Getting the technical people to write what I call “proposalese”-the language of proposals-is the Holy Grail that all marketing people seek. Unfortunately, there is no magic bullet here. However, I’ve found that there are some ways to help them along.
But first, we need to think about the technical person-the “subject matter expert”-and what drives her. I don’t want to make too many generalizations here, but I’ve found that most “technical” people have a difficult time writing “sales” documents because they firmly believe that what they are proposing-a solution to a problem-is valuable because it solves the problem. And if the problem is solved, the benefit is obvious-no more problem.
But, that’s not all the customer is looking for. Sure, the technical evaluator in the customer’s shop needs to see that the technical proposal writer fully understands the problem. But by also calling out the benefit of the solution, the proposal writer demonstrates that she knows what the technical evaluator thinks is valuable. The evaluator says, “Okay, they know what’s important to me.”
But there’s a more important consideration: the technical evaluator is not the only one evaluating the proposal. In fact, evaluation panels often include more non-technical readers than technical ones. And these people don’t often know the technology well enough to see the intrinsic benefit of the technical solution. These are the people the technical proposal writers really have to reach.
One way to get the technical people to focus on the sales aspect of the proposal is to hold a mini-training session at the proposal kick-off meeting. This should run no more than an hour or so, and should cover the basic principles of proposal writing. This session must include before and after examples of proposal sections-the before sections with just the features and the after sections that highlight the clear benefits along with the features.
Another great tool to use is what I call “section directions.” These are written by the proposal leader and give specific instructions about what details to include in the sections, and the main benefits that must be highlighted. These directions take a long time to prepare, but the time spent doing them pays off big time in the end by reducing the amount of rewriting.
Plus, I have found that the technical people love the section directions. We all know that the hardest part of writing is getting started. The section directions remove that major stumbling block.
Finally, you have to hammer at the features/ benefits connection whenever the opportunity arises. When you review the sections, write “what’s the benefit?” or “so what?” in the margin. If you talk with a writer in the hallway about her section, say, “Don’t forget benefits.” At the various proposal meetings, say, “What’s the benefit of doing it that way?”
The point is that the writers have to be constantly thinking benefits, benefits, benefits, and they need reinforcement.
As I said, there’s no magic bullet to getting the tech staff to concentrate on benefits. You just have to keep reminding them. And while they may get sick of hearing it, the proposal sections they write will be better for it.
This one’s for you marketing professionals.
As your firm’s resident “proposal specialist,” do you ever find yourself frustrated because you know what the right thing to do is but no one seems to want to hear you say it? Do you ever wish people would use your expertise more fully, would seek your professional advice about proposal strategies and tactics, or listen to you seriously when you give it?
Maybe you should consider repositioning your role in the company from a support person to the technical staff to being an adviser to the proposal teams. In other words, being an internal consultant to the staff.
You probably already act in the consulting role. When someone on the staff asks your professional opinion and you give it, you are acting as a consultant.
But getting recognized as an internal consultant can be challenging. What it means is re-shaping the image your colleagues have of you. How do you do that?
The first thing you have to do is decide what you’re selling. Do you want to be viewed as a proposal strategy expert, someone who should attend early strategy sessions? Or as a writing consultant, someone who can help the technical staff put together their sections in a persuasively? Whatever you decide, you need to devise strategies for marketing yourself.
Next, find an in-house sponsor. This could be your boss or one of the principals/owners in the firm. It needs to be someone with the clout to be able to announce your status as a consultant and who can help see that you are regarded that way.
In the meantime, you can take the “guerilla” approach-just start doing it. Be proactive in suggesting better ways to run the proposal process, and demonstrating how to do it. Offer to revise sections; make specific appointments with the writers to learn exactly what they are trying to say, then put a proposal spin on the section. Suggest quick and easy ways the writers can show their ideas graphically-and give specific examples.
And don’t be afraid to toot your own horn. Instead of saying, “Here’s an idea that might help,” say, “I’ve been thinking about your section, and I came up with a suggestion for making it more persuasive.” Remember that you’re selling the new image of yourself.
What are the benefits of being an internal consultant? In the first place, your perceived value to the firm will increase; the more you work closely with people the more they will see firsthand how important you are to the firm. This, in turn, results in greater job security, and can serve as a springboard for you to seek greater responsibilities.
In addition, you will add more variety to your job, which can make it more interesting. You will also see more concrete outcomes, and will feel you have accomplished more.
Finally, and most important, you will feel more valued on the job; as your reputation for problem-solving grows, people will seek you out to help provide solutions.
