Proposal Writing, Proposal Templates, Proposal Training, Proposal Tools

• In Proposal Writing Second is the Same as Last
  In many ways, writing a federal proposal is like writing a college term paper. However, the similarities end with the results. In college, you may have been reasonably happy to accept a B. With federal proposals, only one company receives a grade... read more
• Proposal Writing: Know When to Fold Them
  Federal proposal writing is expensive. You are probably doing something wrong if it isn't. Winning proposals have to be outstanding and outstanding proposals are inherently expensive. And, to make matters worse, losing proposals not only... read more
• Writing Guidelines
  Let me use a car analogy for this one. If you are in a car, do you first figure out where you want to go, and then press the accelerator, or do you just start driving before you know where you are going? Obviously, first you establish direction and... read more
• The Toughest Job in Federal Contracting
  Yes, you guessed it. I believe the toughest discipline in federal contracting is writing winning proposals. This is not because I want to achieve job security or because Fedmarket happens to sell proposal products and services. No, my reason for... read more
• Templates and Federal Proposal Writing
  Templates can play an important role in federal proposal writing. If a company wants to win a bid opportunity, the proposal it submits in response to a federal Request for Proposal (RFP) must be unique. Furthermore, the proposal must address the... read more
• What Federal Proposal Evaluators Want
  Most federal proposal evaluators share several characteristics. They don't want to read your proposal and many only read certain sections; they skim for the good parts. They are looking for the duds that they can throw in the non-compliant pile... read more
• If You Write Nothing Else, Write an Executive Summary
  The Executive Summary should drive the proposal writing effort. It should be written before the proposal kick-off meeting so that the selling points made in the draft summary can be stressed throughout the proposal. It should be written by a senior... read more
• Style Sheets are Your Friend
  How many of you use Microsoft Word to write your proposals? If I had to guess, the number is over 99 percent. OK, that may be a stretch, but the point is that this application is ubiquitous in the world of proposal writing or for that matter any... read more
• Why Proposals Win
  Winning a bid opportunity does not occur due to blind luck. Wins are almost always the result of intense and aggressive upfront sales efforts to end users. Deciding on whether to bid on an opportunity can be a stressful and challenging task.... read more
• More on the Difficulty of Proposal Writing
  The process of creating a compelling and winning proposal is a difficult one. Proposal writing is different than anything else a company does. Information technology (IT) companies are good at developing computer systems and managing technically... read more
• Storyboards Save Time and Effort
  Storyboards are conceptual planning tools used to help writers plan each section before drafting text. In the broadest sense, storyboards use words and graphics to outline a concept. A key objective of proposal storyboards is to get and keep the... read more
• Hot Buttons Tell Your Customers You Get It
  From last week's post, you probably took away that the proposal theme (see The Proposal Theme: A Rhetorical Infrastructure for Selling) is not just some fluff language. It is a necessary construct that gives writers a map to coherently address... read more
• Save Money and Time with Proposal Templates
  If a company wants to win a bid opportunity, the proposal it submits in response to a federal Request for Proposal (RFP) must be unique. Furthermore, the proposal must address the customer's issue or problems and the company submitting the offer... read more
• More on Defensive Proposals
  In an earlier installment, we defined a defensive proposal as follows: One written not to be eliminated from consideration by the proposal evaluation committee The proposal written with the goal of being the last proposal standing A... read more
• The Proposal Theme
  A Rhetorical Infrastructure for Selling You want to make your message unforgettable to your potential clients, and you want to show why you are superior to all competitors. But, how do you make this happen? To have a winning proposal, you must... read more
• Red Team Review Guidelines
  A couple of installments ago, we wrote that the process many companies use for proposal reviews is "broken." We discussed why and how to mitigate the issues that seem to plague proposal reviews (see What is Wrong with the Proposal Review... read more
• Full and Open. No, More like Limited Or Closed
  At Fedmarket we sometimes call federal competition for professional services and high technology products "Limited and Closed" as opposed to "Full and Open", which is the public posture of the federal government. We use the phrase "Limited and... read more
• Why Does It Take so Long?
