - Winning Proposals by First Winning Trust

It’s a big impersonal world out there, especially on the internet. The competition for attention is fierce. Anyone can slap a price quote and a cover letter and ship them off via email, but that’s not a strategy that’s likely to succeed.

So how do you create a proposal that will land the customer or secure that business loan or grant money? We all want to do business with people we trust. Your proposal must convince your prospective clients or donors that you are worthy of their trust.

If possible, add a personal touch by requesting a face-to-face meeting to present your proposal. Shaking hands with the other party can go a long way toward finalizing a deal.

But in-person meetings are not always possible, especially in the world of global business, so often your printed proposal needs to do all the work for you.

How do you inspire trust? And particularly, how do you inspire trust in people who don’t know you at all?

First of all, demonstrate that you have integrity and experience. To do this, provide honest, easily understood information about your background, your strengths, and your intentions. You could use a Company History, Credentials, Capabilities, and Awards and Achievements chapters to describe yourself or your organization. Use concrete, straightforward language to describe how your proposal will benefit everyone (add Opportunities and Benefits chapters).

Clarity is important. Be sure to set forth clear expectations that both parties can understand, with results that can be measured. You may want to use a Goals and Objectives or Expected Results chapters to provide a concise summary, and then use other pages to supply more explanation. Be as detailed as possible so ensure that you and the reader have a shared vision of what you are proposing. If you are responding to a request for proposal (RFP), show your thoroughness by carefully considering the information provided and by specifically addressing each requirement. If you are unclear about any requirement, get more information if possible so that you can include appropriate data instead of vague generalities.

In every proposal, you should encourage feedback from the other party, and explain that you are willing to listen and modify plans as needed to make the project successful for everyone.

Show your ability to complete the proposed project by explaining how and by whom the process will be accomplished. There are many chapters you can use for this purpose, such as Project Plan, Implementation Plan, Schedule of Events, and so forth. Describe the resources—such as equipment, financial backing, or experienced personnel—that you will employ for the project (Equipment, Facilities, Financial Information, and Personnel documents, just to name a few extra chapters you might use).

Be thorough. Demonstrate that you understand the complexity of the project under consideration. If blueprints, diagrams, or photographs would demonstrate your ideas better than words, be sure to add those.

Establish your reputation by listing similar projects you’ve finished and recommendations from your satisfied business partners (Company History and Endorsements, Referrals, or References chapters). If you have copies of complimentary newspaper or magazine articles about your company’s projects or history, you might want to include those as well.

We are all more likely to trust others who hold themselves accountable for their actions.

Legal contracts generally spell out the terms of accountability. You can also show your accountability by explaining how and when results will be analyzed. Some of the many possible chapters to add for this are Accountability, Testing, Evaluation, Acceptance Criteria, and Reporting.  Describe what you will do if wrongs need to be righted or the process needs to be changed.  You might offer a guarantee of satisfaction or a warranty to fix any defects in a product.

If you are already allied with respected brands or organizations, highlight that (add Brand Strategy or Strategic Alliances chapters).  Memberships in organizations with good reputations can go a long way to establish respectability—be sure to list any you belong to by adding an Accreditations chapter.

If it’s appropriate, you may want to demonstrate your loyalty to good customers by providing a volume discount or other special offer.

Finally, we all tend to trust organizations and people who are good citizens. Do you donate to charity, lead a nonprofit organization, or lend a hand in your community? If so, point that out using a Donations or Contributions chapter. Have you won any awards or experienced any publicity for your good deeds? Include any evidence that shows you are a contributor to a cause larger than your immediate organization.

Presenting a proposal package that is full of errors will make even the best plans look unprofessional. Whenever possible, have others review your proposal and provide feedback, and get someone with a good eye to check your final version for grammar and spelling errors. Before you ship off the proposal, ensure that all pages are numbered appropriately and all pieces are present and in order. Prospective partners will have more confidence in your ability to complete a project when you show that you are professional in your planning and presentation.