Internal consulting isn’t for everyone. But it can be a rewarding experience in many ways for those who want to put in the work to make it happen.
A couple of months ago I was conducting my proposal class for a group of engineers at a mid-sized firm. These people write a lot of proposals, maybe 100 per year. At lunch one of them—a fellow who’d been working proposals for 15 years or so—approached me.
He said. “It seems like every time we write a proposal, no one’s really in charge. Oh sure, we have a guy who’s been tapped to lead the effort, but all he really does is hand out assignments then goes off and does other work and I never see him again. We hand our sections into the marketing coordinator, who formats the proposal and makes it look pretty. I’m pretty sure the proposals get reviewed by the boss, but I don’t know for sure.”
The he asked me, “How important is it to have a dedicated proposal leader?”
Well, as you might guess, my answer was pretty emphatic:
IT’S ESSENTIAL!!!!
I apologize for shouting. But I do think it’s important. Here’s why:
Every project needs a leader. And proposal projects are no different. The leader sets the overall vision for the proposal, and makes sure that vision is threaded throughout the appropriate sections. The leader makes sure the necessary resources are allocated to the proposal effort, and will fight for them as hard as she can. A leader will make sure that people will work together, even through the high stress of a deadline driven proposal. A leader can make the difference between a winning proposal and a loser.
Now let’s make one thing clear here: I’m not talking about just having an administrator, someone who is process minded, as the proposal leader. A winning proposal requires someone with a vested interest in winning, who has a stake and can motivate the team to follow a well-conceived strategy. Here are some guidelines for selecting a leader:
The leader should be selected early. Ideally, she will lead the pre-RFP marketing activities, and will have a good understanding of the client’s project and his hot button issues. She will use this knowledge to drive the win strategy for the proposal. This person should be in charge of the post-proposal activities as well, such as the short-list presentation.
If you pick the proposal leader late, after the RFP has arrived, his learning curve will be twice as steep; he’ll have to learn what the client wants, and how to structure the proposal to deliver it. And the simple fact of proposal life is that there will never be enough time before the due date to learn all of what he would have known had he been involved since the beginning of the marketing effort.
The leader should be selected on the basis of her ability to lead, not on her ability to do the technical job. This means management needs to pick the best person for the job, and stick with her from the beginning to the end. This shows commitment to winning.
If appropriate, the proposal leader should be the project/program manager. As the eventual project manager, she has a vested interest in winning. She knows that she will be on the hook for performing according to the promises she makes. This will make her work harder to make the proposal as complete as possible.
Once selected, the leader should be kept on the job, not pulled off to take care of some other important job. This happens all too often, and when it does, it disrupts the continuity of the effort. It also sends a strong signal to the rest of the team that, despite all the talk of winning, management doesn’t consider the proposal as important as the other job. This is a sure morale killer.
Finally, the proposal leader must be the glue that holds the effort together. She must be open to all ideas, not just her own. She has to understand that proposals are high-stress efforts, and she can reduce the stress by giving the writers specific direction from her if they are to produce sections that contribute to the overall strategy, rather than letting them figure it out on their own. She will know how to work with all levels of the organization responsible for getting the proposal out the door, from the technical team to upper management to the legal staff to the production coordinator.
Selecting this leader falls on management’s shoulders, and it means making hard choices. A person with these attributes is valuable in any organization, and it’s a great temptation to use her on multiple projects. But if the proposal is important enough, and it will be to at least one of your competitors in the running, then you’ll use her talents where you get the greatest return—on a winning proposal.
Your proposal can lose for a whole lot of reasons. Some are out of your control. Most proposers, however, carry their fates in their own hands; whether they win or lose depends in great part on how they conduct their proposal writing activities.
Over the years I have found that there are certain key elements in preparing winning proposals. Here are my top eight:
Open and sustain a dialog with the client. Establish early client contact to find out as much as you can about his needs and how you can help meet them. But make sure you don’t let it languish by not carrying on the dialog.
Listen to the client, and come up with possible solutions. Then go back and listen some more. The better the dialog, the more the client will view you as helping him solve his problem.
Show the client your ideas as they evolve. A client will always be more favorably inclined to a proposal that includes an approach he is already familiar with. In your on-going dialog with the client you need to be showing him your approach to resolving his problem, getting his feedback, and improving it. When he sees it in the proposal he will be familiar with it.
Make sound go/no-go decisions. Winning proposals require solid go/no-go decisions based on close scrutiny of facts about your client, your competition, and yourself. Don’t make go/no-go decisions based on gut instinct. You may win once in a while, but chances are good you’ll lose more than you win.
