Current Articles

The Facebook Marketing Toolbox

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Back to Basics

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The Proposal Lone Ranger

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The Greening of Procurement

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The RFP is Poorly Written - Now What?

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Top 10 Passwords You Should Never Use

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17 Ways You Can Use Twitter

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The Let Me Show You My Scars Demon

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Avoiding Death by Bullet Point

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The Consultant-Client Demon

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Attacking 12 Proposal Demons

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10 things to improve your proposals in less than 10 minutes

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Common Errors Can Kill Your Proposal

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The Very Best of The Proposal Guys

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Capture Planning

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American Association of Grant Professionals

"Celebrating 12 years of advancing the grant profession."

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Click here to view Shipley's new online training catalog.

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As a proposal professional earn or upgrade your professional accreditation from the Association of Proposal Management Professionals (APMP). There are three levels of APMP Accreditation: Foundation, Practitioner, and Professional. For more info about the APMP Accreditation Program, see http://www.apmp.org/ca-16.aspx. For events scheduled to help you earn APMP Accreditation, see http://www.apmp.org/av-108.aspx.

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Sponsors

 

Please take a minute to look at our Sponsors' Page.

These companies support our efforts so that we can continue to provide you with the most comprehensive collection of free proposal and grant-related information on the web.

Welcome to our newest Sponsors,

American Association of Grant Professionals

RFPMonkey.com LLC

Kelly, Anderson & Associates, Inc.

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The following companies work closely with us to provide useful information to keep ProposalCafe.com's content fresh.


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Defining Moments


This week's proposal/business development terms and definitions from the APMP Journal (Fall/Winter 2009) article: "from A to Z, the Very 'Unofficial' APMP Glossary" by Chuck Keller, ProposalCafe.com President.

dictionary


Dear John Letter: A letter from a US prospective customer stating that you did not win the contract; for non-U.S. procurements: “Dear Juan” (Spanish), “Dear Johan” (German), “Dear Jean” (French), and “Dear Gianni” (Italian).

Debrief: A discussion with the prospective customers to find out why your proposal won or lost, featuring their reluctance to give any meaningful feedback as they try to veil their selection process, met by your defensiveness over losing or your bewilderment over winning.


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Active Groups

Proposal Exorcist

Little_Devil


Proposal Exorcist "Sermons"

Get advice from the Proposal Exorcist for avoiding and fighting proposal demons that can haunt proposal teams. The following are links to articles written by the Proposal Exorcist for the "Journal" and "Perspective" of the Association of Proposal Management Professionals (APMP). (The Proposal Exorcist is the alter ego of Chuck Keller, President of ProposalCafe.com.)

* The Proposal Exorcist: Attacking 12 Proposal Demons

* The Let Me Show You My Scars Demon


* The Get-It-Out-The Door Demon


* The Irrelevant Past Performance Demon

 
* The Extension Tension Demon


* The ? Demon


* The Sunken Sub Demon


* The Consultant-Client Conflict Demon


Current Poll

What resource is most valuable for learning about proposal development tools, practices, and trends? (APMP = Association of Proposal Management Professionals)

Newsletter Subscription

We plan to send out a newsletter quarterly. Please sign up if you would like to be added to the distribution list but don't want to register on our site. Thanks.

Random Quotes

Whether you think you can or whether you think you can't, you're right.

Henry Ford


Welcome to Proposalcafe.com

ProposalCafe.com has 1,120 member registrations and counting!

New ProposalCafe.com Features

On the ProposalCafe.com Home page, we've started two new features highlighting articles by Chuck Keller, ProposalCafe.com president, for the Association of Proposal Management Professionals (APMP):

* Defining Moments. The feature has proposal/business development terms and definitions from the APMP "Journal" (Fall/Winter 2009) article "from A to Z, the Very 'Unofficial' APMP Glossary." We think you'll find that this isn't a conventional glossary for proposal development!

