A quote built from the buyer's economics

A price list answers "what does a lesson cost?". A finance director asks something else: "what changes for us, and is it worth the money?" A commercial proposal that opens with the seller's product (history, features, a rate "among the best on the market") leaves her to do that translation alone, and she may not bother.

So start where the buyer's money and time go today. At Veloria: English calls go to the two colleagues who speak it, so both lose hours; customs forms go to an outside translator; Stepan logs mix-ups with foreign carriers.

An opening built that way reads: "Today English calls go to two colleagues and customs forms to an outside translator; this program aims to bring that work back to the forty people who need it."

Then Klasna's price sits next to a cost Veloria already pays, not next to a tutor's hourly rate on some website.

The "what changes for Veloria" part of a proposal holds the buyer's costs in the buyer's own units: hours, outside invoices, logged mistakes. Ask the champion what poor English costs them now, "not in feelings, in their own units".

Three rules keep this section honest and persuasive:

1. Use their words and numbers: hours the two English-speaking colleagues spend on others' calls, what the translator costs, mix-ups in Stepan's log.
2. Label them as theirs: "as Veloria estimates", "from Stepan's log", quoted with Pavlo's permission. Their own numbers persuade more than yours, and they're harder to argue with.
3. Promise to measure, not to fix their operations. "Mix-ups will fall by half" sounds strong and is unprovable: Klasna controls lessons, the schedule and the measuring, not Stepan's trucks.

Add how the change will be measured and who checks it. Leave out what's about Klasna, such as a list of every subject it teaches.

Pricing a program doesn't mean hiding what a lesson costs. A finance director will want to check the arithmetic, and a total with no unit behind it looks like a trick.

So show both: the program total and the unit price it's built from. For Veloria's full option: 300 lessons a month at 800 UAH = 240,000 UAH a month, which is 6,000 per person for the forty.

What each number does:

• the program total answers "what does this cost us a month?", the figure that goes into the budget;
• the per-person figure lets her compare with what other training costs per employee;
• the unit price lets anyone check the multiplication and compare like with like.

"Total on request" or "price shared after signing" never works with a finance director. Neither does a per-person figure that doesn't add up: 240,000 ÷ 40 is 6,000, not 24,000.

The same 800 UAH reads very differently depending on what it's compared with. A lesson gets compared with the cheapest lesson online. A program gets compared with the cost of the problem it solves.

So name what the money buys. For Veloria's full option, 240,000 UAH a month buys:

• lessons built on carrier calls and customs forms, not generic English;
• a schedule around shifts;
• a tutor replaced within a week if it doesn't work;
• a monthly report Yaryna can check.

This is the same price, described as an outcome with its scope, schedule, guarantees and reporting. It moves the conversation from "is 800 too much for a lesson?" to "is 240,000 a month worth what Veloria loses today?"

Two cautions: keep the unit price visible next to the total, and only list what Klasna really delivers. A program description padded with features nobody asked for is a price list again.

One take-it-or-leave-it number invites a yes-or-no answer, and "no" is easier. Ten options make the buyer do your work. Two or three clear options move the conversation from "yes or no" to "which one".

For Veloria:

• Option one: the twelve dispatchers from the pilot, about 100 lessons a month, 80,000 UAH.
• Option two: all forty people, about 300 lessons a month, 240,000 UAH.
• In both, the pilot's 76,800 UAH is credited to the contract.

Good options differ in scope and risk, not in hidden extras: a smaller start for a cautious budget, the full program for the whole need. Each should be something Klasna would be glad to deliver, with its own clear price.

Avoid fake options, such as a deliberately bad third choice that exists only to make the second look good. A finance director recognises the trick, and it undermines the honest options next to it.

A finance director reads the terms as carefully as the price, sometimes first. Every part of a good proposal closes a question she would otherwise ask, or worse, leave unasked and quietly hold against you:

• Two options answer "which scope fits our budget and our appetite for risk?"
• Quarterly invoices, payment within 30 days answer "when and how do we pay?"
• A month's notice to stop answers "what if it doesn't work for us?"
• A monthly attendance and progress report answers "how will I know the money is working?"
• The pilot's 76,800 UAH credited to the contract answers "do we pay twice for what we've already tried?"

State terms plainly, in one place. Payment terms are part of the price: money that arrives later is worth less to Klasna, and this module comes back to what a longer term really costs.

A serious proposal doesn't need twenty pages. Methodology, tutor profiles and Klasna's history belong in an appendix for whoever wants them. The page the finance director reads should fit on one screen.

Two tests tell you it's finished:

• Can the champion forward it without rewriting a word? If Pavlo has to explain it to Yaryna, it isn't done.
• Does every line answer one of her questions? Situation, outcome and measure, program, options with prices, terms, next step. Anything else moves to the appendix.

Long proposals feel thorough to the writer and tiring to the reader, and the important lines (price, terms, the decision date) get buried on page 14. A short page with an appendix gives both readers what they need: the approver gets the decision on one screen, the curious get the details.

On the one page, order matters: the price before the problem looks expensive; the same price after it looks like an answer.

1. Veloria's situation today, in its own words and numbers.
2. The outcome you're aiming for and how it will be measured.
3. The program: lessons, a schedule around shifts, reporting.
4. Two options with their prices.
5. Terms: invoices, payment days, how to stop.
6. The next step with a date.

The outcome comes before the program because the program exists to reach it. Options and terms follow once the reader knows what she'd be buying. And the page ends with a concrete next step both sides can plan around, not "let us know what you think".

How it fits together: start from the buyer's costs, label their numbers, price a program with the unit visible, offer two or three options, state the terms, one page in order. Next lesson: the ROI case Yaryna will test, what the program really costs and when it pays back.