Proposal Writing, Proposal Templates, Proposal Training, Proposal Tools

• Presenting Personnel Information
  Resumes document a critical corporate asset yet in a lot of companies they are pitifully out of date and in some cases nonexistent. Resumes should be updated on a quarterly basis to reflect new job experiences and improved skills. Companies with... read more
• Writing the Management Plan
  An effective Management Plan can be written by an experienced Proposal Manager with little or no expertise in the subject matter of the RFP. Writing one from scratch however, is costly, time consuming, and tedious. The Proposal Architect, our new... read more
• Process Versus Content
  Proposal writing involves both process and content. Effective proposal writing processes are important but proposal content rules over process. Your company can develop a proposal smoothly and on time, with minimal hassle and without last minute... read more
• What is a Defensive Proposal?
  Most authors on federal proposal writing define a defensive proposal as follows: Is written not to be eliminated; to be the last proposal standing Presents a practical solution from a customer perspective Gives the customer what they want; no more... read more
• The Customer is the Key to Winning Proposals
  Most successful federal contractors understand relationship sales and sell the customer before writing customer driven, defensive proposals. Yet we hear over and over: "we are new and they won't meet with us". Many vendors new to the market turn... read more
• Does a Relationship with the Customer Guarantee a Win?
  In our previous proposal writing installments we have stated over and over that building a customer relationship is the key to a successful proposal. Why do we beat this subject to death? Because it is the foundation of almost every deal in the... read more
• Proposal: What Wins
  In our previous installment we discussed how evaluators think and what they want to see in a federal proposal. They are unanimous in stating that the best solution wins. By "best" they mean a solution that: Meets each and every requirement stated... read more
• How Proposal Evaluators Think
  Many people who have evaluated federal proposals have attended our proposal writing seminars. Without exception, they say the following: Give us exactly what we asked for in the RFP, no more or no less. Avoid sales pitches without substantiation, e.... read more
• Proposal Boilerplate: A Double-Edged Sword
  Using boilerplate -- written material that can be reused in different proposals -- is a double-edged sword. It can save the day from a time and cost viewpoint and can create guffaws (and many lost evaluation points) from the proposal evaluators.... read more
• The Do's and Dont's of Proposal Writing
  Listing all of the do's and don'ts of proposal writing would fill a small book. Some of the more important do's and don'ts are: Do Write a proposal to solve the customer's problems as THEY perceive them, not how YOU perceive them. Don't... read more
• Why a Federal Proposal is Different?
  Federal Requests for Proposals (RFPs) are unique. They are: Long, lengthy, and full of boilerplate and clauses Not written clearly Not well organized Full of detailed, scattered requirements Federal RFPs are evaluated by a formal evaluation... read more
• Improve Your Proposals: First, Deconstruct the RFP
  The proposal writing process starts with the Bid/No Bid decision. Ideally, a yes decision will be based on what you know about the customer from sales efforts carried out well before the Request for Proposal (RFP) is published. Immediately... read more
• Refining the Proposal Outline
  Step one to developing an effective proposal outline begins with the deconstruction of the Request for Proposal (RFP). Step two in the outlining process is to expand/refine the outline. Experienced proposal writers continue to expand their... read more
• Deconstructing a Request for Proposal
  Open the RFP in Word (convert PDF RFPs to Word)Read the RFP and cut and paste any RFP information that is meaningful into a blank Word document under the Proposal Chapter Headings listed below (or similar chapters): Technical Approach... read more
• About Proposal Writing
  The core of every successful proposal is a technical approach that describes a solution that meets the customer's requirements precisely. The description of the solution must be written by specialists who know and understand the subject of the... read more
• Proposal Evaluation: How It Really Works
  Many people new to government proposal writing write their proposals to win, which seems to make sense, right? In the government market, however, you should write your proposals not to lose. Why? Evaluation committees don't read through each... read more
• Outsourcing Proposal Writing
  Many newcomers to the federal marketplace believe that they can hire proposal writers to solve the proposal writing dilemma. You can, but you need to be careful in selecting the writer and realistic in your expectations. Many companies claiming to... read more
• Make Your Proposals Short, Sweet, and On Point
  Government employees who have evaluated vendor proposals while with the government attend our federal sales seminars. The consistent things they say are: *Assume that proposal evaluators are smart people who asked for exactly what they want in... read more
• The Consequences of Writing Losing Proposals
  Previous installments have discussed the need to pre-sell a client prior to the announcement of a public bid and the need to write proposals in the voice of the customer. Adhering to these two principles is likely to produce a high percentage of... read more
• The Bid or No Bid Meeting
  The bid/no bid decision should be made before or immediately at the time the RFP released. As part of the decision process, management should convene a meeting of sales, contract management, and proposal writing personnel and address the following... read more
• The Bid-No Bid Decision Process
  The proposal bid/no bid decision is crucial to proposal writing success. Make the bid/no bid decision early and base it on a realistic assessment of your chances to win. The decision should be made before or immediately upon RFP release.A realistic... read more
• 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.... read more
• Write in the Voice of the Customer
  A winning proposal must be written in the voice of the customer. The only way to write in the voice of the customer is to meet with and sell your product or solution well in advance of the issuance of the Request for Proposal (RFP).During pre-RFP... read more
• Figure Captions, the Unexplored Selling Frontier
  Given the following table: Number of Personnel Position Responsibility 1 Project Manager Management of the project 1 System Architect Software architecture 1 Data architect Database architecture 3 Business... read more
• Blog - The Art of Not Being Eliminated
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• Blog - The Strange, Strange World of Federal Proposal Writing
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• Blog - Don't Waste Your Precious Proposal Resources
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• You Can't Learn Proposal Writing from a Book
  Crafting a well written and compelling proposal is a complex and difficult task. The process requires attention to detail and, furthermore, the writer must have an understanding of what the proposal evaluators will be looking for when reviewing the... read more