Building proposals that win: the buyer's decision journey
Structure proposals as the path a buyer takes to decide — lead with the business case, then products and terms — and build quote templates that walk that path every time.
Written By Mike Forte
Last updated About 1 hour ago
A proposal that opens with a product table asks the buyer to price-shop. A proposal that walks them through a decision asks them to choose.
Most managed service provider (MSP) proposals lead with products and legal terms (MSAs) and forget they are actually trying to sell something. The buyer decides emotionally and justifies rationally. Build the emotional case first.
MSP buyers rarely award work because a SKU list is complete. They award it when they feel the risk of staying as they are, understand the outcome you will deliver, and can defend the investment to whoever signs. Salesbuildr is built for that path: quote templates stack branded pages and content blocks in a fixed order, and the recipient reads that order in presentation view — the page they open from the approval email or share link.
This article is about that order. Catalog hygiene, pricing rules, and assembling from approved products are in Quoting best practices for new quoters. Here the question is: once those blocks exist, how should the proposal read?
A price list is not a decision
The starter template a new account receives — STANDARD TEMPLATE — is a useful draft, not a finished sales document. It currently stacks, in this order:
- An intro Content & Products letter
- A Financial summary
- A Signature and Approval totals block
- Terms and Conditions
That is a price list with a greeting on top. The buyer hits numbers and legal before they have a reason to care. Treat the starter as something to rebuild, then replace the sample products with your listed catalog. See HTML content, variables, languages, and starter templates.
The recipient never sees your editor. They see presentation view: cover first (if you linked one), then each widget in the order you stacked it. On a wide screen, Display table of contents adds a sticky sidebar of those section titles so they can jump around. On a phone, the same list is behind the floating menu button. The table of contents is a setting, not a widget — turn it on in the template settings tab (cog icon), or later under Manage Settings on the quote.
If the first thing in that sidebar is “Products” and “Terms,” you have already told them this is a catalog.
Three things worth knowing about your buyer
- They're buying insurance, not IT. Their emotional driver is fear of loss: downtime, a breach, being the one who didn't protect the business. Loss aversion is a stronger motivator than the appeal of gain.
- Trust comes before price. Buyers won't evaluate your price until they trust you. Show a number before building that trust, and price becomes the only thing they can judge.
- Your competitor is inertia. The most common outcome isn't "they chose someone else," it's "they did nothing." A proposal that doesn't create urgency loses to the status quo.
Lead with the case, then the catalog
Use this order as the default for any proposal that is more than a transactional hardware ticket. Drag widgets in the left-hand widget sorter until the outline matches. Set a page break before or after a widget when a section should start on its own page in the PDF.
Your template blueprint: five buyer questions, five widgets
Terms and Conditions and MSAs come after The Investment, locked.
A short hardware quote can skip the video and collapse steps 2–4 into one intro plus one product table. A managed-services or project proposal should not. Variation across deal types belongs in separate templates and reusable widgets, not in a single bloated layout.
Build the journey into the template
Do this once per deal type. New quotes then inherit the path; the quoter personalizes the letter and sets quantities.
1. Create or copy a template for that deal type
Go to Quotes → Templates. Copy STANDARD TEMPLATE, create a new template, or open a quote you already like and use Create template from this quote. Import from Quotes → Templates → Marketplace only if that feature is on for your account — then rewrite the sample copy so it matches how your buyers decide.
Keep the library small. Typical set: transactional hardware, managed services / MSA, project work, renewal. The quoting best practices table is the same split.
2. Link a cover, then stack the widgets
In the template editor, use Manage cover page at the top of the left-hand widget outline to link a cover page. Open the styling tab (palette) for fonts, colors, and letterhead so every quote from this template looks like one firm. See Styling & Cover Pages.
Click + in the left-hand outline to insert widgets. In Insert Quote Widget, add them in the order in the table above. Drag to reorder. You do not insert a table-of-contents widget — turn Display table of contents on in the settings tab (cog).
3. Write the opening as a letter, not a spec
Select the first content block. In the Edit tab, open Available template variables, copy the fields you need, and paste them into the rich text. A workable opening:
- Who this is for (company and contact fields from the variables list)
- The situation you are solving, in their language
- The outcome in one short paragraph
- A sentence on why you, then a hand-off into the next section
Leave product names out of this block. If you need a layout the rich-text editor cannot do, add an HTML Content widget and check it in presentation view and the PDF before you reuse it.
A Video or Image block after the letter can carry a short walkthrough or a still that shows the outcome; video embeds play in presentation view and are left out of the PDF.
