If you’ve ever found yourself spending hours copying and pasting content into proposal forms, you’re not alone. Manually transferring data from static sources into a predefined template can be an exhausting and error-prone process. The good news is that there’s a better way.
Proposal automation tools can help you format your proposals in seconds, eliminating the time-consuming work and the risk of mistakes.
In this post, we’ll understand the key challenges of formatting proposals, and then show you how to leverage a proposal automation tool to format your proposals quickly, efficiently, and without the copy and paste chaos.
The Challenge of Formatting Proposals
Formatting proposals is often one of the longest and most tedious steps in the proposal process. From gathering the right data to transferring it into the right template, it can take hours of manual work—leaving little room for anything else. Let’s break down why this process is so challenging.
It’s Time Consuming
Proposal formatting is painstakingly slow because it’s traditionally a manual task. You’re pulling data from various sources—local drives, emails, spreadsheets, different documents—and copy-pasting it into the proposal template. Each section needs to be checked for consistency, alignment, and accuracy. This tedious work can drag on for hours, especially for larger, more complex proposals.
It’s Tedious
Beyond being time-consuming, formatting proposals is far from enjoyable. The repetitive nature of the task makes it draining, and it takes your team away from more impactful work. Instead of focusing on strategy or refining the proposal’s content, skilled resources are stuck on the unglamorous work of formatting. This can lead to burnout and, over time, higher turnover as employees look for more rewarding tasks.
It Introduces Human Error
With so much data being moved around manually, human error is inevitable. A consultant’s resume might end up in the wrong section, or you could accidentally skip an important case study. Even small mistakes can throw off the entire proposal, and fixing them often leads to a time crunch and stress. The pressure to get everything right, combined with the repetitive nature of the task, increases the likelihood of errors.
Let’s now cover the solution for all of these challenges: templates.
Templates: The Key to Proposal Automation
In proposal automation, templates are pre-designed, reusable documents that are ready to be populated with your proposal data. These templates have predefined sections that are mapped to specific data points—meaning you can push information from your proposal database into the template in just a few clicks.
Branded Templates vs. Bid-Specific Templates
Templates come in two main types:
- Branded Templates: These templates reflect your company’s identity, with logos, colors, and fonts. They ensure every proposal is consistently branded, saving you from having to reformat every time.
- Bid-Specific Templates: These templates are tailored to meet the specific formatting and content requirements of individual proposals, such as those required for RFPs or government contracts like SF 330. They ensure your proposal adheres to client or industry guidelines.
When Are Templates Needed?
Templates are essential when you’re dealing with repetitive tasks that involve the same data, such as:
- Creating Resumes for Multiple People: For a large pitch or RFP, you might need to create resumes for multiple team members, and in the case of framework agreements, potentially tens or hundreds of them. A template will automatically pull in each person’s information, so there’s no need to reformat for each individual.
- Generating Case Studies: Proposals often require showcasing past projects in a consistent format. Templates allow you to reuse a case study format for different projects, ensuring consistency across your proposals.
Whereas some sections of a proposal are one-off (like the introduction or executive summary), sections like resumes and case studies often require repetition. Automating these repetitive tasks is where templates really drive value.
While templates are invaluable, they need to be used as part of a larger process. We’ll now cover the four steps needed to master proposal formatting.
Step 1: Choose the Right Proposal Automation Tool
Choosing the right proposal automation tool is the first step toward streamlining your proposal formatting. Look for the following features:
- Structured, Searchable Data Management: A system that organizes your proposal data in a structured format so that you can easily search and find the content you need. This also makes it easy to push that data into templates.
- Template Editing Capabilities: A tool that lets you easily edit and adjust your own templates.
- Industry-Specific Knowledge: The tool should have built-in knowledge of the types of templates commonly used in your industry, making it easy to create proposals that fit the bill.
- Support for CVs, Resumes, and Case Studies: Proposals often include resumes and case studies, which can be difficult to format manually. Choose a tool that’s built to handle these elements seamlessly.
- Seamless Integration: Look for tools that integrate well with your CRM, ERP, and other systems to ensure smooth data flow throughout the proposal process.
Step 2: Create Both Branded and Bid-Specific Templates
Once you've chosen your proposal automation tool, it’s time to create your templates. Think about what templates you need, both now and in the future. A branded template is probably your first priority, but what about federal bids or industry-specific proposals that require data to be uploaded in their own designated layout? For those, you’ll need bid-specific templates.
With a robust proposal automation tool like Flowcase, you have three options for building templates:
- We Build Them for You: We can create templates tailored to your needs—quickly and with our industry expertise.
- You Create Using Our Template Builder: Our easy-to-use template editor enables you to create and modify templates without any technical skills.
- Hybrid Approach: We create your templates, and you make adjustments as needed over time—whether it’s for small tweaks or larger updates.
This flexibility makes sure your proposals are formatted quickly, correctly, and with minimal effort. See how Flowcase's Template Editor works below:
Step 3: Gather Your Proposal Content
Having all your proposal content in one place is essential for proposal automation to work effectively. When data is stored in silos or static documents, transferring it into templates becomes impossible, as we discussed earlier.
With Flowcase, all of your team’s resumes, case studies, and project information are stored in a single, easily accessible location. The platform is specifically designed to manage experience data (like resumes and case studies), creating a single source of truth for your firm. This means you can quickly and confidently gather the information needed to populate your templates.
With everything in one place and in a searchable format, finding the right data is quick and easy. You simply search for project experiences, roles, skills, project types, etc and even stack search terms to narrow down the results. AI tools serve to streamline the process further.
Step 4: Export Into Your Proposal Template in Seconds
Once your content is gathered, the final step is to export it into your selected template. With a proposal automation tool, this process is instantaneous. You can choose from a variety of export formats, including Word, PDF, InDesign and PowerPoint.
With just a few clicks, the proposal is formatted and ready for submission—complete with all the right content, consistent branding, and the necessary formatting.
Getting Started With Proposal Automation
Formatting proposals doesn’t have to be a laborious process. With proposal automation tools, you can eliminate the time-consuming task of transferring data from static sources into predefined templates. By automating repetitive elements like resumes and case studies, you’ll save time, reduce errors, and ensure that your proposals always look professional.
Ready to streamline your proposal process? Schedule a demo with Flowcase today.
