Jeffery Gitomer an American author and business trainer said “Great salespeople are relationship builders who provide value and help their customers win”.
Building a healthy relationship with customers will help you get more clients. Building a business may seem overwhelming and often business owners cringe in the name of drafting a business proposal. A well-written business proposal is key to gain more clients that would help your business grow and flourish. A solid business proposal outlines the values you claim to provide and persuades the clients to choose your business over others.
In this article, you will get in-depth knowledge about how to write a business proposal that gets you, new clients.
Keep reading to know more!
As per American billionaire, Mark Cuban- ‘Sales cure all’. You can not make money until you sell your business. Hence, business proposals are vital. So, let’s learn what it is!
What is a business proposal?
A business proposal is a document used by B2B companies and even by small businesses to persuade prospective clients to purchase their goods or take up their services. It helps you to outline what you can offer your clients and what your business does.
A business proposal is different from a business plan. A business plan helps to sell your business and get more investors. Whereas, a business proposal helps to sell your products or services and seek more customers.
Besides helping in persuading your clients to buy the product, what exactly a business proposal is used for? Get your answer here!
What is the purpose of a business proposal?
The B2B sales process often seems complex and that’s when a business proposal comes into the picture and helps in streamlining the entire process. Besides serving as information spruce, it also helps in boosting your brand value that convinces your potential client to purchase your products.
So, let’s now focus on the various kinds of business proposals available!
Type of business proposals
Let’s learn what are the different types of business proposals and their purposes.
Informally Solicited:
Proposals written without any official request are known as informally solicited business proposals. These require more research by the providers. The buyer simply asks for it and they evaluate the proposal depending upon their need.
Formally Solicited:
This is more of a response to an officially requested business proposal. In this case, the business owner generally has more information about the buyer than in the case of an informally solicited proposal.
Unsolicited:
This is a kind of marketing brochure that often takes a generic form of a business proposal. By understanding customer issues one can customize the proposal and create a more persuasive approach.
Though there is no blueprint to write a business proposal, you can follow this general formula to write a unique and effective business proposal.
How to write a business proposal?
Begin with the following steps to write an impressive business solution.
Start a title page:
Provide basic information on your title page to give an initial introduction to your business. Add your and your company name along with the date of submission of the proposal and client name. An aesthetically appealing title page will reflect your professionalism.
Add a table of contents:
Whether online or offline business proposal, adding table content is always useful. It makes it more simple and accessible. For online readers, a clickable table of contents makes it easy to navigate throughout the proposal.
Add executive summary:
Specifying to your prospective clients as to why they should choose your firm is necessary. Therefore, including executive summary answers to this ‘why’. The executive summary will provide a brief about the benefits of purchasing your company’s products and services and how they will solve the problems of your potential clients.
Mention the issues or the need:
Good homework, effective research, and critical thinking are key to create a signature-grabbing business proposal. Provide a summary of the problem the client is facing. This will prove that you have a clear understanding of the problems and will create a probable inclination towards your company.
Suggest a befitting solution:
Pointing out the problems is not the end. Providing a befitting and customized solution will help you to win the project. Make sure that the specified solution caters to the needs of your clients and is an effective remedy to deal with their issues. After all, the solution should be worth each penny invested in.
Add qualification to your team:
Building trust factor is highly essential. Therefore, you must share the qualifications of your team to make them feel secure to depend on your company and invest money. Mention client success stories, relevant awards, and accreditations to boost the authority of your company.
Provide the timeline of submitting the deliverable:
To prove yourself in front of the clients mention the timeline of submitting the deliverable. This will create an impression of how prepared you are for the project. You can add flow charts, or timeline infographics to mention the project timelines.
Mention pricing, billing, and taxes:
Add an optional fee table to mention the pricing. Some proposal software has responsive pricing tables that allow clients to check the products and the software would generate the price as per the preferences made. Do include the billing methods and information on taxes as well, for better understanding.
Terms and conditions:
Mentioning the business terms and conditions is a must. Clarifying the legal matter of the business will help clients decide whether to agree to your terms or not. This would help to avoid unnecessary confusion later after project completion.
Add a space for signature for acceptance:
Including a space for signature to help your clients respond to the proposal quickly. This will also help them to reach out to you promptly in case of any queries.
Take a quick look, to know what you should add to a business proposal!
What should be included in a business proposal?
By now you are probably thorough as to how to write a business proposal. Let’s now take a look into what are the elements that should be included in a proposal.
- Business name
- Your name and contact information
- Contact information of your client
- Proposal date and number
- Reference number
- Project overview and scope of work
- Project timeline
- Itemized list of products or service with price
- Taxes (if applicable)
- Total project cost
- Notes for additional information
- Terms and condition
- Space for signature
Try less text and add more visuals, Check for other added tips for creating business proposals in the section below!
Pro-tips to write an impressive business proposal
An impressive business plan could be the best bet in terms of business health. Let’s discuss a few more additional tips on writing a business proposal more attractively.
- An effective business proposal helps you to achieve your projects. Outline what you want in your proposal and start with that. This will keep you focused and will provide the clients a better understanding about your business.
- If you want your business proposal to grab the attention of potential clients then include quantitative data in your proposal. Moreover, add more visuals than texts as that makes it more appealing to the clients. Adding charts and graphs enhances the strength of your proposal, makes it more convincing and helps you stand out from others.
- Boosting the business credibility in front of your potential clients is the main target. Therefore, adding elements that help in building trust factors in your business is beneficial. Add social proof to convince them as to why they should give the project to your business firm.
- Adding multimedia elements will make your online business proposal more engaging. Whether adding it to the introduction or at the end, it will make a solid impression and would convince the auditory communicators to a great extent.
- The best proposal can take you far, but not without proper direction and guidance. Guide your clients as to what would be their next step if the proposal generates interest in their minds. Including a call-to-action mechanism would be an effective way to guide them.
- To boost your sales you need to provide details about other additional information related to your business. Mention what more your firm can offer to your clients.
- Keep your business proposal simple and crisp. Don’t make it too fancy and avoid using business jargon.
- Your proposal should be designed in such a way that it creates a sense of urgency in the minds of the clients.
- Reflect your company’s personality through your business proposal. Add a business logo and theme to make it more impressive. Stay true to your brand and mention what separates you from your competitors.
- Design your business proposal to make them say ‘yes’. Eliminate every element that stands in your way to win the project.
- Check to confirm that your business proposal is flawless. There should not be any grammatical mistakes or factual errors as that might drop the impressions about your brands.
FAQs
1. Avoid typos or grammatical errors by doing a spell-check. As multiple errors may communicate your message and you may end up losing clients.
2. Switch up your proposal design by adding more visuals and making it attractive which will make it more engaging.
3. Provide a PDF file of your business proposal to your clients as by these you can attach other collateral like videos or case studies to provide detailed information.
The length of the business proposal depends upon the project scope, who your clients are and their pain points. No matter whether it is one page or more, it needs to succinctly articulate the important information.
Final thought!
Creating a proposal needs effective software for attractive designs and features. This decides the fate of winning the project. Therefore, you can refer to multiple online software that is available nowadays to create your business proposal. Refer to this article to have an in-depth idea as to how to write a business proposal.
