Proposify’s metrics help us customize winning proposals for our clients.

SeaMonster Studios, a full-service digital agency located in Seattle, Washington, believes that the ideal client experience is one that includes that perfect harmony of human touch and SaaS automation. Wes Buckwalter, SeaMonster’s founder and CEO, executes each project with a data-driven strategy. By utilizing his clients’ metrics—from SEO to sales to social media—his team is able create the ideal result. Throughout that process, Wes is at the ready to ensure his clients still have a personal one-on-one touchpoint to address any concerns.

Before Proposify, Wes and company were taking on the proposal process as a team. Even though they were an agency of designers and creatives, the process took hours, proofing was a nightmare and that human touch was waning.

“Proposify saves me 20 to 25 hours a month easily, compared to the way we were doing things before. We would use Word to type a proposal, take pieces from our other contracts to cut and paste the rest of the content, and then use Illustrator or InDesign to design the proposal. It was just tedious and painful. We had no way to tell if the client was looking at those four hours of work, or even reading it. We needed a Saas solution, and believe me we looked at everyone. We dove into Proposify for a trial account, and after the trial, we fell in love with it and needed a paid account.”

With Proposify, SeaMonster Studios can get their proposals out in half the time it used to take them.

“Using Proposify, it takes me about 90 minutes to get a proposal out. In some cases, with straightforward projects, I can fire up the proposal template, adjust the pricing and scope a bit and 20-30 minutes later, I'm in the game.”

After those proposals are out the door, Wes says that his client onboarding is a snap. Using Proposify’s integration with Zapier, Wes can trigger his CRM, time management, and email automation software platforms, and update his client’s information across the board.

“It’s awesome that we can use Proposify and Zapier to connect with our other software. The integration ensures that the data that we use in Proposify is consistent across all of the platforms. For example, when I create a new proposal in Proposify it moves the client into my CRM, it integrates them into my accounts system and adds them to our email conversations list, and to our marketing list. The client is pretty much ready to go out of the gate, which saves me an inordinate amount of time.”

Wes takes every opportunity to learn from his clients. For him, their feedback, their habits and their reactions to every part of the sales process is a golden opportunity to grow. Proposify’s metrics give Wes a looking glass into the needs of his clients, and without having to request feedback, he’s able to tweak their proposals and get the information the client wants and needs to see, front and center.

“Using the metrics that Proposify shows us, we know that some clients don’t read 15 pages of values. So we know to slim that down and save our time. Most clients will love the cover, spend a few minutes on pricing and head right down to the signature. Proposify has helped us understand what people think and what their behaviour is surrounding those thoughts. We can change our proposal to suit who they are, and what they need.”

The access to metrics and the email notifications that SeaMonster Studios receives when their clients view the proposal has not only made the process more enjoyable for Wes; it’s upped his close rate by 50%.

“One of the things I’ve noticed using Proposify, is that not only do we always have the necessary content at the ready to create proposals, we also have the data to show what we should include for a client to sign on. It’s sped up our acquisition process. Typically a contract would take a couple of weeks to come back, and now it’s a week. So that’s pretty awesome.”

As a result of Proposify’s metrics, and the client specific changes to each proposal, SeaMonster Studios has a large roster of happy clients, who time and time again are eager to work with them, sometimes, as business partners.

“One of the things I’ve discovered along the way is the faster I can get a proposal into the client's hand after the point of a meeting the better chance I have of them not looking for one from somebody else. I think being hungry for work and being hungry to acquire a client means something to people. Delivering on that promise and showing folks that, ‘we really want to work with you and therefore here’s our proposal,’ is a pretty big deal for us. Proposify helps us do that.”