Sent my first proposal. Client said "looks great!" Then ghosted. Changed ONE thing. Now 8/10 proposals close. THE MISTAKE I sent the proposal and waited. No follow-up plan. No urgency. No clear next steps. Client got busy. Proposal got buried. Deal died. MY WINNING PROPOSAL STRUCTURE SECTION 1: Problem Statement (in THEIR words) "You're currently spending 12 hours monthly manually entering invoice data. This takes time away from growing your business and creates error risk." Use exact phrases from discovery call. SECTION 2: Solution Overview (high-level) "We'll build an automated workflow that reads invoice emails, extracts all data, validates accuracy, and posts directly to QuickBooks. You'll only review exceptions." Not technical. Focus on outcome. SECTION 3: Timeline & Deliverables Week 1: Workflow build and testing Week 2: Client review and adjustments Week 3: Go-live and training Be specific. No vague "2-3 weeks." SECTION 4: Investment Setup: $1,200 (one-time) Monthly maintenance: $200 Tool costs included in maintenance Payment structure: 50% ($600) deposit to start 50% ($600) on delivery SECTION 5: Next Steps "Reply to this email to confirm. I'll send invoice for deposit. We'll start building next Monday." Crystal clear. No confusion. THE FOLLOW-UP SEQUENCE Send proposal: Friday 6pm Follow-up email: Monday 2pm ("Just checking if you had questions") Follow-up call: Wednesday ("Want to walk through anything?") Final follow-up: Friday ("This timeline still work for you?") Most closes happen on follow-up 2 or 3. Not the initial send. HANDLING "I NEED TO THINK ABOUT IT" Them: "I need to think about it." Me: "Absolutely. What specifically do you need to think through? The timeline? The investment? How it would work with your team?" Get specific. Address the real concern. Often it's just: "I need to talk to my business partner." That's fine. "When are you two meeting? I can send some additional info that might help the conversation."

Client asked "How much?" I panicked. Said $600. He immediately said yes. I knew I messed up. That sinking feeling when you realize you undercharged. The client was happy. I felt sick. He would have paid double. THE PRICING MISTAKE My first invoice processing automation. Client manually entering 80 invoices monthly. Taking 12 hours. At $50/hour internal cost, that's $600/month wasted. I built the solution in 5 hours. Quoted $600. He said yes instantly. That's when I knew. If someone says yes THAT fast, your price is too low. THE VALUE-BASED PRICING FRAMEWORK Stop thinking about YOUR time. Start thinking about THEIR savings. CALCULATE THEIR CURRENT COST: - Hours monthly on manual work? - Their hourly rate? (Use $40-60 if unsure) - Annual cost = hours × rate × 12 YOUR SETUP FEE: - Setup = 20-40% of annual savings - More complex = higher percentage MONTHLY MAINTENANCE: - Maintenance = 15-20% of setup fee REAL PRICING EXAMPLES INVOICE PROCESSING: Client cost: 10 hours/month × $50 = $6,000/year Your setup: $1,200 Maintenance: $200/month FORM EXTRACTION: Client cost: 6 hours/month × $45 = $3,240/year Your setup: $900 Maintenance: $150/month CONTRACT ANALYSIS: Client cost: 15 hours/month × $60 = $10,800/year Your setup: $2,400 Maintenance: $400/month THE CONVERSATION SCRIPT "Walk me through your current process..." (They explain manual work) "How long does that take monthly?" (They say 10 hours) "What would you estimate your time is worth? $40? $50?" (They usually say $50) "So you're spending about $500 a month on this task. $6,000 annually. My setup fee is $1,200, which pays for itself in about 2.5 months. Then you save $500 monthly going forward. Make sense?" (They say yes because the math is obvious) MY LEARNING CURVE Client 1: Charged $600 (should have been $1,500) Client 2: Learned lesson, charged $1,400 Client 3: Charged $1,800 confidently Client 5: Comfortable with $1,800-$2,400 range Current average: $1,800 setup + $250/month BIGGEST LESSON

Hey, good morning everyone! Just checking in before I head to work. Wish you all a wonderful day! **Morning Post (Before 9 AM)** Day 15 of 30 Goal: Fix workflow, run further tests with Google Drive upload before demo. Plan Week 3 in detail. Blocker: upcoming errors I can't understand immediately Need: solve this small errors that pop up

Hey guys, how do you test a market to see if the pain point you believe a certain business has is large enough to serve. Essentially do you guys niche down or do you serve to a vast majority of industries?

Hey all, Any recommendations/experience for following usecase? I got a Client who asked for a RAG chatbot for his construction employees. They want to ask the chat bot for execution details instead of looking through many documents manually. I saw there are new solutions possible using knowledge graph. Do you prefer simple rag (+ reranking?) or knowledge graph? Thank you 🙏🏻🙏🏻