Differentiate yourself from your competitors. Here’s a fact: most firms in any given competition are equally capable of doing the work the client wants done. The winning firm will cast its approach in such a way as to create the perception that its approach is unique. You need to find ways to do this.
Identify your specific competitors early. If you know who your competitors are, you can identify their strengths with respect to this proposal opportunity, and then figure out ways you can neutralize them in your proposal. Once you have determined the competition’s strengths, come up with ways your firm matches or exceeds each perceived strength.
Call out the direct and specific benefits of your approach to the client. It’s not enough to stress the strengths of your approach or your project team. You must also point out in specific terms just how your strengths translate into direct benefits to the client. Make sure that these benefits are clear; this lets your proposal stand out above the rest of the competition.
Commit 100% to writing the proposal. If you want to win, you must commit yourself to the kind of effort it really takes to win. Dedicate the necessary people to the proposal, even if it means taking them off billable work. Get your subs involved from the beginning. And plan the effort from the start, to make sure everyone’s time is used wisely.
Get started early. The best way to win is to start early. If you wait until the last possible moment, you will probably lose. To put it another way, if you wait, don’t write the proposal. You can bet someone out there has got the jump on you.
Everybody I have ever talked to agrees that it’s important to do a lessons learned exercise after a proposal. Hardly anybody ever does. ”No time right now,” they say. “Too busy,” they say. “We’ll get to it later,” they say. And they don’t. And guess what? They go out and make the same mistakes on the next proposal.
I know doing a lessons learned exercise is easier said than done; I have to kick myself in gear sometimes to make room for it in my schedule. But a lessons learned session–a postmortem–is a key element of the proposal project for one simple reason; it helps you write better ones in the future.
I suggest you take one hour, tops, as soon after a proposal is completed as possible. In this session you look at the proposal itself–how it’s laid out, how well it sends the message, how easy it is to read. Plus, you should analyze the proposal preparation process you went through to identify what worked well, and what you need to improve on.
Who should attend? Not everyone involved with the proposal need attend the session. But the proposal manager needs to be there, and anyone else who played a major role in preparing the proposal. If you had a graphics developer involved, he or she should attend to comment on how well that part of the job went. Whoever wrote the management section ought to attend.
You may also want to invite key subs if you intend to use them in future proposals; you’ll want them to learn how to be more efficient as well.
The session should last no more than an hour. The following are some questions you can ask.
The Proposal Document
The Proposal Process
These aren’t all the questions, and some won’t apply to every proposal every time. But some will. And you can add more.
The point is, you should be asking questions like this after the proposal leaves your offices. Doing this is a way you can make significant changes—and improvements—to how you write proposals. And you ought to be doing something like this; your competition probably is.
The best way–the only way, really–to make sure your proposal is giving the client what he wants is to have it reviewed by an objective panel that have been briefed to think like the client. This type of review is often called a Red Team Review.
The idea is to assemble a group of people who will read your proposal from the client’s perspective. You will ask your reviewers to read your proposal as if they were evaluating it. This means that they will not be looking at the draft as friends-as someone who will say, “Oh, guess I see what they mean,” and give you the benefit of the doubt. Quite the contrary. Ideally, if they don’t get what you’re trying to say, they will say, “I do not see what you mean,” and they give your section a failing grade. That’s what the customer would do.
This review is arguably the most important in the entire cycle. In fact, if you do no other reviewing prior to this-if your staff is small if the schedule won’t allow it or if you just don’t see the need for this entire review process-you should leave time in the schedule for the Red Team review.
Who should be on a Red Team?
Pick at least three people to serve on the Red Team (if it’s a long proposal, the number could range to up to ten). Ideally, you will have as many reviewers as you have major sections of the proposal.
The people you select should be knowledgeable in the areas they are reviewing. If, for instance, you have a section on how you will design the HVAC system for a facility, you better have a person who understands HVAC systems for the type of facility you’re proposing to design.
Your reviewers should also have understanding of what the client wants. You should brief the Red Team before the review about what you think the client is looking for. That way the team can be looking to see if your proposal hits the right buttons.
In addition, they should be dedicated to spending the time it takes to give the proposal a thorough review. This is an extra-curricular activity; it takes time out of your team’s busy schedule, and the chances are good they will have to work after hours or on a weekend to conduct their review.
Finally, each person needs to be able to play hardball; you’re going to ask them to be very critical, to step on toes if necessary, and to pull no punches. A Red Team member who holds back honest and incisive criticism because of a fear of hurting someone’s feelings is not helping the effort.
When should the Red Team review occur?
