Don't keep the prospect bored waiting for your proposal

Two hours. That's right. Two hours is your deadline to put the requested proposal in your prospect's email inbox.

You have finished the call or meeting and the prospect has requested the proposal.

You open the proposal template, adapt some things and submit. This should take no more than 2 hours.

"Ah, but my proposals are personalised."

Yes, they are. 10% custom? 20%? You will need a maximum of 15 minutes, 30 minutes. And that's for a good customisation.

"But I depend on other departments to complete tender deadlines and prices."

Then talk to these departments to get one of the following:

1. They give you the information within 1 hour of your application.
2. They give you a table with ranges (of deadlines and prices)
3. They give you scope to arbitrate for their inputs.

"I don't have templates and have to start from scratch every time."

Well, zero more or less. You at least take another "save as" proposal and adapt it, right?

Check out these tips:

1. Get a complete proposal with all the possibilities of services and prices.
2. All other non-customisable text and images should also be included.
3. Save about 10 to 15 copies, created from this template.
4. Save in a folder "proposals_in_white".
5. Once you finish a call or meeting that demands the proposal, you use one of these and just fill in the custom part and discard the excesses.

"I need to research before I put the proposal together. And that takes time."

Search then. But do it immediately. The prospect says, "OK then, can you send me a proposal with x and y that we talk about?" You then immediately start the research and then prepare the rest of the proposal. Keep the 2 hours as your maximum deadline.

Is all this easy? No.

Is it worth doing? Very much so.

Think that your chances of being better considered increase as you reduce your turnaround time: of follow ups, of proposals, of responses and everything else that keeps your prospect waiting.

And the proposal is the most sensitive part of the whole conversion process. It contains deadlines, values, obligations.

The faster your output, the more prepared to serve you will appear to your prospect.

He will get the (justified) feeling that he is dealing with professionals in the field. And with that, his chances increase exponentially.

Key tactic: Set an additional 30 minutes after your call/meeting to prepare the proposal.

Example: You have a 30 minute qualification call at 10am. You then lock in your schedule from 10-11am: half an hour for the call plus half an hour for you to prepare the proposal (if that much).

Problem: You went to a meeting. You left with the promise of sending a proposal. You hit traffic and you're tired. You just can't think about anything. Let alone send a proposal, which needs some fancy work. You promise to do it later or early the next day. And you know the end of the story: 10 days go by and you send the proposal with an apology for the delay.

Solution: It doesn't (realistically). At least this article will leave you feeling a little guiltier about the late delivery of proposals and you'll be able to organise yourself by prioritising this issue and thus decrease this deadline.

And there are still remnants of the following thoughts:

If I deliver the proposal quickly then it will look like I "copied and pasted" and have nothing personalised and this will reduce my chances of conversion.

If I take 5 days (more or less) it will seem that the proposal was the result of more time-consuming studies and research, that we studied the client's briefing and that several people were involved in order to produce this (very particular) proposal for the client. And all this only adds value to the proposal through your perception that it was a lot of work to prepare it.

Both beliefs are pure nonsense. And I give you reason if you were irritated by my arrogance. But let's stick to the arguments.

If you really copy and paste and don't personalise the brief/solution, then your proposal will have no value, even if you deliver in 2 days or 20 days or 20 minutes.

And nowadays, things have changed. People don't have time anymore and they don't give a damn about the issue delay charm because "you know... we're too big and we have too many departments looking at your proposal." What the prospect wants is a good, credible solution to their problem. And he wants it as soon as possible.

And the last one, "I like to take my proposals personally." Ok, so. If you can afford that luxury and if you convert enough with 5 to 10 proposals a month, fine!

But in overwhelmingly B2B, to make the numbers game in times of low conversion you need to hammer your segment with dozens of well-qualified proposals.

How much does your prospect value your presence when presenting your proposal? A lot, maybe. But can you run your numbers on 10 proposals delivered face-to-face per month?

So.

We will issue proposals within 2 hours of your request. We'll email them to you and schedule a feedback call. Then you schedule the face-to-face meeting if needed (hardly anyone cares about that anymore these days, trust me).

Is your business different? I respect that. Disregard this article. It will all seem silly. Otherwise, try it out and tell me in 30-60 days if it has noticeably improved your conversion or not.

Good sales and with many good/qualified offers