How to Create Great Proposal Themes Part 2: Features and Benefits
By Chris Simmons, founder and principal member of Rainmakerz Consulting
In Part 1 of this series we explored the definition of a theme and the benefits of theme development in telling a compelling proposal story that scores well with evaluators. Part 2 takes a closer look at the two primary components of winning proposal themes: features and benefits.
The development of proposal features and benefits is a key part of solution development and the critical first step in developing proposal themes. Most proposal teams use established methods and templates including storyboards, module plans, work packages, or some other form of pre-draft deliverable to provide a process and structure for feature and benefit development.
However, despite providing proposal teams with what might appear to be clear feature and benefit definitions, directions, and examples, many writers and subject matter experts ignore them completely or simply don’t understand what is required. At best, features are listed as benefits (and vice versa). Or worse, they are so vague and generalized that they fail to achieve the desired result – to provide evaluators with compelling reasons to select your company.
What happens next is predictable. Time pressures force the team to start writing before themes are sufficiently developed and the entire proposal process begins to unravel. Understanding proposal themes and the features and benefits that comprise them is a big step toward efficient and effective proposal development.
To read the rest of the article, Click to go here: http://www.24hrco.com/images/articles/html/GreatPropThemesPart2.html.
Reader (RSS)
Email