The Ultimate Guide to Creating an Irresistible Website Proposal

Creating a website proposal for your client that rocks can truly make a difference. Why? Because it influences the chance of getting business out of it. Therefore it’s of vital importance to explain what solution you are offering and why your (potential) client should be working with you and not with your competitors.

If you’re an agency or company that needs to create an outstanding web design proposal, keep reading! We’ll guide you through all the steps.

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What should a website proposal include?

To make a client sign your website proposal, there are several things to take into account. Your proposal must contain all the necessary information to make a decision, it should be attractive and nothing should be left to improvisation.

Besides, it’s important to bear in mind that your client will try to collect several proposals before making a decision. These might differ in price, quality and many more aspects. Make sure you pay attention to all of them:

Let your design shine. It shouldn’t be distracting but it’s good to pay attention to it to make a professional impression.
Get to the point. Don’t use too many words to explain every feature of the website. Keep it clear and simple.
Sell your solution. Highlight your USPs and sell the solution you want to offer. How are you distinguishing yourself from the rest? Offering an incredible user experience, a great design, shorter deadlines… Think about the things your client wants to hear to make a final decision.
Think ahead. It’s common that after sending a proposal you’ll receive some typical questions. Save yourself time and include a section with FAQs in your website proposal.
Hosting and domain. Creating a website from scratch isn’t the same as redesigning one. When it comes to an existing website, make sure your client has access to the required coding or account to manage the website. It should be clear who owns the source code.

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web design layout — Woman drawing the layout of a project. Source: Rawpixel

Key elements of a website proposal

Try to create different types of website proposals to figure out which one works best for your clients. Try to focus particularly on the design or on the tone of voice for example. Depending on your target audience, you’ll have to figure out which aspects they care about more.

Anyways, let’s start with summing up the indispensable elements of a website proposal. Here we go!

Executive summary

Start your proposal with summarising what the goal of the project is. Why does your client want to develop a website? What are the objectives of the project? And most important: how is your web proposal going to help achieve that?

An executive summary needs to be clear and to the point. So that anybody who would need to take a look at it (or even approve it), immediately understands what the rest of the document is about.

The details of the project

It’s common to arrange a meeting with your client before sending a proposal. However, if that’s not possible or necessary, a phone call or Skype meeting could also work.

The most significant thing here is that everyone is on the same page. Both parties should fully understand what they can expect from each other and ensure they’re going in the same direction.

Screen of the user interface. Source: Rawpixel

Solution

It’s time to explain the solution you are offering. Get into details and describe the necessary steps and tasks that are involved in the development process. Highlight how these actions are going to fulfil the needs of your clients.

When talking about costs, it’s recommended to split up the total costs into different stages of the development process. And don’t forget to include information about the web architecture and project management tools that will be used.

Every service that is part of the web development process should be included in the proposal. In case your client wishes to add SEO, copywriting or other services, you can also include them.

Keep reading: Tips for Creating a Successful International Website

Timing

The overall planning and timing of your project is an important aspect of your website proposal. On the one hand, it helps to keep track of the progress of the project but on the other hand, it can cause a lot of pressure. To prevent this, you have to make sure the timing is feasible and realistic.

Avoid creating false expectations and miscommunications before but also during the development process. Explain how your client will be able to evaluate the work in every phase of the project. And also what tools are going to be used to keep everyone involved in the development process up to date.

Explain how much time you are going to dedicate to each phase and main tasks of the web project

mockup design — Woman working on the computer on the web design sketch. Source: Rawpixel

Investment

Don’t talk about costs, call it rather an investment. Words are very powerful when it comes to discussing the money topic. Make sure you don’t scare someone off by mentioning the total amount right away.

First, list the prices of the different phases or services that are required to get the project done. Allow your client to better understand what needs to be worked on before getting to the result they asked for.

Don’t forget to include additional services (if required) or the price for maintenance after the website is live.

Call to action

The next step is to give that one final gentle nudge to sign the proposal. Explain how they have to proceed if everything is clear and no changes have to be made.

How to accept the proposal? Is it possible to sign it digitally? Is it necessary to make an upfront payment?

These are all common questions when someone wants to sign a proposal. Make sure the next steps are simple and clear to follow.

Concerning the payment, it’s common to pay part of the project beforehand and the rest upon delivery of the result. You decide the percentage but we recommend to stick to 50%-50%.

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Finding the best web developer

You can’t offer your client a website proposal without having a programmer or development team at your disposal. If you’re an agency, you’ll need to find the right profile(s) to be able to offer your client a web development service.

It doesn’t matter if a website has to be created from scratch, with a custom design, a website template, or if it concerns a redesign of an existing website. The important thing is to find developers with experience in similar projects.

If you’re looking for a digital partner to help you out with this, here we are! At Yeeply, we connect you with professionals that truly fit your project.