The second draft is the best time to conduct the red team review. To get the most out of the review, the draft should be as fairly complete. The first draft is too loose and unfinished, and if you wait until the third (final) draft, you don’t have enough time to incorporate the Red Team’s input.
Yeah, yeah, now you’ll say, “We never even have enough time to do a third draft; the second draft is usually what goes to the client.” I hear that a lot. And here’s what I say:
Number 1: the client usually gives you enough time to do more than two drafts of a proposal; it’s just that you usually procrastinate long enough that you never give yourselves the time to do a third draft.
Number 2: If you don’t take the time to review the second draft, you will likely lose to the team that does. My experience tells me that winners review their proposals from the standpoint of the client; losers make excuses for not doing it.
What should the Red Team do during the review?
During the review, each member will evaluate his/her assigned sections (or the whole thing, as the case may be) for the following in order of importance:
1. Responsiveness to the evaluation criteria and other solicitation requirements.
2. Convincingness of the proposal, including technical accuracy, substantiation of claims and clear client benefits.
3. Clarity of the writing and the graphics.
During the review, the team members should do the following:
When you write a proposal you run the considerable risk of becoming so enamored with the elegance of your solution-both your technical solution to resolving the client’s need and your solution for presenting it in your proposal-that you grow less and less capable of being a good judge of the most important aspect of any proposal: Will the client feel so strongly that it meets his needs that he simply can not eliminate it from the competition?
What’s the most difficult part of writing for you?
Most people will answer. “Getting started.” This part of the process is the single biggest time-waster in the whole writing effort. Time spent pondering, time spent writing and running into dead ends, time spent cranking out words that end up being cut. Because you often don’t know where to start, you’re more likely to put off the writing until the last moment, which erodes the quality of what you do end up producing.
What’s the answer? Use section directions to manage the proposal content and give the writers a kick start. These section directions are just that—directions to the writers about exactly which topics they should include in their sections, which themes they need to stress, what kind of graphics and how many.
Who writes these directions? The Proposal Manager is in the best position to write these directions. This person is the one with the big picture. She knows the winning themes, the approach, the overall proposal outline. Now she has to sit down and give her writers their marching order.
Use section directions to manage your sub-contractors/ consultants. Section directions are also an excellent way to manage your sub-consultants. By telling your subs what you want in their sections you can manage their input, and when they submit their sections you’ll find you will have to do very little revising to bring their sections on track.
What do you include in section directions? Here’s a list of the basics to include section directions :
· The writer assigned to this section
· The section number and title
· The number of pages allocated for this section
· The number and kinds of figures allocated to this section
· The main message or theme of the section
· Key points to include (RFP requirements, win strategy points, specific benefits to the client)
The section directions can be as specific as you want, or as general. Remember, though, that the more general your directions, the more control over the content you are giving away to the individual writer. And the more you will have to edit later to make sure it fits with your vision of what the proposal should look like.
Section directions are terrific time-savers; they focus the writer immediately on what to include in the sections. This means less work later, when you are fighting the clock to get the proposal out the door.
Getting the technical people to write what I call “proposalese”-the language of proposals-is the Holy Grail that all marketing people seek. Unfortunately, there is no magic bullet here. However, I’ve found that there are some ways to help them along.
But first, we need to think about the technical person-the “subject matter expert”-and what drives her. I don’t want to make too many generalizations here, but I’ve found that most “technical” people have a difficult time writing “sales” documents because they firmly believe that what they are proposing-a solution to a problem-is valuable because it solves the problem. And if the problem is solved, the benefit is obvious-no more problem.
But, that’s not all the customer is looking for. Sure, the technical evaluator in the customer’s shop needs to see that the technical proposal writer fully understands the problem. But by also calling out the benefit of the solution, the proposal writer demonstrates that she knows what the technical evaluator thinks is valuable. The evaluator says, “Okay, they know what’s important to me.”
But there’s a more important consideration: the technical evaluator is not the only one evaluating the proposal. In fact, evaluation panels often include more non-technical readers than technical ones. And these people don’t often know the technology well enough to see the intrinsic benefit of the technical solution. These are the people the technical proposal writers really have to reach.
One way to get the technical people to focus on the sales aspect of the proposal is to hold a mini-training session at the proposal kick-off meeting. This should run no more than an hour or so, and should cover the basic principles of proposal writing. This session must include before and after examples of proposal sections-the before sections with just the features and the after sections that highlight the clear benefits along with the features.
Another great tool to use is what I call “section directions.” These are written by the proposal leader and give specific instructions about what details to include in the sections, and the main benefits that must be highlighted. These directions take a long time to prepare, but the time spent doing them pays off big time in the end by reducing the amount of rewriting.
