How to write an agency proposal: one page, sent after the call, built from their words

On 20 October 2026, Google's autocomplete for "agency proposal" offered template, pdf, deck and design before it offered anything about the client.

That order tells you how most proposals get written. Format first, buyer second.

A cover page, an about-us section, three package tiers, a case study, a timeline in a nice table. It looks thorough. It is mostly about the agency.

So here is the complication with every "agency proposal template" you will find. A template is written before the call, and a proposal that could be written before the call is not about the client.

Here is what I send now.

Step 1: do not write anything until the call is done

A proposal is a summary of a conversation, plus a decision.

If you have not had the conversation, there is nothing to summarise. Ask for twenty minutes first. Ask what made them reach out this month and not last month. Ask what they tried before, and why it stopped.

Write down their exact words. You will need them in step 2.

If a prospect wants a proposal before any call, send a short note with how you work and ask for the call. Some will refuse. Those are rarely the ones who sign.

Step 2: open with their problem, in their words

The first lines of the proposal should be things the client said.

"You're posting three times a week and nothing is coming back from it." "Your last editor disappeared mid-month." "Your podcast gets views but the episodes don't grow."

When they read their own sentence back, they know you listened. Nothing else on the page does that as fast.

Do not open with your agency. They already looked you up, or they would not have taken the call.

Step 3: recommend one thing

This is where most proposals go soft.

Three tiers side by side, each with a checklist, and the client is left to pick. But they came to you because they did not know what to pick.

So recommend one option, in a sentence, and say why it fits what they told you.

If there is a smaller or larger version worth knowing about, give it one line each underneath. That is enough.

Picking one feels risky. It is less risky than looking like you have no opinion.

Step 4: write what is not included

Scope fights almost always start with something nobody wrote down.

So list the exclusions next to the inclusions. Paid ads, if you do not run them. Shooting, if you only edit. Replying to DMs, if that is theirs.

It reads as honest, and it is. It also means the third month's "can you also just" has an answer already written.

Step 5: put the price on the page, plainly

One number, or one range, with what it covers and how often it is billed.

No "investment" instead of price. No asterisks.

Across the group I run, the rule changes by business, and the proposal follows the site. VALORAE Media publishes its Full Page tier at $2,000 to $3,500 a month, so a Media proposal never surprises anyone. Its Edit and Manage work gets quoted on the call, so the proposal is where that number first appears in writing.

Either way the proposal is not where the client should first meet a figure they did not expect.

VALORAE Arc sits at the far end of that rule. The clipping agency prints no price anywhere and scopes every campaign on a call against the footage, so the proposal is the first place its number appears in writing, and the call has already covered it.

Step 6: show the first two weeks

Clients do not buy a twelve-month roadmap. They buy the feeling that something will happen on Monday.

So write the first two weeks as a short list. Access we need from you. The first call. The first piece we deliver, and when. Who they will talk to.

That list does more to close than any case study, because it lets them picture saying yes.

And it doubles as your onboarding plan once they do.

Step 7: add an expiry date and send it within a day

A proposal with no end date sits in an inbox forever.

Write a date, two weeks out, after which the price and start date get re-checked. Not as pressure. As a fact about your calendar.

Then send it within one working day of the call. The proposal's best asset is the client's memory of the conversation, and that fades fast.

A proposal polished for four days is competing with whoever sent theirs the same evening. Speed is part of the pitch.

Step 8: follow up once, on a date you named

Say when you will check in, in the same email. "I'll check in on Thursday if I haven't heard from you."

Then do it, once, and ask one question: is anything in here wrong?

I would rather ask that than "any thoughts?", because correcting me is easier for a busy person than deciding.

If the expiry date passes with no reply, send one line saying the proposal has lapsed and the door is open. Then close the file.

A dead proposal left in your pipeline only makes next month's forecast a lie.

What the page looks like

Here is the whole thing. Swap the brackets.

What you told me: [two or three of their sentences, quoted].

What I would do: [one option], because [the reason in their terms].

Not included: [three things].

Price: [number or range], billed [how often].

First two weeks: [access], [first call], [first delivery and date].

This stands until: [date, two weeks out].

Six lines. If one of them is hard to write, that is the question you forgot to ask on the call.

That is the real test of the format. A long template hides the gap, and a short page shows it.

What I leave out, and when I break this

Cut the about-us section. Cut the logo wall. Cut the case study unless it matches their problem closely enough to quote in one line.

Terms can travel as a separate attachment, so the page stays one page.

This will not suit every buyer. One who needs a deck for their boss will ask for it, and procurement sets its own format. So build the deck from the same six lines, and let them keep the page as the summary.

The short version

• Have the call first, and write down their exact words.
• Open with their problem, quoted back to them.
• Recommend one option and say why.
• List what is not included next to what is.
• Put a plain price on the page.
• Show the first two weeks as a short list.
• Add an expiry date and send it within one working day.

More operator notes like this live at tgsidd.com.