Win the work.Keep your engineersbillable.
aec-proposals.com is the full proposal shop for architecture, engineering, and construction firms. Strategy, writing, compliance, graphics, and management, from the go/no-go call through the shortlist interview. It is run like business development, not a writing assignment, because that is how proposals are actually won.
A BD-AEC service · Proposal development inside a business development practice
Where AEC pursuits go wrong
Most AEC firms do not lose work because their engineering is weak. They lose it because the proposal was written at midnight by the same people who should be running the projects. These are the gaps we close.
No proposal manager
The pursuit has no owner, so the deadline runs the firm instead of the firm running the pursuit.
Principals writing proposals
Your most billable people spend the week on narrative instead of the projects that pay for it.
Inconsistent quality
Every submission reads differently because a different overloaded person wrote each one.
Weak graphics
Dense pages of text lose to competitors who made the evaluator’s job easy.
Compliance failures
A missed form or a blown page limit gets a strong team tossed before the technical score.
No surge capacity
Two good RFPs drop the same week and you can only answer one of them.
Tight deadlines
The solicitation posts, the clock starts, and there is nobody free to meet it well.
A proposal is never free
A professional AEC proposal commonly consumes 50 to 100 hours across leadership, technical, marketing, design, and administrative resources. That time bills to overhead instead of a client, and it comes out of exactly the people you most need on projects.
Per pursuit, produced in house
A proposal is never free when it is produced internally.
| Resource | Hours | Burdened rate | Illustrative cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Principal / seller-doer | 8 to 15 | $225 to $350 | $1,800 to $5,250 |
| Project manager / technical lead | 10 to 20 | $125 to $175 | $1,250 to $3,500 |
| Marketing / proposal coordinator | 20 to 35 | $75 to $110 | $1,500 to $3,850 |
| Graphic design and production | 6 to 15 | $80 to $125 | $480 to $1,875 |
| Executive review and admin support | 6 to 13 | $50 to $400 | $700 to $2,560 |
| Total | 50 to 98 | — | $5,730 to $17,035 |
Illustrative fully burdened cost, including compensation, benefits, payroll expense, overhead, software, and indirect resources. Actual hours vary by pursuit.
Winning proposals take more than good writing. They take strategy, capture planning, technical depth, and a presentation that makes evaluators believe you. We bring all of it.
What a winning submission actually needs
A compliance matrix maps every requirement to a response. This is the one that decides most selections: the gap between how a firm usually submits and how a pursuit should be run.
A dedicated proposal manager
A real go/no-go decision
Full compliance matrix
Win themes carried throughout
Professional proposal graphics
Independent red-team review
On-time, to-spec submission
The full scope, one shop
One shop for the whole submission. Engage us for the full pursuit or for the single piece your team cannot get to. Every service is built for AEC selections, public and private.
Proposal Development
End-to-end development of a compliant, persuasive proposal, from kickoff through submission.
SOQ Development
Statements of qualifications and SF330s built around how public owners actually shortlist.
RFQ / RFP Responses
Complete responses to public and private solicitations, mapped to every evaluation factor.
Proposal Management
A dedicated manager owns the schedule, the compliance matrix, and every deadline so your team does not have to.
Technical Writing
Clear technical narrative written from interviews with your engineers, in your firm’s voice.
Compliance Review
A line-by-line check against the solicitation so a formatting miss never disqualifies a strong team.
Executive Summaries
A first page that frames why you win before the evaluator reads another word.
Technical Approaches
Approach and methodology sections that prove you understand this project, not a template.
Staff Resumes
Resumes rebuilt around the selection criteria, so the right experience is impossible to miss.
Project Descriptions
Relevant-project sheets that tie past work to the exact scope being procured.
Interview Preparation
Shortlist coaching, presentation build, and Q&A rehearsal for the interview that decides it.
Proposal Graphics
Org charts, schedules, and infographics that make your strengths obvious at a glance.
Proposal Strategy
Win themes, discriminators, and positioning set before the first word is written.
Not on the list?
If it touches a pursuit, it's in scope. Tell us what the solicitation needs.
One strategic standard. Two levels of finish.
Every engagement is built around responsiveness, persuasive content, and a submission-ready final document. What changes between the two is how far the production goes.
Professional
Word-based production
- Best fit
- Straightforward SOQs, on-call selections, qualifications packages, and time-sensitive pursuits.
- Production
- A polished Microsoft Word layout, delivered as a submission-ready PDF.
- Compliance matrix and pursuit strategy
- Writing, editing, and QA/QC
- Resumes and project descriptions
- Photographs, tables, and basic graphics
Timing
Available at every schedule tier, subject to capacity.
Reviews
Two review cycles
Signature
Creative production
- Best fit
- High-value, highly competitive, brand-defining, or shortlist-critical pursuits.
- Production
- Custom Adobe InDesign production by our creative team.
- Everything in Professional
- Custom visual concept and information design
- Infographics, diagrams, and image treatment
- Agency-level production quality
Timing
Best with 30 or more days. Generally available at 15 or more days.
Reviews
Content and design reviews
The production level changes. The strategic discipline does not.
