Laura’s Winning Ideas

Welcome to the March 27, 2007 edition of business proposal carnival. This monthly post is a Carnival. What’s a carnival? Well, it’s an open invitation to Bloggers, to submit posts from their sites. I look for posts which might be of interest to those of us who work to win proposals.

Business Development

John presents
>Top 10 Indicators that You Need Help in Your Business posted at
>OhCash.com, saying, “There will come a point when you’ll “just know” that you’ll need help in your business, whether that’s an in-person employee or two, or a virtual assistant/online business manager or other type of independent contractor.”

Strategy

CA presents
>#1 – Issues in Strategy Implementation posted at
>Strategy, marketing and project management consulting services for small business: IQI Strategic Management, Inc., saying, “The articles series looks at some of the challenges faced while implementing strategy”

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of business proposal carnival using our carnival submission form.
Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Technorati tags:

business proposal carnival, blog carnival.

I’ve been getting more grumpy about email that slows me down when I’ve got an inbox overflowing. If you are inclined to send mass messages, or even just routine messages, heed these gripes. Today it’s just me whining, tomorrow it may be your client.

These gripes and examples are all from just today’s email.

1) Color banners at the top of the message.

These prevent me from seeing anything in my preview window. It is annoying to have to scroll down to preview the text. I’ll do it a few times, but then I’m outta’ here!

2) HTML messages

For security reasons, I don’t accept HTML messages. I’m not alone. If you want to send HTML, be sure to offer a text-only version. If you can’t manage this, at least preview your message format on a text-only screen.

3) Layouts that blow up in a text-only message

If you send out regular correspondence, you would think you’d check this to see what we receive from you.

This message arrived in a condition that would be a challenge to piece together the message. Lucky for me, I don’t care enought to do that and just deleted it instead.

4) Subject lines that are meaningless

Everyone is busy. We must priortize which messages get answered first. It’s great when the subject line allows me to know how to priortize your message. Folks who can’t illuminate me in the subject line wait until I answer the better messages.

5) Do you check your email to be sure it reads correctly on a Blackberry? You just need to do this once and you’ll understand whether you can be understood in that medium. </gripe></whine>

Last week was the interactive conference in Austin, SXSW and I eavesdropped on one of the sessions from my office in Wisconsin.

I was surprised at the fidelity. I could easily hear everything going on, and the transmission was easy and free.

Here’s how it worked. My friend, Karen Kreps was attending the conference and offered to dial us in to any of the sessions she attended.

I picked one out and sent her an email. Then, at the appointed hour, I sat at my desk and logged-on to Skype.

Skype is a VOIP service. It is free and can be downloaded from their website. Most folks use Skype for free long distance calls, computer to computer. It has especially excellent fidelity, so I enjoy using it for long conversations because it sounds just like you are in the same room. (You can also pay a fee to use Skype between phones)

I sent Karen an instant message to let her know I was ready.

She had her laptop computer with her, and used the WiFi connection in the convention center to login to the internet. She’d experimented a bit on the previous sessions. The best results were had by plugging in her AC-28 headset (two earphones with attached mike).

“I had the mike plugged into the mike jack and the headphones jack into the headphone jack (otherwise, my speakers would pick up any sounds coming from the person calling in on Skype). When someone wanted to listen in, I could Skype them so they would pick up the sound via the headset mic and we could communicate via skype (instant messaging).”

Karen Kreps is President and Main Muse of Net Ingenuity, an Internet strategy and content consultancy.

This experiment gives me all kinds of ideas.

• Would it help to add in a listener at a convention you are attending?
• Maybe a client would be especially interested in one of the presentations?
• How about giving someone back at the office the chance to hear your Vice President giving a speech at a conference?

This also gives me a word of caution about your proposal meetings. It might be a good idea to leave laptops out of the room during sensitive meetings.

Klaus Christian Hofer presented his class, Applied Psychology for Technical Communicators, this week and I was in attendance to glean nuggets we can use to win proposals.

Tactical Elements

Do you use lists correctly?

• Bullets are for lists without indicating priority nor hierarchy
• dogs
• cats
• pigs

1. Numbered lists are perceived as stronger and more mandatory
2. Insert screw A in tab B
3. Tighten screw A to 5 lbs of torque

1) And you can soften and make a hierarchical list more optional with this style.
2) Stir in one cup nuts before pouring batter into pan
3) Brownies are done when still tender. Best not to test with toothpick.

Writing Strategy

Klaus advises that we should begin by writing to express ourselves, and then edit to communicate to others. Or rather:

1. Write to get your ideas out
2. Edit your writing to make it clear and understandable to others

Themes

I learned that Applied Psychology academicians have their own description of why Themes work.

The brain uses both hemispheres to process information. If your proposal is technical and dry, the “margin of perception” will be wide open for the right hemisphere to play around, while the left hemisphere is studying your proposal.

Ergo, the reader will “day-dream” to add a creative spin to your material. Depending on what that “day-dream” is about, this may take away from your intended message.

In my own opinion, if you use a strong theme, you are offering the right hemisphere something to play with, and I think you’ll be more likely to “tatoo” your message on the brain of the reader.

There was a lot of good stuff here, and to take full advantage, you should look for an opportunity to sit in one of his sessions yourself. His website is www.klaushofer.ca