Proposals are one of the most important things to your business, helping give you a good presentation to your customers, and help you get their business. This document will help you get the most out of your proposals in D-Tools Cloud, so you understand all the ways you can present and show/hide data.

Proposal customizations

To start, you will need to know how to edit a proposal. From inside the quote, go to the upper right and click the edit proposal button.

Add a nice image to your proposal header, giving you a good first impression with your customers. This can be an image from a past project or some banner designed by your marketing team. Don't forget to take advantage of the overlay color and text color to make your proposal pop.

Below the banner, you will see a few sections prepopulated in the proposal for you. You can remove or reorder any of the sections. You can also add from the D-Tools templates.

Adding, removing, and moving sections

To add or remove a section, hover over the section and you will see a list of options to the right, add and remove being an option. Here you will also see up and down arrows to move the sections. You can also drag the sections in whatever order you like. Keep in mind the banner will always be fixed at the top.

Types of sections

There are various types of sections. This is a different way to present useful information in the text.

Paragraph - This is any type of text you want to add. Might be a mission statement, project description, or statement of work.
Image gallery - include images or videos in your proposal to give a more visual appeal and some confidence in your work. You can also put drawings, whiteboards, site pictures, or videos of home walk-throughs.
Products - This is what you are selling. There are options to show this in different ways, but these are the products installed in the customers' homes.
Summary - A summary of what the project costs including tax, labor, and adjustments
Payment terms - How will your customer pay you? Ask for a deposit, or phase payment, however, you may charge. Set these up in your settings.
Attachments - Any other important documents, pictures, or spreadsheets you think would be valuable to the customer.

Displaying all the right information

Calling out products particularly, there are many options to show a short description, of what order of products. Choose to show/hide the brand, model, accessories, product image, and price. Include labor and/or accessories in the product price. Show MSRP next to the price. Show a group total, and/or break out labor. Endless combinations to help you customize the data you present to your customers.

Using templates

Don't forget to save all your hard work into a template! You can set a default template, or have a list of different templates for use cases so you always have the perfect proposal for the right situation. In the menu next to the quote name, you will see the option to change the template or save it as a template.

Accepting payments

There is an integration in D-Tools Cloud with Propay where you can electronically collect payments after the customer signs your bill of materials, including Check (ACH) or Credit Card.

Preview proposal

After you have gone through and built your perfect proposal, don't forget to preview your proposal before you share it with your customer. You can do this by Presenting your proposal to yourself and clicking the "View Proposal" button in the upper right. The proposal will appear exactly the same when you send it. This will allow you to do a last review before sharing. You can share it with yourself first too.

Once you have proofread your proposal, share it with your customer. This is very similar to sending an email. Enter the contact name or email address to pull up your list of contacts. Tailor the message and share the proposal. We do recommend sharing with yourself first. Don't forget to take advantage of our Google Contacts and QuickBooks Online contacts integration.

You can also print the proposal or share it by URL and insert the URL into your own email.

Proposal Analytics

After you send your proposal, see if your customer is viewing it and how many times. This is really powerful as you can see who is a hot vs colder lead. If someone hasn't viewed it, send them a reminder to take a look.