What a lovely picture this is, taken by Flickr user Thomas Hawk.

It seems bizarre to me that traveling around, giving speeches about and writing books on business has somehow become a career in and of itself. Nevertheless, Tom Sant, professional business-advice-giver, delivers some excellent tips on selling to the customer in his book, “Persuasive Business Proposals: Writing to Win More Customers, Clients and Contracts.” He relies on personality types to ensure that the proposal in question really is catered to the audience.

The personality types in he makes use of are taken from the well-respected Meyers Briggs personality test, which assesses how people “perceive the world and make decisions.” They are:

Analytical: detail oriented folks, who value accuracy and having access to lots of data and respond to patience and knowledge, but not vague promises.

Pragmatic: these are bottom-line driven people who value brevity and respond to the ideas of action, impact and delivery rather than emotional appeals.

Consensus Seeker: these guys are very much others-focused, value feelings and morals and do not respond to risk or pressure, but rather, support and testimonials.

Visionary: long-term view oriented individuals, who are fueled by big thinking and respond to energy and break-through ideas rather than routine or detail.

Few clients will ever fit perfectly into these categories, which is why it is especially important to take careful note of the customer you are working with. How do they respond to conversation? How do they decorate their office? How do they talk? These all contain clues about their decision making. Always keep in mind that each client is unique. It isn’t enough to have the right information, it also needs to be delivered in the right way.

A true business-person is also a people-person.

What a lovely photo that Flicker user adonis hunter / ahptical provides us with.

Allow me to describe a scene from the movie Elf. Elf is completely new to civilization as we know it. He’s just skipping merrily down the street when he spots a sign on a window for “The World’s Best Cup of Coffee”. He runs into the shop and enthusiastically shouts “CONGRATULATIONS!” to everyone for the amazing achievement. In return, he receives a full serving of blank stares. You can check the clip out here.

This makes an excellent point. In sales and proposal writing, it’s easy to get caught up in saying the usual things rather than the accurate things. Customers don’t really buy that crap. When was the last time you really believed that place had the top of the line _____ or the best _____ on this side of the hemisphere?

In celebration of making accurate, fresh points, here’s a list of ten phrases to keep out of your proposal:

1. Top quality
2. Cutting edge
3. Customer first
4. Comprehensive solutions
5. State-of-the-art
6. We are commited…
7. Our mission is to…
8. Trustworthy
9. The right choice
10. We will strive/We hope/We intend

Instead of using tired cliches, focus on stating what you DO do and giving concise examples of the amazing work you’re capable of producing.

Source: CapturePlanning.com.

Many thanks to the feisty Flickr user Anant N S (www.thelensor.tumblr.com) for this great picture.

I’m talking about the military tactic, not the video game. Its also known as counterattack or in debate, the counterpoint, and surprisingly can be an important technique to master when it comes to proposal writing.

To sum it up, a counterstrike is a response to an attack. There are many ways to respond to criticism in the sales world, the most popular of which seems to be the well-known “RUN-AND-HIDE!!!” technique. This entails the company becoming aware that their product or service has a weakness and doing everything they can to cover that up.

That technique is all well and good, but as we all know, eventually the person hiding gets caught. And by that time, the person who had to run all around looking for them is nothing short of furious. Enter counterstrike.

This technique enables the company to admit to a certain fault in the proposal; to come clean. But, never let your guard down. This is the moment for battle. Anticipate their offense: What arguments could my client think up to convince herself not to buy my product? Now, throw up the defense (counter): Break down the argument with facts. The final blow (strike): Provide another brilliant example of why your products or service rocks. And bam, the reader is blown away.

Flickr user Audringje is a saint for graciously providing this photo.

So, you want to be that dude in the sweet hat, eh? Well, you’ll have to be quick on your feet if you want to write a better business proposal. Any successful piece of writing requires engaging in a balancing act between author and audience.

If you don’t sell yourself enough there is nothing to buy. But, if you don’t sell to your audience enough there’s nothing they would want to buy.  “To” is italicized for a reason. You never want to sell at the audience, but rather cater to them.

Two very important things to remember when selling to the audience:

1. It’s very likely that the person reading your proposal has 100 better things to do with his or her time and doesn’t even enjoy reading proposals in the first place.

2. However, this person really wants your proposal to be the winning one. If they didn’t have hope that yours would be worth their time, then they wouldn’t be reading it.

Keeping these things in mind here are 3 tips:

A. Backwards essay: don’t save the best for last. Your reader is short on time, so put the most important, most compelling information about you service at the beginning and work down from there. Remember, the audience wants your proposal to be The One, so give them what they want from the start and show them that you have what it takes to solve their problems.

B. Keep is short: Filling up pages with b.s. is also another essay technique that I don’t recommend employing in a proposal. The longer a proposal is, the less likely someone is to read through it. So, identify what the reader needs to know, toss out the rest and make these need-know-points easily accessable for the audience.

C. Jargon watch: always keep your audience in the back of your mind when choosing your vocab. Do they know a whole heck of a lot about this subject? Great, use those fancy words. Are they noobs? Keep your writing elementary, then, my dear Watson.

Follow these tips and in no time your proposals will be looking as suave and gentlemanly as our good friend up there.

Flickr user dklimke is a real pal and courteously provided this image.

…a regular smelling marketing plan into a plan that smells like POWER? If you haven’t seen the outrageous Old Spice commercials yet, they are a viral hit; they are over the top and at times laugh out loud funny, but this did not happen by accident.