  Why does proposal writing take so long? Many underestimate the amount of time that must be devoted to such a project. The reality is that it often takes three times longer than you might have expected. Even the best writers have to force themselves... read more
• Use Model Tasks to Improve Proposal Quality
  An example is worth a thousand words and helps to avoid a plethora of meetings. It is not uncommon for corporate management to assign the task of writing individual tasks in the Technical Approach to a number of staff members. The Proposal... read more
• Proposal Planning: What to Do Before Kickoff
  Before you undertake any project, what do you put in place? A plan. Writing a proposal is no different. The objective of preparing a proposal plan is to establish direction for the proposal. This should be accomplished BEFORE tapping into the... read more
• Working with Teaming Partners to Draft Proposals
  No one person or corporation is an island. If you are like most successful contractors, you team with other organizations to write winning proposals. Successful teaming arrangements can result in spectacular wins for an organization that would... read more
• Saved by the Modification or Extension
  Does this scenario happen in your company? You are writing two or more proposals in parallel or perhaps even just one. The submission deadline is approaching and your proposal team is behind schedule for the myriad of reasons that occurred the last... read more
• What is Wrong with the Proposal Review Process?
  Many companies have proposal reviews of different colors. The reviews we'll focus on in this installment are the two most common, Pink and Red Team reviews. The goal of a Pink Team review is to ensure that the structure of the response is... read more
• Best Practices and Best Avoided
  Our seminar staff recently completed one of our monthly seminars on proposal writing. As we do in every class, we discussed how proposals should be written to be the "last proposal standing" or, said in Fedmarket-speak, a defensive proposal. Our... read more
• How Evaluators Judge a Proposal
  You have been writing proposals for some time. You have become a pro on piecing responses together, writing, reviewing, booking, and delivering them. But, deep down inside, do you know what goes on once your proposal is delivered to the customer?... read more
• Curing the Two Deadly Sins
  The previous installment discussed the problems associated with waiting until the last minute to tackle critical issues and providing overblown corporate experience and personnel chapters for federal proposals. We recommend following the steps... read more
• Two of the Deadliest Proposal Writing Sins
  A service company's two greatest assets are its corporate experience and the background of its staff. Often, both assets are not presented effectively in a company's federal proposals. The following is a summary of common mistakes contractors... read more
• Wild Cards Can Delude You
  An attendee at one of our proposal writing seminars stated that her company calls blind bids on FedBizzOpps solicitations "wild cards". Every once in a while when the stars line up correctly they play a wild card and they won one last year. An... read more
• Cornerstones to Proposal Success: Past Performance Library
  A past performance library contains past performance write-ups that summarize your organization's experience on different projects. More often than not, you will be asked to reference past performances in your RFP response. Because of this, you... read more
• Cornerstones to Proposal Success: Compliance
  Not meeting Request for Proposal (RFP) requirements is the most prevalent reason used by evaluators to reject proposals. Therefore, meeting each and every requirement specified in a RFP is critical to a winning proposal. How do we ensure... read more
• Don't Waste Your Precious Proposal Resources
  Your most precious proposal resource is your technical staff. Their morale and attitude is critical to contract performance and the production of high-quality proposals. Don't waste this resource by losing proposals. Sales people want to bid on... read more
• Proposal Writing Is Not Going to Go Away
  Most owners of small and medium-sized federal contracting companies wish that writing proposals was not a requirement of doing business with the federal government. Over the past several years, the perception has been that GSA Schedules and other... read more
• Proposal Gobbledygook Loses and Brevity Wins
  Why are proposal page limitations becoming more and more prevalent in federal Requests for Proposals (RFPs)? Proposal evaluators find their task either distasteful or mildly painful. They view proposal reading in about the same light as most... read more
• Proposal Page Limitations; What's Not to Like?
