How to Create Professional RFP Documents Online (and Save Money Doing It)

Answering and sending RFPs is a mandatory exercise in business, and for many companies is the only way to grow their sales. And if there’s one thing all of these RFP-building teams can agree on, it’s that creating a quality proposal presentation is a time consuming task.

Between the research, the internal strategy meetings, the actual building of a proposal, and finally the RFP printing and shipping, it could take at least tens of human work hours, per person, to finish the process. Many large organizations have specific RFP teams where their only task is to source, answer, and send RFPs!  

While some parts of the process, including the research and strategy development, will inevitably require the same amount of hours, there are tools out there that can streamline the RFP process as a whole and save your team time and money. 

By choosing to create professional RFP documents online, your team could save 30-40% of their time — and use it to perfect their proposals, as well as answer even more RFPs every month, winning your company more business. 

Building an Online Proposal: 4 Steps 

Creating professional business proposals online can streamline your RFP process, whether you print RFPs or send them virtually. Here’s how to start building a quality proposal online.

Step 1: Choose an online printing platform that has on demand print solutions, like Mimeo. Having on demand printing is imperative to getting your proposal printed and shipped on time — plus, you don’t want to have to print 15 copies of your presentation just to meet an order minimum. Not only does it waste your money and warehousing space, it’s not sustainable. 

Step 2: Utilize a printing RFP template to ensure you don’t miss any important sections or proposal tabs. 

Step 3: Personalize it! While an RFP template is a great starting point for your business proposal, the average win rate with a proposal is only 5% and you need to stand out to get the business. Include letters and tailored images, acknowledge current events, and choose unique effects to spice up the proposal like the RFP-requesting company’s colors or logo. 

Step 4: Check the online proof to make sure your answers are correct, your offers are intriguing, and your layout isn’t wonky. When you use an online print company to build your RFP, you won’t need to print out proofs to send around to your team to approve — instead, you’ll save time and paper (and money!) emailing the proposal for its final checks. 

Next Steps After Creating Your Proposal Presentation Online

Once you’ve chosen an online printing business to create your online proposal and have completed building your presentation online, it’s time to print it and get it into your prospect’s hands. 

Since you chose online, on demand print services to build your proposal online, you’ll be able to stay within the platform to choose print designs and finishings to make your RFP stand out. Choose durable binding (so it can withstand several viewings), add tabs, and pick a high-quality paper stock. 

Then, it’s time to print and ship. With Mimeo, you can print a single proposal — or hundreds — and have it delivered directly to the desk of your prospective client. Even if you work up until the last minute, you can still have your online print orders delivered by the next morning, anywhere in the world. 

It’s Easy to Create Professional RFP Documents Online With The Right Print Partner

Online print companies like Mimeo are saving RFP teams time and money. On demand print options eliminate order minimums, so you don’t need to over-order print RFPs, plus they give proposal teams hours of their time back that was previously spent standing in front of a printer. 

When you build your proposal online, you can streamline the proposal printing process for your team and eliminate the headaches and stress associated with doing it all in-house.