The Results Consultancy

Write On

Published 1 May in Tax Adviser Magazine
Written by John Timperley, The Results Consultancy

I recently met up with an old friend – he’s a tax adviser with a major UK accountancy firm and we’ve known each other for years. He seemed a little down and I naturally enquired why this was. His answer was not an unfamiliar one. He had a business proposal to write – one which, if it was successful, would bring his firm impressive levels of fee-income. He’d built a good relationship with the prospective client, but had now reached the point where he needed to commit his thoughts and solutions to paper.

‘But I hate writing’, he moaned. ‘I’m better at talking through a solution rather than writing it down. I usually end up putting far too much information in and creating something that I’d be bored reading – let alone a client’.

I reassured my friend that, in my experience, you don’t have to be a Dan Brown, a JK Rowling or a similar writing ‘natural’ to write winning business proposals. While there is a real skill involved, it can be learned. In fact, if you know how to structure a winning document and write in a style that your readers will find enjoyable, you’ll reap the rewards. Here’s how some of the top business winners structure their proposals.

Step 1 - Identify the situation
They invariably start by summarising the client’s present problem or opportunity. By doing this, they immediately demonstrate their understanding of the client’s business and their authority on the subject. A word of warning, though. Try to be concise in how you summarise and avoid simply repeating verbatim everything the client has told you from your fact-finding discussions. Clients are not interested in this; instead they want to see how you summarise and evaluate the key issues facing them. They are looking for an objective viewpoint.

Step 2 – What results does the client want?
At this point in their proposal, the great business winners invariably communicate their understanding of the outcomes the client is looking for, the desired objectives or targets. This gives them the opportunity to outline what results the clients will get from solving the problem or issue they are facing. Some also choose to suggest what would happen if the client kept the status quo and did nothing.

What this does is to paint a picture (albeit in words) of the end-game and what the solution is leading to. As you have probably found yourself, with the proliferation of media and millions of messages all around us, our attention span is shortening every year. It is therefore important to signpost key points early on in your proposal to keep the reader interested and engaged.

Step 3 – How you can help
This is where you can explain why this client should choose you and your firm. In doing so, try to set out a number of options and recommend specifically what your contact and the other decision makers should do. To make your suggestions really powerful, do as the great business winners do, and make sure they link back to the client’s specific needs and the results they want.

Step 4 – Highlight the benefits of taking action now
Next it’s time to explain what’s in it for the client by using you. What difference will this project (and working with you) make to them?

Here you are highlighting the benefits. A benefit is something valuable that the client gains from a specific action, piece of advice etc. Try stating your key points with the addition of ‘which means that...’. This phrase helps you to explain what the client will gain from each of them. And when you’ve highlighted the benefits, try what one of my tax adviser clients calls the ‘so what’ test. She asks herself to see if ‘so what?’ will be the likely reaction of the client to each benefit she’s listed. If it is, she then goes back and rewords the benefits to make them more relevant and tangible to the client.

Step 5 – Provide the proof
Here’s where you need to provide hard evidence that you and your firm can deliver on your promises, and the client can trust your advice. It’s the section where you demonstrate your credibility, competence and compatibility as a tax adviser. Consider including permutations of these:

• pricing and cost details
• technical specifications
• project plans
• budgets
• delivery dates and milestones
• key performance indicators
• references
• case studies
• client lists and satisfaction studies
• The choice is yours – but just make sure anything you include passes the ‘so what’ test.

Summary
You don’t have to be a natural writer to write winning proposals, but you can win more often by making your documents as engaging and relevant to the client as possible. The top business winners think very carefully how they structure their proposals. They limit the points they want to make and pick the best – the ones of greatest importance for their readers. Their aim is to make sure their key messages stand out. As one experienced proposal writer (and winner) told me recently:

‘We run an unusual ‘slide rule’ over our draft documents. We ask “is this interesting to the client?” If in any doubt, we leave it out. It’s a good way to make sure that what we write is focused on what they want to hear.’

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