Convert Everything To Total Commitment
Ignore the monthly figure on the cover page and calculate the complete cost across the full term: media, production, setup, creative changes, management fees, platform fees and taxes. Two proposals only become comparable once both show one total number and one length of commitment.
Write One Sentence Per Proposal
For each option, write a single sentence: who it reaches, how often, for how long, and what action it is meant to produce. If that sentence cannot be written from the proposal, the missing information is the first question to send back.
Score The Same Five Factors
- Audience and geographic fit with your actual service area
- Evidence the channel can produce the action you need
- Flexibility to change creative, audience or spend mid-term
- Reporting access and how outcomes will be verified
- Exit terms, renewal terms and what happens on under-delivery
Decide What Would Change Your Mind
Before approving, state what result would justify renewing and what result would end the commitment. A proposal without that line is difficult to review fairly later, no matter how well it performs.
Comparable proposals rarely arrive comparable. The buyer's job is to convert them into one format before choosing.