Plus, I have found that the technical people love the section directions. We all know that the hardest part of writing is getting started. The section directions remove that major stumbling block.
Finally, you have to hammer at the features/ benefits connection whenever the opportunity arises. When you review the sections, write “what’s the benefit?” or “so what?” in the margin. If you talk with a writer in the hallway about her section, say, “Don’t forget benefits.” At the various proposal meetings, say, “What’s the benefit of doing it that way?”
The point is that the writers have to be constantly thinking benefits, benefits, benefits, and they need reinforcement.
As I said, there’s no magic bullet to getting the tech staff to concentrate on benefits. You just have to keep reminding them. And while they may get sick of hearing it, the proposal sections they write will be better for it.
The truth is that some projects let out for “competitive” proposals are really sole source jobs; the client has a specific contractor or consultant in mind and is just going through the motions. The question is, How do you get your firm to be in that position?
One answer to this is to prepare what I call a “White Paper.” This is a document written when you first get wind of a potential job—the earlier in the procurement cycle the better.
What goes into a White Paper? Here are the four basic elements:
Some Tips for Writing the White Paper
Statement of the Problem. This is a short discussion of your understanding of the client’s problem. It’s based on your marketing intelligence; you have found out something about what the client wants to have done, and here you tell him/her what you think the problem is. It’s extremely important not to misrepresent yourself: you are not trying to say, “You may think that x is the problem, when in fact y is really the problem.”
In other words, don’t patronize. Simply state the problem as best you can from the client’s point of view. This will have two immediate effects. In the first place, by giving a clear representation of the problem you establish yourself (or your firm) as an expert in the field. In the
second place, and as important, the client will perceive you as being sympathetic to his/her needs. You will have established a climate of good will.
Critical Issues. In the next four or five paragraphs, identify the critical issues that must be addressed in order to successfully resolve the problem. Every solution has potential obstacles, or “showstoppers.” These showstoppers may be technical; the solution requires a level of technical understanding that only experts (like you) understand.
There may be schedule obstacles that lie in wait. Or maybe political land mines lurk beneath the surface. Whatever they are, here is where you identify them. But don’t stop there. Now you need to explain how you overcome those obstacles. If it’s a technical hurdle, what has your firm done on similar projects to leap it? How have you used your knowledge of ticklish political implications to implement a similar solution?
By identifying critical issues and then explaining how to resolve them, you show the depth of your experience. And you also educate the client; now he/she knows more
about the problem than they originally thought.
Project Approach that Resolves the Issues. Once you have brought the issues to light and explained how they are resolved, you can suggest a project approach that best puts your solutions to work. This is really nothing more than a general scope of work. You might start by saying “On projects similar to this, we have addressed these issues by structuring the program in four tasks. . .” Then you go on and discuss the tasks, devoting no more than a paragraph or two apiece. You may, if you want, include typical deliverables of each task, and how long each task usually takes.
This is really the payoff section. If all goes well–and it certainly can–this section can contain the seed of the client’s eventual Scope of Work.
Suggested Timeline. Finally, you want to include a rough estimate of how long this sort of project would take. It’s especially important to include a timeline if scheduling is one of your critical issues. How long should each task take? Which tasks are linear? Which are parallel? All the while, you should be reminding them of your experience with these kinds of projects.
White Papers are short–no more than three pages–and most effective when written in a helpful tone. But remember that this is a marketing document, however much it sounds like you’re just trying to help out. In the end, a well-crafted White Paper is successful if it sets up the climate for an eventual solution, and that solution is yours.
And who knows–maybe the next RFP you read may be wired for you.
Some Tips for Writing the White Paper
Scheduling reviews in advance gives you enough time to remedy errors and deficiencies; no last minute "patches." We'll get the right people reviewing the document, looking for the right things,
Looks aren't everything, but first impressions can mean the difference in having your client pick up your proposal versus one submitted by your competitor.
You want the client to be impressed with your work.We live in the information age where customers expect proposals to be submitted "yesterday".
Having reusable material to draw upon could be the time saver that you need in order to meet your customer's ever increasing demandsIf you need a Proposal Manager for help with proposal writing and an Editor for another we can provide the services you need when you need it, nothing more nothing less.
Or, how about using our document management system to control yourWe will conduct strategy sessions to identify the customer's hidden "hot buttons" and determine what you will offer that will resolve them.
This will allow you to tell your story soThey must be guided by steady hands at the helm, by people with experience working under pressure.