Above all, be polite and show your respect in your cover letter by thanking prospective business partners in advance for their time and consideration and inviting their questions and feedback on your presentation. You may want to send a handwritten thank you note and follow up with a phone call.

Take the time to peruse the extensive list of documents in a pre-designed Proposal Kit.  A Proposal Kit package includes all of these chapters and will give you a big head start creating a trust-based proposal.

Establish your credibility and dependability with your prospective business partners.

Because it’s all about trust.

How to Write a Business Proposal that Wins

You’ve been given the task and now you’re wondering how to write a proposal. What is a proposal, anyway? At its core, there’s a need. And there’s a solution. That’s the basis of a proposal, which can be as short as a one-page letter or over a hundred pages long. As a proposal writer, sometimes you’re the party with the need, like when you write a proposal seeking a loan, a grant or some other form of support. At other times, you’re the one with the solution, like when you write a proposal offering products, services, or ideas that the other party needs or wants.

So obviously, statements of needs and descriptions of the solutions are major parts of all proposals. Sometimes the needs are stated in detail in a Request for Proposal (RFP), in which case you as the proposal writer will respond to each item in the RFP, in the format requested. At other times, you’ll need to convince the proposal reader that there is a need and that you have the solution, and the format of the information will be completely up to you.

How to Write a Proposal – Phase One: Plan It

Creating a complex proposal can seem a bit overwhelming, but Proposal Kit contains a number of checklists to help you stay on track. You can print these out and check off the steps as you work your way through the proposal writing process.

The first step is to get organized and do your research. Who will read this proposal? Get all the data you can on your prospective client or donor. Who are your competitors? You want to beat their presentations. Gather all the data you need for your pitch, too—any important history, contact information, schedules, website links, photos, product descriptions, and so forth.

The second step is to decide what you want to say in your proposal. You need to introduce yourself and describe your capabilities, products, or plans. Be specific, and if possible, mention awards or recommendations from others to add credibility. Check out the sample proposals in the Proposal Kit to get ideas on what to say and how to say it.

How to Write a Proposal – Phase Two: Get All the Data in There and Make It Perfect

Next, select the Proposal Kit templates that cover the topics you’ve decided to include in the proposal. The Proposal Pack Wizard can help you assemble all the selected templates into a single proposal document.

Now that you have the structure in place, take all your gathered content and flesh out the pages of your proposal, filling in the blanks, generating estimates, describing financial information, and so forth. Each template has instructional information to guide you, and you can use the included financial calculator spreadsheets to help figure costs, budgets and other numerical information.

Next comes the review stage. Use spell check, but don’t assume it can catch all errors. Have others check your proposal for grammar and spelling errors or for missing or misplaced information. This is particularly important if you copy content from samples or past proposals (see Why Not Just Copy the Sample Proposals? for a discussion of the risks of copying).

How to Write a Proposal – Phase Three: Send It and Then Follow Up

Now that you’ve perfected your masterpiece, create the final distribution copy. Print it out or convert it to PDF for delivery. Do one last final check and then send it on its way.

Whew! You’re done, right? Not quite. If you don’t hear back from your prospective client or donor, you need to follow up. If you receive a negative response, analyze what went wrong and ask for an opportunity to resubmit an improved proposal. Proposal Kit includes templates for follow-up letters and checklists for the post-submittal phase, too.

If you landed the job or won the grant, odds are that you’ll need to complete other documents such as contracts, work orders, non-disclosure agreements, change orders, development milestone sign-offs, just to name a few. Proposal Kit includes a large collection of pre-written contracts to help you with your obligations.

Now you know the basics of how to write a proposal. That means you know the basics of how to write a business proposal, how to write a grant proposal, and how to write a sales proposal. Each proposal type simply includes different information to establish credibility and provide the data that the client or donor needs.

No matter what type of proposal or business document you need to produce, Proposal Kit includes the templates, samples, and instructions that will help you succeed.