How to create a business proposal
How to create a business proposal
Certain terminologies are common in the business space and some of them are so important such that you cannot afford not be familiar with them as a serious business person or an entrepreneur. One of such terminologies is “Business Proposal”. So, what is a business proposal and how do you create one? That is what we will be looking at in this article.
The first thing to understand is that a business proposal is a form of document that is prepared by a business owner as a tool for convincing a buyer. Say you are trying to sell a product or service to prospective client, a proposal can be used to introduce the product and/or service, reinforce the benefits the client should expect, the discount you’re offering (if any), and any other information you want the client to know which you believe will help the client decide in favour of your product or service.
Types of business proposals
A business proposal can be solicited or unsolicited. These are the two categories of business proposals that we have. A solicited business proposal is the one you prepared for a client (existing or prospective) who has considered you for patronage and has contacted you to request for a proposal from you. You in turn prepare the proposal based on the client’s specification and you send it to the client when you are done preparing it.
The other type is, of course, the unsolicited business proposal. This is the business proposal that is prepared by a business owner and submitted to a prospective client who did not request for one.
Now, I know the next question you want to ask is, “How do I create a business proposal?” and the answer to that is pretty simple. So, we will begin to answer the question of how to create a business proposal by looking at what the structure of a business proposal should look like.
Business Proposal Elements
While business proposals can be written in a number possible ways, mostly less-structured documents, they are often long documents that might include anything from engineering specifications to equipment lists to project staffing, depending on what’s requested in the RFP – or what the writer of an unsolicited proposal feel it is necessary to include. Vendors responding to RFPs must always follow the prospective client’s preferred, stated format for the proposal. Common elements requested, which can also be used in unsolicited proposals, often include:
- Cover letter
- Cover page
- Executive summary
- Table of contents
- Overview or summary of the problem or need
- Strategy or approach to solving the problem
- Representative tactics
- Company qualifications
- Schedule
- Costs
It is important to bear in mind that business proposals can be as short or as long as necessary to communicate required information. Furthermore, a business proposal can be written or presented in a less structured or an informal way. A business proposal can include a lot of details about a service of a proposed project such as detailed engineering specifications and requirements, staffing details for a project, breakdown of costs, and so on. Therefore, for the most part, a business proposal is usually a long document.
If you are writing a business proposal in response to the request of a client, then, that business proposal is solicited proposal, as we have stated earlier. In this case, you will be expected to stick to the guidelines provided by the client in their request for proposal usually referred to as RFPs. More often than not, when prospective buyers or clients request for a proposal from a vendor, they would give you a specification and guideline to follow – usually a format. The format in most cases would be similar to the business proposal outlines we already presented above, and you can almost always adopt that for your RFP submission. In the next section, let’s look at how to create a business proposal in more detail.
How to create a business proposal
- Write your title page
The very first thing you need to write is your title page. Although this is not a rule but it is what seem mostly logical and that is what many people do. The title page should include some basic information such as your company name and address, your phone contacts, email address and website (if you have one).
- Write a cover letter next
Should I assume you already know what a cover letter is and skip this part? Oh no! Let’s not do that. I mean, what if you don’t really know? Okay so, a cover letter is a page document in which you introduce yourself, your company and what you do. You also briefly talk about why you have sent the business proposal (more like introducing your business proposal too), and you encourage the client to carefully go through it.
How to create a business proposal
- Write your table of contents
Yeah! I am including this here because that is typically what should come next after your cover letter. However, it may not necessarily be what you write next after the cover letter. In fact, it is much easier to put your table of contents together AFTER all the other parts of the document have been written. The logic here is simple: until you have the other sections of the document written, your table of contents does not even surface – and this is true for any kind of book or document; it is not anything peculiar to business proposals. I am sure you caught that?
Read Also: How to write a business model canvas
- Write your Executive Summary next
Your executive summary is simply summarizing all that your business proposal contains into about a page or so. Executive summary is written in such a way that, if your business proposal happens to end up in the hand of a very busy person (especially if he/she is the decision maker) who would not be able to go through the entire document, what is contained in the executive summary will be just enough to either convince the person to buy your offer, or at the least, convince or motivate him/her to create the time to go through the entire document – when he/she must have been persuaded of a need to do so, from the little information provided in the Executive Summary.
Finally, you should write the other parts of the business proposal depending on your field or industry and what is obtainable. The rest of the business proposal is also dependent on what things are specifically requested buy a client in the case of RFPs.
Do not gamble with your business proposals
99.99% of the time, you won’t have a second change to make another impression after the first one, especially if your first impression turned out bad or uninteresting to your client. For the most part, many business owners are usually unable to write a business proposal by themselves, at least in an effective way that convinces anyone to want to buy what they are offering. If you’re not able to write such document by yourself, there is no reason to keep knocking yourself over it. A business proposal is a professional document and getting a professional or a group of professionals to help you isn’t such a bad idea. This is because a badly written proposal can make you lose a huge opportunity with a potential buyer – and in most cases, your proposal would have opened the eyes of the prospect to the fact that they need the solution you are offering but they might end up looking elsewhere for the solution if your proposal is defective in some ways, or if it isn’t convincing enough to prove your competence, reliability, trustworthiness, etc to the prospective client.
Dayo Adetiloye Business Hub
Writing award-winning business proposal is one of our specialties at Dayo Adetiloye Business Hub, we have a team of experienced professionals who are dedicated to seeing your business succeed. One thing that marks us out at Dayo Adetiloye Business Hub is that we won’t just work for you but will work with you through the process of gaining absolute clarity on your business proposal. Meanwhile, our work speaks for us and you can review what many of our clients all over Africa have said about the service we have offered to them. Some of the reason why you should come to us for your professional business proposal and other business writings are as follows:
- Experienced Writers
- Compelling Salesmanship
- 100% Confidentiality
- On-Time Delivery
- High-Quality Proposal
- Widespread industry knowledge
- High affordable
- Error-free document
- Up to 93% proposal wins
- We have plenty results to show
Conclusion
Business proposal is not a document to gamble with. You either get every component right – or it will be wrong altogether! Anybody can write anything, but it is usually different when you need to write a proposal that increases your chances of success, sales and business wins. This is where we can help. Let us help you win that contract or job bid without stress.
If you need a service of a Professional Business plan writer, then Dayo Adetiloye Business Hub is the place to go Call or WhatsApp us now on 081 0563 6015, 080 7635 9735, 08113205312 or send an email to dayohub@gmail.com and we will solve any of your business plan problems.
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Call or WhatsApp us now on 081 0563 6015, 080 7635 9735, 08113205312 or send an email to dayohub@gmail.com and we will solve any of your business problems.
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