Engage early
The best time to prepare for a proposal is before the opportunity is released.
Options and cost both reflect the time available to do the work responsibly. Engaging early preserves every production format, a full review cycle, and the most flexible footing. It is also why a reusable foundation, a case study library, current resumes, and a project image library built before the RFP posts, pays for itself across every pursuit that follows.
What a foundation builds
- Case study library
- Resume development
- Personnel and project image library
- Reusable marketing materials
How a pursuit runs
A repeatable production process, run to the RFP’s calendar. You always know what is due, who owns it, and where the submission stands.
- 1
Opportunity Evaluation
A real go/no-go. We score fit, competition, and win probability before you spend a dollar chasing the wrong solicitation.
- 2
Capture Strategy
Win themes, discriminators, and the storyline, set before writing starts. What makes you the obvious pick, said in the owner’s language.
- 3
Proposal Planning
Compliance matrix, annotated outline, schedule, and assignments. Every requirement mapped to a section and an owner.
- 4
Technical Content
We draft the approach, resumes, and project descriptions, and interview your team so the narrative sounds like your firm.
- 5
Graphics & Design
Org charts, schedules, and project sheets designed so an evaluator gets your strengths without hunting for them.
- 6
Quality Review
Compliance check, independent red-team read, and a final pass against the evaluation criteria before anything ships.
- 7
Submission Support
Formatting, production, and on-time delivery, physical or electronic, to the letter of the submission instructions.
Owners we write for
We write for the full design and construction market, and we know how each of these owners evaluates. The engineering disciplines below link through to BD-AEC’s market pages.
More than a proposal writer
A proposal writer edits your words. BD-AEC runs the pursuit. The difference is that proposal development here sits inside a business development practice, so every submission is built the way work is actually won.
Business Development
We think in pipeline and positioning, not just the document in front of us.
Proposal Strategy
Win themes and discriminators set the direction before a single section is drafted.
Technical Writing
Engineering narrative written from your team, clear enough for a non-technical evaluator.
Industry Experience
AEC only. We know how public owners and private clients shortlist design and construction firms.
Capture Planning
The work that happens before the RFP drops, so you are positioned when it does.
Relationship Development
Proposals land better when the owner already knows your firm. That is BD-AEC’s core job.
Most of the score is qualitative. We build the proposal to win the parts that are not price.
Straight answers
How much does proposal writing cost?
It depends on the scope and the deadline. A single SOQ is a fixed, modest fee. A full RFP response with graphics and interview prep is priced by effort. We scope it up front, in writing, before you commit, so there are no surprises.
Can you manage an entire proposal?
Yes. That is the most common engagement. We run the whole pursuit as your proposal manager: compliance matrix, schedule, assignments, writing, graphics, review, and submission. Your team gives us the technical substance and stays on the projects.
Do you work with engineering firms?
Yes. Civil, structural, transportation, geotechnical, MEP, environmental, and water firms are the core of what we do. We interview your engineers and turn their expertise into a compliant, persuasive proposal.
Can you help with interviews?
Yes. Shortlist interview coaching is one of the highest-return things we do: presentation build, message discipline, and Q&A rehearsal. The interview often decides a QBS selection, and most firms under-prepare for it.
Can you review an existing proposal?
Yes. We do compliance reviews and red-team reads on proposals your team has already drafted. You get a marked-up copy against the evaluation criteria and a punch list of what to fix before it goes out.
Do you write SOQs?
Yes. Statements of qualifications and SF330s are a core service, including project sheets, resumes, and org charts built to how public owners shortlist. Deep SOQ work also lives at aec-soq.com and soqwriters.com.
Can you help with RFQs?
Yes. RFQ responses, qualifications packages, and prequalification submittals are all in scope. If the pursuit is RFP-heavy, aec-rfp.com goes deeper on the response side.
Tools we bring to every pursuit
The tools and field notes we bring to every engagement. Ask for any of these on a discovery call and we will walk you through it against a live pursuit.
Go / No-Go Scorecard
The scoring model we use to decide which solicitations are worth chasing.
Compliance Matrix Template
Map every requirement to a section and an owner before writing begins.
SOQ & SF330 Checklist
What a shortlist-grade qualifications package includes, section by section.
Win-Theme Worksheet
Turn your discriminators into themes an evaluator remembers.
Proposal Schedule Template
A production calendar that works backward from the submission deadline.
Public Procurement Primer
How QBS, best-value, and low-bid selections differ, and what each one rewards.
Ask for any of these on a discovery call. Request one →
§ Contact
Have a pursuit on the clock?
Send us the solicitation and your deadline. Scott Mann responds within one business day with a straight read on the pursuit, a go/no-go take, and what a winning submission needs.
Discovery call
A straight read on the pursuit and whether we should chase it.
Proposal assessment
A compliance and win-strategy review of a draft you already have.
Opportunity review
A go/no-go on a specific solicitation, scored before you commit.
Request a proposal assessment
AEC firms only. We'll never share your details.
One shop, seven front doors
aec-proposals.com is the front door to the BD-AEC proposal network. Each site below goes deep on one kind of pursuit. It all runs through the same shop.
AEC markets on bd-aec.com