Proposals have always played a pivotal role in the sales process, but today they are more important than ever. Although in-person meetings have resumed to some degree, buyers are still craving—and expecting—a digital sales experience. As a result, your sales proposals—typically delivered digitally via email, accessed by the prospect via a shared drive, or viewed through the company website or client portal—carry the heavy responsibility of serving as the face of the company and generating the results previously delivered by sales reps through in-person meetings.
In Sales and Marketing Management, Jennifer Tomlinson and Olivia Hardy divulge the most essential strategies and tips for understanding how to write a sales proposal—and not just any sales proposal, one that delivers the same impact as in-person presentations by speaking directly to the buyer's unique challenges, needs, and goals.
If you’re wondering how to write a sales proposal that resonates with prospects and wins business, begin by focusing on the essentials. These basics form the backbone of your sales proposal and, if neglected, can seriously undermine your sales efforts.
Follow these 7 essential tips when creating a sales proposal and you'll have the foundation for a proposal that’ll set your company apart from the competition:
In addition to these seven essential tips for creating a winning proposal, apply the following best practices to help prospects engage more effectively with your proposal and simplify the decision-making process.
Sales proposals should be personalized and clearly reflect that you understand the prospect's business environment. Summarize how your offering will help them achieve their specific goals. If your proposal fits into their thought process, you'll have a far greater chance of getting them to sign on the dotted line.
Do your homework before writing the proposal. Research happenings within the prospect's business and industry. Don't hesitate to ask insiders for advice: if you are fortunate enough to have a champion, leverage that relationship to find out what matters most to the people who will evaluate your proposal. What are their hot-button issues? What are the potential showstoppers? Once you've pinpointed the prospect's top challenges and goals, weave this insight into the opening sections of your sales proposal.
Another useful way of adding a personalized touch is to mimic your prospect's branding. By creating a sales proposal that tastefully adopts their color scheme, style, and tone throughout, you will subtly reinforce that your company is the ideal fit for the project and that it shares similar values to their brand.
Most likely, your prospects will evaluate multiple proposals and won't have the time to dive into every single detail you provide. Instead, they will skim your proposal to gather the most important and compelling information. With that in mind, you should aim to make their life as easy as possible.
Your sales proposal should be succinct, and your language should be direct and conversational. Avoid the use of confusing legalese and jargon, as this will cause the prospect's eyes to glaze over. Include callouts and pull quotes to emphasize differentiators and key benefits; use graphics to illustrate concepts. If you see that a section is becoming too wordy, break it up into smaller sections with subheadings. And, in your table of contents, include links that let the reader easily jump to different sections of the proposal.
Your goal should be to create the most crisp, attractive, and user-friendly proposal of the bunch. If it makes your prospect's life easier, they will assume your product or service will do the same for their company.
There isn't a one-size-fits-all approach to creating an effective sales proposal. However, there are some best practices you can follow to shorten sales cycles and improve win rates. Cut the fluff, do your research, and focus on what matters the most: your customer's needs and goals.
Proposal templates are your new best friends. They simplify the proposal writing process by offering you a customizable content framework upon which you can quickly build your sales proposals, while tailoring them for each prospect’s unique needs.
Templates encourage repeatability and efficiency, saving you valuable time and money and enabling you to spend your time where it drives the greatest return. Plus, templates ensure you present a consistent brand across all of your sales documents.
Check out the QorusDocs Template Hub for access to a variety of templates, including various proposal options, Request for Proposal (RFP), Statement of Work (SOW), Request for Quote (RFQ), and Security Questionnaire documents.
If you’d like to learn more about how to write a sales proposal or what makes a proposal shine, QorusDoc’s resource library is chock-a-block with helpful resources and tools—from the Ultimate Guide to Mastering RFPs and Sales Proposals and helpful tip sheets like 5 Ways Proposal Management Fuels Sales to our APMP-sponsored webinar that reveals the secrets to creating winning sales proposals.