What Makes Us Happy; Seven Questions for a Client Centered Proposal

"...keeping you great"

HEADLINES:

"If you wish to persuade me, you must think my thoughts, feel my feelings, and speak my words." ~ Cicero as quoted in Persuasive Business Proposals

Small Font Size? -- just heard from Ray King, founder of AboutUs.org, that the font size of my insights shows up small in his in-box. Are any of the rest of you experiencing the same problem with the insights? The font size should be roughly the same as any email you receive. Please let me know -- thank you.

What Makes Us Happy? -- David Brooks, NY Times columnist, wrote an interesting peice this week summarizing what research shows makes us happy. My favorite few lines -- "The daily activities most associated with happiness are sex, socializing after work and having dinner with others. The daily activity most injurious to happiness is commuting. According to one study, joining a group that meets even just once a month produces the same happiness gain as doubling your income." It's the last line that particularly garnered my attention.

What About the Rest of the Executives? -- Members of various CEO organizations receive this "happiness" benefit of a monthly forum meeting -- but what about the rest the executives? Gazelles has been testing a monthly forum process with CFOs, COOs, HR, IT, Sales, and Marketing executives this past six months with 22 leading-edge growth firms. Given the initial positive feedback, we'll be rolling this out with 40 additional firms in the fall -- stay tuned.

What Doesn't Make Us Happy? -- writing proposals! Some of the very best executives, program managers, engineers, and consultants freeze up when they have to put what they know and what they're recommending on paper. You can make the best face-to-face presentation, but inevitably the client wants something in writing. And almost all major government contracts require a proposal. Tom Sant, the guru of proposal writing and author of Persuasive Business Proposals, even has research showing that sales people will often skip going after multi-million opportunities because they don't want to submit the necessary proposals!

What A Proposal Isn't? -- Tom Sant, who has taught thousands of top executives how to write winning proposals, notes "Writing a winning proposal isn't a matter of content. It's a matter of structure and process. Say the right things in the right order and you'll win." What his book focuses on is the process -- the steps to follow to develop and write a clear, compelling, persuasive proposal -- the same methodology Sant uses when he works directly with a client.

Seven Questions for a Client-Centered Proposal -- I'm a huge fan of the right questions, and Sant has seven that drive writing a winning proposal (I would get his book and go right to that section of the book for the details). Here are the seven questions:

1. What is the client's problem or need?
2. What makes this problem worth solving? What makes this need worth addressing?
3. What goals must be served by whatever action is taken?
4. What goal has the highest priority?
5. What product/applications/services can I offer that will solve the problem or meet the need?
6. What results are likely to follow from each of my potential recommendations?
7. Comparing these results to the customer's desired outcomes or goals, which recommendation is best?

Sant also has twelve questions for developing a consultative proposal -- powerful list.

The Language of Success (Email). This is the title of Sant's latest book and focuses on general business writing, especially email. The key is eliminating jargon and developing a straight forward approach to communicating your message. BTW, my one "must" re: emails -- that the subject line must match the email. Often in email strings the subject of the email changes but no one has changed the subject line to match! The other "must" is communicating just one main idea in an email. If there are several subjects, write a separate email to the same person covering each subject -- that way they can forward to and copy the people appropriate to the specific topic. And I'm more likely to get a response to a single-subject email then if I stick multiple subjects in a single email.

The Giants of Sales -- Sant also wrote one of my favorite classic sales books entitled The Giants of Sales: What Dale Carnegie, John Patterson, Elmer Wheeler, and Joe Girard Can Teach You About Real Sales Success. Some sales fundamentals never change and Sant has gleaned the best from these four fathers of sales. At a minimum, if you're a sales professional, you should know the history and giants of your own profession and their timeless knowledge. NOTE: Elmer Wheeler's classic book Tested Sentences that Sell is another must read -- I was blown away by the insight and power of using one simple word vs. another -- particularly powerful in the internet world of sales.