* Proposal Exorcist. Links are provided to Chuck's series of Proposal Exorcist articles in the "Perspective," the APMP newsletter. In the articles, Chuck (the Proposal Exorcist) gives tips for avoiding/fighting proposal demons that can haunt your proposals and proposal teams.

Full access to all "Journal" and "Perspective" articles is a benefit of being an APMP member. The "Journal" is published twice a year. A printed copy is mailed to APMP members, while "Journal" articles are also available on-line in the Publications section of the APMP web site: www.apmp.org. The "Perspective" is published quarterly and is available only on-line in the Publications section of www.apmp.org.

Proposal Poll

"Vote" in the new proposal poll on the Home page of ProposalCafe.com. We plan to post new polls more frequently and to archive the results. Please contact us if you have an idea for a poll question.

ProposalCafe.com Articles

We are adding new article links more frequently to our Current Articles list. While browsing the Internet, if you find an interesting article about a proposal topic, please send us a link to the article for possible posting on ProposalCafe.com. As Current Articles "age," they are archived in the Information (Archived Articles) section of ProposalCafe.com. There are now about 120 article links posted on ProposalCafe.com with more waiting in the wings to be posted.

ProposalCafe.com Activity & Membership

In 2010, the average monthly "traffic" for ProposalCafe.com has been about 3,000 visits and 100,000 hits. ProposalCafe.com has about 950 registered members. Please tell your proposal colleagues about ProposalCafe.com and encourage them to become a registered member. It's free and easy to register as a member -- see http://proposalcafe.com/component/alpharegistration/?task=register.

The 1000th ProposalCafe.com member will be given a free copy of Proposal Writing: The Art of Friendly and Winning Persuasion, co-written by Chuck, the ProposalCafe.com president.

Training for Pricing

We don't often see training available for those who do proposal pricing. If you would like this type of training, check out the following training opportunities.

 

Shipley Associates

* Price to Win (www.shipleywins.com/training-corporate-register.php?seminar=49)

* Winning in the Cost Volume (www.shipleywins.com/training-corporate-register.php?seminar=51)


CAI SISCo

* Strategic Bid Pricing (www.caisisco.com/training-ModernBid.html)

* How to DO Competitive Analysis & Price To Win (PTW) Studies (www.caisisco.com/training-PriceToWinDO.html)

* How to USE Competitive Analysis & Price To Win (PTW) (www.caisisco.com/training-PriceToWinUSE.html)

Attention - Grant Writers

If you write grant proposals for non-profit organizations, check out the following web sites.

Grant proposal services

* Foundation Center (www.foundationcenter.org)

* The Grantsmanship Center (www.tgci.com/about.shtml)

Professional organizations

* American Association of Grant Professionals (www.grantprofessionals.org)

* American Grant Writers' Association (www.agwa.us)

* National Grants Management Association (www.ngma.org)


For more links about grant proposal resources, see the Resource Links section (Grant Services) on ProposalCafe.com.

ProposalCafe.com Sponsors

Advertise your proposal-related business on ProposalCafe.com. We offer three affordable sponsorship levels: Premium, Plus, and Basic. For sponsorship info, see http://www.proposalcafe.com/information/our-sponsors/68-sponsorship-information.

Thanks to our current sponsors.


Premium Sponsors:

Adam McArthur, Actia Consulting

Benjamin Services Corporation, Inc.

Bill Andre, Proposal Consultant

Keller Proposal Development & Training

RFPMonkey.com LLC


Plus Sponsor:

Mrs. Michelle Salta, Kelly, Anderson & Associates, Inc.


Basic Sponsors:

Mike Parkinson, 24 Hour Company

Linda Mahnke, Mahnke Consulting

Jayme Sokolow, The Development Source, Inc.

 

Regards,

Chuck Keller - This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

and

Bill Andre - This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it


 

Have a winning day at the Proposal Cafe!

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