Laying a Solid Foundation

Winning proposals have their roots in good sales and marketing. I have never believed that a proposal by itself was likely to win business if there was no prior relationship, no effective positioning or branding, no information gathering to provide insight into the opportunity. As a result, there are numerous pre-proposal activities that must be carried out long before you begin to work on the proposal.

However, sometimes you will have an RFP thrown on your desk, or a salesperson will call up and say, "Can you put together sort of a standard proposal for me?" Naturally, these are always terrific opportunities, can't miss, gotta go for it, just do the proposal and the rest will be easy.

Right. In my experience and based on research we have conducted, I can tell you that you're almost surely wasting your time. If there is no prior relationship, if the buyer doesn't recognize you, if your sales team has no knowledge or insight about the opportunity, your chances of writing a winning proposal are roughly the same as winning the Super Lotto. It happens. It just isn't going to happen to you.

Suppose you have to write the proposal anyway. In that case, you need to scramble as quickly as you can to acquire any information and insight you can grab. You can get data—factual information—from public sources. Ideally, you can supplement that with insight—the kind of information an insider possesses. It's the combination of data and insight that will give you a well-rounded understanding of the client and opportunity.

Data is usually easier to acquire than insight, so it makes sense to work first on acquiring the data. Where should you look? Start with the client's Web site. Type their name into some search engines. Look for press releases and newspaper articles. If they are publicly traded, you should be able to access their annual reports, 10-K documents, and other reports. You may be able to obtain press kits, executive bios, even marketing brochures and trade show materials if you have enough lead time.

And what are you looking for? Insight into the issues facing the firm or agency, their financial status, their objectives, the primary customer base they serve, who their chief competitors are, what kinds of values they revere in their corporate culture, the major initiatives they have launched during the past year or so, their basic organizational structure, recent events or developments among their competitors. That will do for a start.