Chapter 1: The Challenges You Face

Overview

Suppose you're a sales professional representing a vendor of specialized computer systems. You make a powerful presentation to representatives of a potential client, and you can tell it's gone beautifully. They're clearly impressed. They're flashing all kinds of buying signals, asking questions, focusing on their particular concerns. Then the chief decision maker says, "Well, this looks very promising. Why don't you put together a proposal for us that covers what we've talked about, the pricing issues, and some kind of basic delivery and installation schedule, and then we'll go from there. Okay?"

No problem, right?

Or suppose you represent a company that specializes in reducing energy consumption in large buildings. You're going through your e-mail one morning and come across a message announcing a competitive bid to retro-fit an entire school district! You open the attached RFP document and glance through it. You can see that it's perfect for you. In fact, this is a job you really want. You can handle it well. You can make money on it and deliver a big ROI for the school district. All you have to do is respond to the attached 125-page Request for Proposal and create a convincing argument as to why you're the right choice.

No problem, right?

One more: You're a partner in a mid-size accounting firm. You've managed to grow and develop a solid client base in your region by personally selling to small and medium-size businesses. But now you want to win some larger projects, take on bigger clients, perform complex audits, move into general business consulting, and generally move the level of the firm's activity up a notch or two. What that means, of course, is that now you'll be competing for jobs against other firms like your own and sometimes against the big, international firms. And instead of face-to-face selling and relationship building, you'll be competing through your proposals.

No problem, right?

Chances are, it is a problem. If you're like most people, you find writing proposals a big challenge.

Some of the very best account executives, program managers, engineers, designers, consultants, and business owners freeze up when they get back to their desks and have to put what they know and what they're recommending on paper. These are people who are capable of making outstanding presentations face to face and who can manage a complex program with exceptional skill. But when it comes to writing a proposal, they don't know how to begin. They don't know how to organize their information and ideas. They aren't sure of the format to use, the pattern to follow, or the details to include.

What's worse, if you're like most professionals, you probably hate writing in general and proposals in particular. That's too bad, because it's hard to do something well if you hate it.

Recently I was speaking at an international conference sponsored by Microsoft. The attendees were integrators, developers, and resellers from all over North and South America and Europe. More than eight hundred people attended my session, so I thought it was a great opportunity to do some informal polling. I asked them a question I've asked many other groups over the years.

"How many of you honestly enjoy writing proposals?" I asked.

From that group of over eight hundred attendees, fewer than twenty hands went up! And that response is fairly typical. Most people—95 percent or more—do not like proposal writing.

Maybe that's why they've figured out clever ways to escape the job.

The most popular technique involves cloning. Proposal cloning. Have you ever seen a salesperson stride into the office and ask, "Who has a proposal I can use?" He or she grabs an electronic copy of somebody else's proposal, does a global find/replace to change the former client's name to that of the new prospect, and then fires it off. The fact that the original proposal was to the Southern Regional Medical Center and the new proposal is to Oscar's Cigar Shop doesn't seem to matter. Of course, the client is a little confused when it sees itself referred to as the region's leading cancer specialist, but that's a minor detail.

You and I have both seen the consequences of proposal cloning, of cutting and pasting old boilerplate together. The proposal doesn't flow. It doesn't really address what the customer cares about. It may even contain embarrassing errors. I've even seen proposals that had the wrong client's name in the cover letter!

Recently, I was called by the president of one of the largest direct mail marketing firms in the country. He wanted some advice on how to turn a bad situation around.

"We just responded to an RFP from Microsoft," he said. "We worked like crazy people, cutting and pasting from previous proposals to make sure we gave them a complete response, and then sent it overnight to Redmond. A couple of days later I called the manager there who was the primary decision maker and asked her how our proposal looked. She said it was a little early to say, but she could offer two observations. First of all, she said, our proposal was so long that no one had time to actually read the whole thing yet. And then she said, 'The second thing is, we don't call ourselves Oracle.' "

I talked with the president for over an hour, and we came up with a few ideas for salvaging the situation, but I truthfully doubt the opportunity could be saved. Putting the wrong client's name in the proposal is bad enough, even though everybody has probably done it. But putting in the name of Microsoft's archenemy is probably the kiss of death.

Another escape technique that people sometimes use is the "data dump" approach to proposal writing. The author gathers up all the internal marketing documentation, product slicks, case studies, white papers, technical specifications, and anything else not clearly labeled "proprietary," forms it into a neat stack, drills three holes along the left-hand margin, and puts it all into a binder. The basic attitude behind this approach is "Here's a bunch of stuff. I'm sure something in here will convince you to buy from us. Just keep looking until you find it."

For obvious reasons, this approach yields very little in terms of positive impact. Customers don't want bulk. They don't want irrelevant detail. And they don't want to do more work than is strictly necessary to understand your proposal.

Finally, and perhaps most damaging of all, is the "graveyard" technique some salespeople use to bury opportunities that will require too much work. They hide the deals that will require a complex proposal or bid response. If they can make their quota with easier sales and smaller deals, they think, where's the harm?

While doing a consulting engagement with one of the most successful sales training organizations in the United States, I had the opportunity to interview several of the firm's star producers about how they handled proposals and RFP responses. Noses wrinkled. Lips lifted in sneers.

"I avoid them," one woman said. "Trying to get anybody to help on a big RFP is impossible. Announcing you have to respond to an RFP is like turning on the lights in a dark room and watching the cockroaches scatter."

They all preferred to sell a lot of small deals rather than a single million-dollar deal that involved a complex RFP response. One of them admitted that he hadn't bothered to go after a seven-figure contract with a major high-tech firm because the RFP was too complicated. What's more, he had buried the same deal two years in a row!

I suspect that sales managers would be stunned to learn how many deals their own salespeople manage to bury in the same way for the same reason.

If you can close business without writing a proposal, you should do so. The fact is, writing a proposal can be a lot of work. Sometimes the task involves tons of annoying details that you may find tiresome. But proposal writing can be extremely rewarding, too, both professionally and financially. To create a winning proposal, you have to give your best effort. You need to combine your business savvy, your psychological insights, your communication skill, and your creativity, all in one package. When does a mere memo or e-mail message allow you to do so much? And how often are the stakes so high?

Your proposal may be the only means you have of communicating to the highest levels of your customer's organization. When you write a proposal, you never know where it may end up. Will it be read by the manager to whom it was addressed? By a committee of evaluators? By the CEO of the corporation? Your proposal is your surrogate, representing your ideas, your products and services, and your company to these people. By creating a powerful proposal, you create a better impression. You cast a larger shadow.

So learning how to write a great proposal can be one of the most important business skills you ever acquire. It will enable you to communicate your solutions effectively and persuasively to your customers, your colleagues, and your own management. In doing so, you'll be meeting their needs for information and insight while achieving your own goals.

Besides, writing a proposal is often the most truly professional thing you do.