Qualify the job before the account
A promising proposal software lead needs more than a company in the right sector. Confirm the job: a revised proposal is sent with conflicting scope and pricing sections. Identify sellers assembling scopes and obtaining internal approval as the possible user group, then find who can authorize a pilot; the working buyer hypothesis is an agency owner or sales operations lead managing proposals.
Ask about the current workaround, copied documents and approval in chat, and what would make changing it worthwhile. Do not assign a budget or procurement timeline from company size, funding, or job title alone.
Use a category-specific qualification rubric
Use the calculator below to organize your judgment after reading the source. Unknown evidence should remain unknown. Its weights are a transparent prioritization convention, not a prediction of purchase probability.
| Dimension | Evidence to seek | Reason to pause |
|---|---|---|
| Problem | Which sections are reusable and which must be approved for each deal? | The person cannot describe a recent instance of the problem. |
| Product fit | Can you assemble a fictional proposal from approved scope blocks and route one exception for review? | buyers requiring legal document services or unsupported signature guarantees |
| Timing | more than one seller is preparing proposals at the same time | The proposed change has no confirmed date or relevance. |
| Implementation | What marks the proposal as accepted in the actual sales process? | signature, payment, and document-export capabilities must be checked individually |
| Value | a reviewer approves the final consistent version before it is shared | The buyer and user disagree on what success looks like. |
Work through an illustrative assessment
Suppose the source says: “We keep copying old proposals and missing a pricing paragraph. I need reusable sections with an approval step before sending.” That supports investigating the problem, but it does not yet settle purchasing authority or technical compatibility. A reviewer should ask the two discovery questions above and preserve the answers beside the source.
Compare that with: A student searches for a research proposal format. This weaker example should not receive the same pain or timing score. A relevant public topic is not evidence of a current evaluation.
Even a strong problem signal should be rejected when the need belongs to buyers requiring legal document services or unsupported signature guarantees. Qualifying out prevents a misleading promise and preserves time for a prospect the product can help.
Create a reviewable handoff
A qualified opportunity should contain the original evidence, a summary of the job, confirmed and unknown constraints, the buyer/user distinction, and an agreed next step. Keep a score attached to those facts so another teammate can challenge the conclusion.
Propose a pilot only when the critical gap is addressed: signature, payment, and document-export capabilities must be checked individually. Evaluate the pilot through a real observation that a reviewer approves the final consistent version before it is shared, and keep that observation separate from the initial qualification score.
About these playbooks and examples
Prepared by DemandBolt with AI assistance as practical planning resources for people building and selling software. The category scenarios and message examples are illustrative, not quotations from real prospects or claims of customer results. Adapt the hypotheses to your product, verify original sources, and review capabilities before making an offer.
The workflow follows our first-customer guide and buying-signal review method. Our PyInvesting and Rae records distinguish actual internal work from targets. Published .