Proposal templates Value-based
A value-based proposal puts the outcome, and what it's worth to the client in their own numbers, before any price. The fee is fixed, shows no hours, and is set against that value rather than against your time.
It is the primary pricing model for 15% of the roughly 1,000 consultants in Consulting Success's study. It fits when the outcome is measurable and the client will share the numbers. When they won't, or when the result depends on things you don't control, use a fixed price instead.
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Type a client, a fee and a timeline and watch this proposal fill in. No account, no email.
Example figure — illustrative, not a pricing recommendation.
For Your client$5,000 · 4 weeks
Use this template freeRuns in your browser — nothing you type is saved or sent, or carried into the editor.
Prepared for Your client
PreviewValue-based proposal
Investment
Illustrative figure.
Plan
Where you are and where this gets you
+ 1 more in the full proposal
Signature
Your client signs here once you send it.
How the payments and terms read to your client
Deposit
Due on signing
$2,500.00
50%
Changes live
Due on completion · Changes live
$2,500.00
50%
The fee is fixed and does not depend on the hours it takes. [Optional guarantee: if the agreed metric does not move by [amount] within [period], the final payment is waived.] Ownership of the final work passes to you once every invoice under this proposal is paid in full. Drafts and unused concepts stay ours. Overdue invoices may pause the work until they are paid, and may carry interest at the rate allowed where we are based.
Every section below exists to answer a question your client is silently asking. Use the example copy as a starting point and replace the specifics.
The problem in the client's own numbers, from your discovery call. Jonathan Stark's rule is not to assume in a value conversation: the figures come from them.
“Your checkout converts 1.8% of visitors. At your current traffic and average order, you told us each tenth of a point is worth about [amount] a year.”
Objectives and measures of success, framed as shared rather than guaranteed. Name the metric, where it comes from and the period it's measured over.
“Goal: raise checkout conversion from 1.8% to 2.5%, measured in your analytics over the 30 days after launch against the 30 days before.”
Quote the client's own value estimate back to them. Practitioners anchor the fee as a fraction of it: Stark's ceiling is around 10% of the annual value delivered, and Alan Weiss wants the client to see at least a ten-to-one return.
“By your estimate, reaching 2.5% is worth about [amount] a year in added revenue.”
Phases as durations, without hours. Hours invite the client to price your time instead of the outcome.
“Diagnose (1 week): session recordings, funnel analysis and a ranked list of fixes. Change (3 weeks): the top fixes designed, built and tested. Measure (30 days): results against the baseline.”
One fixed fee with no hourly breakdown. If you offer options, make them three value-anchored ones, highest first.
“Checkout conversion project, fixed fee: [amount]. The fee is fixed and doesn't depend on the hours it takes.”
A change to the goal is a new agreement, not extra hours. Ron Baker's fixed-price agreement adds a service guarantee, a refund or reduced payment that reflects the value received. If you offer one, keep it optional, define the metric and window precisely, and never guarantee a business result your work doesn't control.
“A change to the goal or scope is agreed in writing, with its effect on the fee, before the work changes. [Optional guarantee: if the agreed metric does not move by [amount] within [period], the final payment is waived.]”
Example pricing section
Value to you, the client's estimate (example)
$120,000 / year
Checkout conversion project, fixed fee
$12,000
On signing (50%)
$6,000
When the changes are live (50%)
$6,000
In ApeiroCraft the payment schedule becomes invoices after signing — the deposit invoice is drafted the moment they sign.
A proposal where the fee is set against the value of the outcome to the client rather than against your hours. It opens with the client's situation, the goal, how it will be measured and what it's worth to them, in their own numbers, and only then shows one fixed fee.
Practitioners anchor it as a fraction of the value. Jonathan Stark uses a floor from what the work costs you and a ceiling around 10% of the annual value delivered; Alan Weiss wants the client to see at least a ten-to-one return. These are practitioner rules of thumb, not measured norms.
When the outcome can't be measured, when the client won't share the numbers, or when the result depends mostly on things you don't control. The dispute this model invites is the client reopening the value premise afterwards, which is why the figures should be theirs.
Yes, and it fits well, because the fee is one total. The template opens with the situation, goal, value and measures, then a single fixed-fee line and a 50/50 schedule. When the client signs, the first invoice is drafted for you to send. If you'd rather the second payment fall on a date than on completion, change its trigger in the editor.
This template as a tracked, e-signable link — with the invoice one click away once your client says yes.
Use this template freeStill deciding? Talk to the founder
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