Sell the Customer and then Write the Proposal

It is nearly impossible to produce a winning, customer-centric proposal by writing a blind bid in response to a federal Request for Proposal (RFP). The key to writing winning proposals is to sell the customer first, then write the proposal. Attendees at our proposal writing seminars tell us over and over that they write proposals with little or no contact with the customer. This approach to federal sales will almost guarantee that most of the proposals you write will lose.

Winning proposals are sales driven and customer-centric. They present solutions specifically tailored to address the customer's needs and concerns.

Legally, the sales process must take place before the public announcement of the RFP. During pre-RFP sales meetings, talk with the customer to identify the ideas, approaches, goals, and possible solutions to problems that the client favors. In doing this, potential "win" themes will evolve, enabling you to present your company as uniquely capable of fulfilling a contract when it comes time to write the proposal.

Expand and refine your win themes during the sales process as follows:

Keep notes on the customer's desires, perceived solutions, fears, hopes, concerns, and biases.

Write a full sentence on how you will resolve each customer issue. Test the truth and uniqueness of each win theme. For example, "Our team is the only team that can guarantee continued performance on Day One of the contract."

Is that actually true? If not, throw it out; marginal themes are easily detected by the customer and can detract rather than convince. Write your proposal around the win themes and the solutions that you have developed with the customer during the sales process. Make sure your proposed solutions meet each and every requirement presented in the RFP without exception.

When developing your solutions, do not fall into the trap of judging the RFP requirements as unrealistic, trivial, or impractical. They are in the RFP for a reason.

Do not exceed the RFP requirements. Presenting costly and unwanted solutions can be equally as dangerous as not meeting an RFP requirement.

The bottom line: On-going contact with the customer prior to the issuance of an RFP is essential to writing a successful proposal.

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