How to make a dry technical document great bed-time reading?
May 26, 2011 2:36 AM Subscribe
I'm looking for a creative writer to help me turn a dry, technical proposal into a compelling narrative and sales story.
I have a lot of content from various subject-matter experts, which I now need to translate into a joined-up story to convince the client.
The subject-matter is IT-related and will be pitched to a large ex-public sector corporate client.
Ideally I would be looking for someone to work with me and the broader team in face-to-face collaboration in the London / south-east UK area.
Can you recommend anyone? An agency?
I have a lot of content from various subject-matter experts, which I now need to translate into a joined-up story to convince the client.
The subject-matter is IT-related and will be pitched to a large ex-public sector corporate client.
Ideally I would be looking for someone to work with me and the broader team in face-to-face collaboration in the London / south-east UK area.
Can you recommend anyone? An agency?
If you're looking to recruit someone from MeFi, it's better in the jobs section. If you're just looking for a resource to find freelancers, you might start at Guru.com.
posted by Ted Maul at 3:51 AM on May 26, 2011
posted by Ted Maul at 3:51 AM on May 26, 2011
This is precisely what I do all day. In the U.S. unfortunately. But here, in the D.C. government contracting world, there is a whole community of proposal managers, coordinators, desktop publishers, graphic artists, and yes, writer/editors whose role you've encapsulated pretty well.
Some companies, like mine, maintain dedicated proposal departments. Others don't do enough volume, or sufficiently complicated proposals, to justify that and prefer to hire contractors when needed. On the other side, proposal work can be intense and tends to burn people out, so a lot of skilled and experienced proposal people eventually go freelance so they can decide when (and especially with whom) they want to work.
The combination means that D.C. has a pretty thriving community of very capable proposal experts who can be hired on a per-job basis. (Which is not to say they're cheap.) Since London is also a national capital with a pretty serious governmental infrastructure, I'd be astonished if there weren't also a lot of government contracting and consulting firms, and thus a fairly similar network of freelance proposal writers.
As for how to find them, that's a little trickier if you don't already know some proposal people who can recommend someone, because a lot of the business, over here at least, works by word of mouth. People work with other people, and they recommend the good ones when someone asks.
I'd start by looking at temp agencies. See if you can find one that specializes in editorial personnel. Check their web sites carefully. Obviously any agency you call up is going to happily tell you that they have plenty of people with the precise skills you need, but proposals really are a very different animal from, say, ad copywriting or journalism. Another idea might be to scan U.K. technical job sites specifically for proposal-related jobs and see what kind of skills and language they use and create your own ad.
Heck, if you've got good relations with some company that you know does a lot of proposals or government contracting work, call them up and ask to talk to their proposal people and see if they know someone. That's the best way to find good people in my experience. Anybody who's kicked around the proposal world for a few years will be able to point you in the right direction - and equally importantly tell you who to stay the hell away from.
posted by Naberius at 4:42 AM on May 26, 2011 [2 favorites]
Some companies, like mine, maintain dedicated proposal departments. Others don't do enough volume, or sufficiently complicated proposals, to justify that and prefer to hire contractors when needed. On the other side, proposal work can be intense and tends to burn people out, so a lot of skilled and experienced proposal people eventually go freelance so they can decide when (and especially with whom) they want to work.
The combination means that D.C. has a pretty thriving community of very capable proposal experts who can be hired on a per-job basis. (Which is not to say they're cheap.) Since London is also a national capital with a pretty serious governmental infrastructure, I'd be astonished if there weren't also a lot of government contracting and consulting firms, and thus a fairly similar network of freelance proposal writers.
As for how to find them, that's a little trickier if you don't already know some proposal people who can recommend someone, because a lot of the business, over here at least, works by word of mouth. People work with other people, and they recommend the good ones when someone asks.
I'd start by looking at temp agencies. See if you can find one that specializes in editorial personnel. Check their web sites carefully. Obviously any agency you call up is going to happily tell you that they have plenty of people with the precise skills you need, but proposals really are a very different animal from, say, ad copywriting or journalism. Another idea might be to scan U.K. technical job sites specifically for proposal-related jobs and see what kind of skills and language they use and create your own ad.
Heck, if you've got good relations with some company that you know does a lot of proposals or government contracting work, call them up and ask to talk to their proposal people and see if they know someone. That's the best way to find good people in my experience. Anybody who's kicked around the proposal world for a few years will be able to point you in the right direction - and equally importantly tell you who to stay the hell away from.
posted by Naberius at 4:42 AM on May 26, 2011 [2 favorites]
Response by poster: In the end we went with an agency with whom we have an existing relationship. Thanks for your input anyway.
posted by Lleyam at 11:19 AM on May 27, 2011
posted by Lleyam at 11:19 AM on May 27, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
However, you may wish to post this on Jobs.
posted by tavegyl at 3:24 AM on May 26, 2011