  In a previous installment "The Art of Not Being Eliminated"  we discussed the simplicity and clarity that federal evaluators desire in a proposal. The goal of reducing the need to read endless tomes that go on and on is reflected in the... read more
• Implement Version Control
  In a recent installment "Solving the Proposal Dilemma," we recommended that you automate and "version control" your old proposals and Management Plan boilerplate. Your proposal manager can do this but management must invest in effective software... read more
• Implement an Incentive System
  In a recent installment "Solving the Proposal Dilemma," we recommended that you use an incentive system to compensate your best technical writers when your company is the successful bidder on a federal opportunity. We can already feel your management... read more
• The Art of Not Being Eliminated
  Imagine that you have a full time job as a professional person in the federal government. And someone dumps 30 proposals in four large boxes in your office and says: "Remember the boss put you on the evaluation committee for the big XYZ project?... read more
• Eliminate Wasted Billable Time in Proposal Writing
  Wasted billable time in writing the technical solution for federal proposals is one of the mortal sins of federal contractors. Why? Subject matter experts don't really want to write in the first place so they circle, procrastinate, and postpone.... read more
• Message to Management: Why Should My Proposal Writing Capabilities Concern Me?
  Federal proposal writing is inherently chaotic, a drain on billable hours, and crucial to revenue generation. The quality and clarity of a proposal usually doesn't win a contract; it sews up (closes) a new sale or defends your position as the... read more
• Write the Executive Summary Early
  In a recent installment "Solving the Proposal Dilemma",  we recommended that you write the Executive Summary before the proposal kickoff meeting. You should make sure that it includes winning themes and salient selling points so that they can be... read more
• Corporate Experience and Resume Database
  In a recent installment "Solving the Proposal Dilemma," we recommended that you invest in building a database of up-to-date resumes and corporate experience and actually keep it updated. You Proposal Manager can oversee this provided he or she... read more
• Structure and Automate Your Sales and Proposal Processes
  In a recent Fedmarket installment "Integration of Sales and Proposal Writing," we recommended that you integrate the sales and proposal- writing process. Guidelines, procedures, and templates should be developed for the following interrelated... read more
• Integration of Sales and Proposal Writing
  Our last installment discussed the concrete steps that should be taken to minimize haphazard and disjointed efforts to write federal proposals. This installment presents additional information on how the sales and proposal-writing process can be... read more
• Model Your Federal Proposals and Refine, Refine, and Refine (I)
  For many companies proposal writing is reinventing the wheel over and over, at great costs within tight deadlines. Creative and concise documents emanate from original thoughts and repeated rewrites; each rewrite sparking more creativity and... read more
• The Proposal Writing Dilemma, Again
  We return to a frequent topic - - the practice of some companies to submit proposals that are both poorly written and not organized well. Although it may seem that we are beating a dead horse, the issue repeatedly surfaces and our message bears... read more
• Solving the Proposal Writing Dilemma
  Our last installment discussed the haphazard and disjointed federal proposal writing efforts that take place in most companies and why they occur. This installment presents concrete steps that can be taken to minimize the problem. 1. You have... read more
• Think of Proposal Writing As the Last Step in a Sale
  Our federal sales seminars stress that your sales efforts and proposal-writing process should be one, highly-structured undertaking. We advocate that you should only write defensive proposals (those proposals that defend a strong position or... read more
• An Approach to Structuring Your Technical Approach
  Use a table-driven approach to develope a detailed technical approach outline. This provides a highly-structured framework for defining tasks, sub-tasks, time-lines, staffing requirements, solution concepts and approaches. Customer feedback on our... read more
• Could Your Proposal Writing Process Be More Structured?
  It is not possible to have too much structure in your proposal writing process and even the largest prime federal contractors do not have enough. A structured or systemized proposal writing process results in higher quality, more responsive... read more
• Presenting Corporate Experience
  Corporate experience summaries show the core capabilities of a company. Like resumes, in many companies they are not as well documented as they should be. Project summaries should be updated on a quarterly basis and clearly describe the tasks and... read more