Best proposal software for your team and how to choose it

Before comparing features, write down how a proposal moves through your business today. The answers narrow the field quickly.

• How many proposals, quotes or SOWs does the team send in a typical month?
• Do most deals start from a brief or discovery call, or from a formal RFP?
• How many people write, review or approve proposals?
• Do prices come from a fixed catalog, or are they built for each deal?
• Where do deals live today, and does the proposal need to update that system?
• Who signs on the client side, and do they need a signing order?

A team that answers RFPs every week needs very different software from a solo consultant who sends a few proposals and wants them to look polished.

These are the questions worth asking every vendor. Each one has a real effect on time saved, cost and control.

• Writing: does the tool write a full first draft from your brief or RFP, or does it help you fill a template you choose and edit?
• Templates and style: can you set brand colors, fonts, voice and reusable content once, so every document follows them?
• Pricing tables and quotes: line items, quantities, optional add-ons the client can select, discounts and taxes
• E-signature: legally binding signatures, multiple signers, signing order and an audit trail
• Tracking: notifications when a proposal is opened, time spent per section, forwarded views and reminders
• RFP support: importing a request, extracting questions and drafting answers from approved content
• CRM integrations: creating a proposal from a deal and syncing status back to HubSpot, Salesforce or Pipedrive
• Control: roles, approval rules for discounts, shared templates, SSO and an audit log for larger teams
• Pricing model: per seat pricing grows with every person you add, while flat team plans include a set number of seats
• Buying process: whether you can sign up and start yourself, or must go through a sales process first

PandaDoc is a broad document platform covering proposals, quotes, contracts and e-signature. It is a good fit for teams that want one tool for many document types and already work from templates.

• Approach: template based documents across many use cases, with AI that assists with text inside documents
• Pricing model: per seat; public pricing at the time of writing is roughly $19 to $49 per seat per month, with custom pricing for higher tiers
• Strengths: wide document coverage, e-signature, integrations with common CRMs
• Consider: costs grow with every seat you add, and the writing still starts from a template you choose

If PandaDoc is on your shortlist, our PandaDoc alternative page compares the two approaches in more detail.

Proposify focuses specifically on sales proposals, with design control, templates and approval features for sales teams.

• Approach: template first proposal building with a design editor
• Pricing model: per user; public pricing at the time of writing is roughly $19 to $41 per user per month, with a custom higher tier
• Strengths: proposal focus, design flexibility, team features
• Consider: AI writing is lighter than a full draft from a brief, and teams pay for each user

Both tools are known for attractive, web based proposals that clients open as a link rather than a PDF.

• Qwilr: interactive web page proposals with strong visual design; per user pricing roughly $35 to $59 per user per month at the time of writing; less focus on RFP responses and complex quoting
• Better Proposals: a large template library and straightforward sending and signing; per user pricing roughly $13 to $49 per user per month at the time of writing; light AI and no RFP module
• Consider for both: they suit teams whose main need is presentation and simple sending, rather than drafting full proposals or answering RFPs

Loopio is built for RFP and security questionnaire responses at larger organizations. It centers on a managed answer library and collaboration among subject experts.

• Approach: RFP response management with a curated content library and project workflows
• Pricing model: custom pricing through a sales process, typically aimed at enterprise teams
• Strengths: depth in RFP workflows and answer library management
• Consider: it is focused on RFPs rather than everyday sales proposals and quotes, and buying usually involves sales calls and higher minimums

ProposalCreation is AI proposal software that starts from the client brief or the RFP itself rather than from a blank template. Here is how it measures against the same criteria, using our own product facts.

• Writing: our AI writes the full first draft (cover, executive summary, scope, timeline, pricing table, terms and signature block) from what you sell, the client, budget and timeline, or from a pasted brief, notes or RFP
• Templates and style: industry templates plus your brand colors, logo, fonts, voice notes and past proposals; brand styles range from one on Starter to unlimited on Business and Enterprise
• Pricing tables: line items, quantities, optional add-ons the client can tick, discounts, taxes, recurring and one off fees, currency
• E-signature: legally binding electronic signatures under the U.S. ESIGN Act and UETA, multiple signers, signing order and an audit trail certificate, on every plan
• Tracking: opens on Starter, time per section on Growth, forwarded views and reminders on Business and Enterprise
• RFP support: import, question extraction and answer drafting on Business (up to 60 pages per RFP) and Enterprise (up to 200 pages per RFP)
• CRM integrations: Zapier and webhooks on every plan, HubSpot and Pipedrive from Growth, Salesforce from Business
• Control: basic roles on Growth, approval rules for discounts on Business, custom roles, SSO (SAML), audit log and data retention settings on Enterprise
• Pricing model: flat team plans with seats included
• Buying process: fully self-serve, every plan starts with Get started

We also do not train AI models on your proposals, and you can export everything and cancel anytime. Where it fits less well: if you mainly need a general contract and document platform, or a curated enterprise answer library run by a dedicated bid team, a specialist tool may suit you better.

Per seat and flat team pricing are hard to compare by headline price alone. Work out the total for your actual team size and the features you need, then confirm current prices directly with each vendor, because public pricing changes.

These are ProposalCreation plans. Annual billing saves 50 percent. Sending created proposals is not limited, while AI drafts and rewrites follow the plan limits. For other tools, check the vendor's own pricing page for current figures.

Shortlist two or three tools that match your workflow, then test each one on a real deal rather than a made up scenario.

• Use a recent brief or RFP and see how much of the proposal each tool writes for you
• Check that the pricing table handles your real line items and optional add-ons
• Send a test proposal to a colleague and review tracking and signing from the client side
• Confirm the CRM sync works with your actual deal stages
• Calculate the full yearly cost for your team, including seats you will add

You can try ProposalCreation on your own deal right now: describe what you sell and who the client is, and see the proposal being written. Compare plans on the ProposalCreation pricing page, learn about RFP software features or see how proposal software CRM integration works.