When Good People Write Bad Proposals (the 6 biggest mistakes)
When I work with clients on their sales process, I have 6 leverage points that when we examine them, typically we can find hidden unbanked sales revenue in their business.
One of these leverage points that don’t get talked about much is with proposals.
Now, there are a stack of opinions out there about proposals, people saying you shouldn’t write them, that you should just send an agreement to other advisors saying you should write them.
So firstly, my take on proposals is if you can secure a sale without writing one and you can save yourself some time, then by all means cut straight to the order part and while you’re there, celebrate that. *well done tiger!
But there are times when writing a proposal is not only warranted but essential if you want to get a sale across the line.
But when I look at most proposals out there, they suck big time.
Here are the big 6 boo boo’s that I see being made when good people write bad proposals
No conceptual agreement of value
Calling it a proposal
Stuff they already know
Too much stuff about the company
Doesn’t mirror what was discussed
Just emailing it without going through it with them
No conceptual agreement of value
This is number one for a good reason. If BEFORE you write your proposal, you haven’t established that 1.They have a problem you can solve 2.That there is sufficient potential and upside in solving that problem that justifies an investment to do so. and 3. They understand in principal and you have a verbal AGREEMENT in terms of what it will take time and investment wise to fix it.
Then guess what? you are totally wasting your time.
Calling it a proposal
If you have seen, read or listened to any of my stuff you will already know I am big on language. The mere use of the word “proposal” (especially if you have conceptual agreement of value) subtracts from the possibility that your client will go ahead with you. Yeah it’s semantics but guess what? semantics are the meaning of words. Call it a plan or an agreement or a outline – anything but a proposal.
Stuff they already know
You wouldn’t believe how many proposals I review that start with “XYZ company is an established professional services firm specialising in….blah blah”
If you are doing this, stop it. Don’t write about stuff that your client already knows. Write about the things you have helped them identify that they didn’t already know but that more importantly they need to fix.
Too much stuff about the company
Capability statements and director profiles do not belong in proposals especially at the start. If you put this as the first 6 pages or so you have already lost them. They’ve already checked all that stuff out on your site or on linkedin otherwise you wouldn’t even be at the proposal writing stage. Either leave that crap out altogether, or put it in the back. Client case studies and testimonials are also great but put them at the end.
Doesn’t mirror what was discussed
There should be no new information in your proposal (or plan as it will now forever be known ?
If you want to get a yes result, your plan document should also mirror the syntax of your sales process discussion that you had with your client.
As a general rule, if you didn’t talk about it, don’t put it in. It should simply mirror and confirm in writing what was discussed.
Just emailing it without going through it with them
You are never more powerful in the 2 seconds that elapse before your potential client sees your plan. Which is why you should be there to walk them through it. Either face to face or over the phone. The benefit of that of course is that you get to ask for the sale after they have confirmed they understand everything that you can walk them through while you’re there.
Of course the actual process you use to present a plan to a client is also really important and can also make a massive difference to your conversion depending on the process you use.
If you’d like to work with me 1 on 1, I’m currently not accepting any clients but I do open up spots periodically.
If you’d like to potentially work with together, you can go on my wait list by simply completing the form here and typing WAIT LIST in the message box