Former editor-in-chief of  Adweek, Brandweek and Mediaweek, Craig Reiss lays out five steps that rejuvenated Old Spice’s brand image and sales, which include creating a persona, seeding social networks, engaging the influencers, personalizing the responses and keeping the communication short and sweet. These tips are great for adding a little *ahem* spice to both your ads and social media output. The full text of his insightful article is available here at Entrepreneur.com.

Oh snap. Thank you to Flickr user Life as Art for the photo.

This is not the latest anti-sport. Here’s a snippet of the official description from Rohit Bhargava’s Influential Marketing Blog:

“HateSurfing” is a term that describes the act of going online specifically to read as many negative comments, blog posts, tweets and messages as possible to generate insights that can help you run your business better.”

I love the idea of taking the customer’s complaints into serious consideration in order to improve their experience. A surprisingly positive outcome for something that sounds distinctly negative. Check out his full article here.

Special thanks go to Flickr user snlsn for the background photo.

…as long as you keep you perspective balanced.

Diligence is essential. The stats vary a little bit from place to place, but the general consensus seems to be that most sales (meaning a whopping 80%) are made after the 5th point of contact. But, to point out how truly interesting this information is, you have to take a look at how salespeople make their calls. Basically half, 48%, only call one time. 12% of folks only call three times. But then there’s the 10% who doesn’t give up and these guys are the ones who make 80% of sales. In other words, these are the people making 5 or more points of contact with the client.

The reason I mention keeping a balanced perspective is because getting ran off by a secretary before you have a chance to make meaningful conversation with someone by no means counts as a “point of contact” or a “call”. If you are pouring out your energy making as many calls as possible, but seeing no sign of life on the other end of the line, then you may be beating your head against a wall. Reassess your strategy and attack the problem from a more effective angle. Here your persistence will be valuable.

FEBRUARY 1. 2. 2012
LOS ANGELES CONVENTION CENTER
LOS ANGELES, USA

THE TRADE SHOW FOR LIVE EVENT PRODUCTION & MANAGEMENT

Come by and see all the features that Paperless Proposal has to offer to the event industry at booth 2056.  Imagine your proposal brought to life with audio and video in addition to your current print material all available online!  After your prospects view their proposal online you can see what they viewed and how long they looked at it for and tailor your sales pitch to match their interests.  Once your prospect is ready to sign they can even approve the proposal online!

We are excited to announce that we will be at the Catersource Conference & Tradeshow Feb 26-29 at Caesars Palace Las Vegas.

Come by and see all the features that Paperless Proposal has to offer to the catering industry at booth 2126.  Imagine your proposal brought to life with audio and video in addition to your current print material all available online!  After your prospects view their proposal online you can see what they viewed and how long they looked at it for and tailor your sales pitch to match their interests.  Once your prospect is ready to sign they can even approve the proposal online!

So what do we end up with? We end up with a document that does not reflect the company brand, usually does not have the most up-to-date material and is not customized enough to feel personal to the client. All that and the rep dreaded writing the proposal the whole time.

So what can we do about it?

Differentiate Your Proposal

Customize Your Proposal

Keep your most customized information at the top of the proposal and let the generic information such as company history and other static pieces come later so that when a prospect reads your proposal their solution is the first thing in the proposal and the backup information is there for them later if they wish to read it. If you put all the static pieces up front then you run the risk of them seeing the fluff and skipping to the pricing where they know there is meat. Even in the “fluff” portions should at least be customized with the clients name and logo where appropriate if you have a templating system.

Include Personal Letters

We all know we should use cover letters. Use this as more to talk about your meetings with them and mention their pain points up front and that you have the solution.

Do Something Really Different

Everyone sends a PDF or a bound proposal. Make your proposal stand out. Include video if possible from people they have met, or introduce through video the staff that will be interacting with them. They will be likely to watch it if it is recorded just for them. Don’t go overboard. A decent video from your webcam goes a long way.

Keep It Simple for Reps

Make It Easy To Find And Use Information From Marketing Library

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If they have to search the network drives every time to find pieces to use in their proposal they either will not do it, or possible use out of date pieces. Use a method where the information is organized and the most up-to-date information is always available to them.

Give Them A Pre-built Proposal Structure

Don’t let the “wing it.” Give them pre-built proposal templates that already have all the standard information in them. Then give them an easy way to really personalize it. This not only ensures your branding is consistent over all your reps, but makes their life a lot easier.

Don’t Make Them Track Twice

Use a system that as they create a proposal the dollar value, sales stage, and close date are tracked so they really pay attention to their proposal and do not have to track a separate system or spreadsheet.

Use Your Proposal As A Tool

Know When Your Proposal Was Read

If you can use an online system to know when your prospect opened your proposal then you will be miles ahead of making that follow up call right when the proposal information is fresh in their head and most willing to talk with you.

Know What They Read

If you know what sections of your proposal they cared about when you make the follow up call you can sell to their interests as well as let them know why the part of the solution they didn’t read was important and possibly a key piece that they have not considered. This may give you an advantage when you show them why that piece is necessary and it is not in your competitors proposals.

Follow Up

Make sure they received it and make sure they read it. Follow up is the most key element in sales. Win by attrition. It is unbelievable how many people are in sales and cannot consistently follow up with their prospects. The proposal is not the end it is just a step towards the close.

Conclusion

The proposal is a tool to convey how much you understand the client’s needs and wants. It also is a tool that should convey your brand. Make it easy for your reps to have the brand nailed from the get go, and then give them tools to help them REALLY personalize a proposal to a prospect and stand out.