Save a reusable version at Quotes → Widget templates (your account already has Standard intro). When you insert that block into a template, choose Link if you want every template that uses it to pick up later edits. A Copy is a one-off. Quotes created from a template are a snapshot — later library edits do not change drafts or sent quotes that already exist. A content block you insert on a live quote with Link is the exception: that one stays tied to the library.
4. Build trust before the price
Add a reusable content widget for case studies, testimonials, credentials, and team — no product table. Write it once at Quotes → Widget templates, then insert it into this template before the priced product widgets.
Insert it with Link (see step 3) so every template that uses it picks up later edits. Give the widget a title that names the proof ("Why teams trust us," "Who will look after you") so it appears in the presentation-view table of contents.
Do not put a financial summary or a product table in this block. Trust first; the number comes after.
5. Put products after the case, grouped by outcome
Add the priced Content & Products widgets below the letter and the trust block. Search the listed catalog; do not create products in the template. For project work, drop in the job widget from the library rather than rebuilding hours — see Quoting labor and projects.
Name each widget for the buyer (“Monthly protection,” “One-time cutover”), not for your PSA category. Those titles become the presentation-view table of contents — along with any H1 / H2 / H3 headings you put in the rich text. Bare content with no title is skipped. If Use product parent category as widget title is on under Settings → Quotes, rename the widget after products land so the table of contents still reads like a buyer section.
Prefer bundles and catalog add-ons so the package is already decided. The buyer sees a stack, not a parts list. On the template, set Show bundle products to visible expanded, visible collapsed, or hidden depending on how much detail that audience needs.
The line still needs a clear name and quote description. That copy is what they quote in the internal email, not your category code.
6. Decide what the buyer may change
On the template settings tab:
- Recipient can adjust quantities — only if you want them to change quantities on the sent proposal. Leave it off when the package is the offer.
- Anonymous approval — on for most transactional templates; off when you need a signed-in identity. Details are in Quote Templates.
- Signature requirement — on when the approver must draw or upload a signature.
- Display table of contents — on for any proposal longer than one product table.
- Show product images, Show bundle products, Show totals / subtotals, Show tax — set the defaults this deal type should always use.
Optional lines and choice groups are set on the product widget itself, not in settings. Mark lines Optional when the buyer should be able to toggle them in presentation view. Use a choice on a product group (minimum and maximum) when they must pick — for example five laptop models and exactly one selection.
A Financial summary or Summary belongs after the product sections, not before. Turn on the details that match the deal: grand total, widget subtotals, contract-term total, tax. A leasing deal can add a Leasing summary here; see Leasing. Keep Signature and Approval next to the totals. Add a Custom form only when you need something from them before they approve — a purchase-order number, a go-live date, a site address. Mark those fields required so they cannot approve with the form empty.
7. Lock terms and anything else that must never come off
Select the terms widget (and any compliance attachment or mandatory legal block). Click the lock icon. On a quote created from this template, account managers cannot remove or reorder a locked widget.
Replace the starter terms with your own. The shipped wording is a placeholder.
8. Preview as the buyer, then make it the default
Use Presentation view (or Switch view) on a test quote from the template. Walk it the way a recipient will: cover, letter, trust, outcomes, numbers, approve. Toggle Mobile/Desktop on the toolbar. Open Preview for the PDF — remember that video embeds will not be in the file.
When the path is right:
- Set this template as the default quote template on companies that always get this deal type.
- Tell quoters to pick it on New Quote (or press Q) instead of starting blank. The everyday loop is in the quote editor.
Review the template when the catalog or the offer changes. A journey template is only as current as the widgets and products sitting in it.
What the quoter still does on the deal
The template carries the path. The live quote still needs a human:
- Pick the template (or accept the company default).
- Rewrite the two or three sentences in the opening that are specific to this buyer — keep the variables for the rest.
- Add or adjust listed catalog products and quantities. Leave prices to the rules you already set.
- Glance at optional and choice lines so the buyer is not offered a dead option.
- Open presentation view once. Then send.
That is a decision journey with a price in it. A price list with a logo on it is the other way around.
See also
- Quoting best practices for new quoters — catalog, pricing rules, then templates
- Quoting labor and projects — hours as catalog products, not notes
- Quote Templates — library, locking, settings cascade
- Quote Editor — widgets, send, presentation view
- Cover Pages — the first page the buyer sees
- HTML content, variables, languages, and starter templates — merge fields and STANDARD TEMPLATE
- Styling & Cover Pages — fonts, colors, letterhead
- Quotes (admin) — tenant defaults, including Display table of contents
- Your First Quote — first proposal after onboarding
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