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How to Deal with Business Proposal Denials

Hearing a “no” never feels good.

Especially when you invest your time, creativity, and energy in something and you get a cold hard rejection.

Unfortunately, in this competitive world of business, this is pretty much inevitable.

What you need to do is to find a way to leave all of that behind and deal with those denials head on. If you are trying to get over a business proposal denial, here are some tips that will help you out.

Learn from your experience

Getting rejected doesn’t have to be a bad thing. We learn about ourselves through different experiences in life.

This rejection can actually make you better. Just take the feedback you got and use it to your advantage.

They must have mentioned several things which they don’t like about your proposal or what should be improved. Use these comments and suggestions to make your business proposal even better and eliminate all the little imperfections.

This is an objective and bias feedback. It’s not like when your mother or your best friend say that they have never heard anything better. It is a real opportunity to perfect your proposal.

Forget the past, focus on the future

According to Adela from Writers per hour, won’t get you anywhere. Shake it off and start thinking about your next move.

One of the mind tricks you can use is to imagine how it will be once you succeed. Put the accent on how you will feel then and let that be your motivation.

Veronica Wright, a CEO at professional Resumes Centre is backing this up, “If you manage to overcome the past and only focus on the future, your perspective will completely change. You will stop looking at yourself as someone who failed and start looking at yourself as someone who will succeed.”

All these denials and challenges are only steps you need to take in order to get to that final achievement.

Put your mind into getting better

Instead of feeling sorry for yourself, focus your energy on new ideas and how you can improve the existing concept.

Try to redirect all your feelings into improvement. What can be changed? What needs to be omitted? Are you contacting the right people?

If you think that one of the problems was how your proposal is composed, team up with some writing and editing service such as Flashessay.com. This company will connect you with professional writers who can provide you with in-depth review of your proposal.

Don’t take it personally

Business is business. If someone rejected your proposal it doesn’t mean that you aren’t competent or talented. You just need to work on your project some more.

Taking business denials personally is one of the biggest mistakes people make. By doing that, they put themselves down and start losing faith.

The world of business can be a scary place, especially with this much competition. Just imagine how much people are going through the same struggle as you are.

If you think that there is nothing wrong with your proposal technically and you start doubting your ideas and business goals – don’t. You probably just haven’t met the people who will understand your vision.

Talk to experts

An expert’s opinion can give you some fresh ideas and a different perspective on your business proposal.

Pat Fredshaw, head of the content department at Essay Supply explains, “Experts in your field can give you useful tips and help you to improve.”

You can even ask about their personal stories and how they handled denials. You’ll then see that it truly does happen to everyone.  

It can also help you learn more about the industry which you plan to target. Who knows, maybe you’ll even make a new friend and find the support you need.

Improve the content of your proposals

Once you’ve managed to get over the denial of your initial proposal, the final step you need to do is learn how to be better next time.

The best way to do so is to find ways to improve the content of your proposals and ensure your next time is a winner.

Better Proposals

In order to make your business proposal content better, try following these useful tips:

  • design a quality business proposal template or use one of existing successful templates
  • use a proposal software to make your sales process faster and more effective
  • think of it not as a trying to sell something, rather trying to evoke certain emotions in the person reading
  • make sure to include all the major points such as:
    • Introduction
    • Timescales
    • Proof

Learn more about the 8 essential elements of a business proposal to ensure you’re nailing it.

  • write it to be responsive on all devices
  • make it up to 6 pages long
Proposal Templates

In addition to that, you can check out the two courses of Proposal University (Proposal Design and Proposal Writing courses) which can help you learn everything you need to know about writing business proposals.

Over to you

Rejection can paralyze you. Make you feel like you aren’t good enough. But it doesn’t have to be that way if you know how to deal with it.

With these pieces of advice, you’ll be able to handle any challenge like a pro! As you can see there is even a bright side of denials. Ultimately, it all comes down to your perspective and if you apply these tips, you’ll see that business proposal denials aren’t such a scary thing.

Jessica Fender is a marketing consultant, blogger, and content editor at Online Writers Rating and Writing Help service. She is focused on creating innovative and customer-friendly strategies for business growth. You can follow Jessica on Twitter and connect with her on LinkedIn.

Adam Hempenstall's profile image
Adam Hempenstall is the CEO and Founder of Better Proposals. He started his first web design business at 14 and has since written four books and built an international movement around sending better proposals. Having helped his customers win $500,000,000 in the last 12 months alone, he’s launched the first ever Proposal University where he shares best practices on writing and designing proposals. He co-runs a once-a-year festival called UltraMeet and is a massive FC Barcelona fan.