Creating RFP Documents Online: A 4-Step Guide

By Gene Plotkin • Published on 12 September, 2022 • Updated on 24 August, 2026 • 5 min read • Training & Corporate Materials

The fastest way to build a professional RFP proposal online is to choose an on-demand print partner, start from a proven template, personalize your content for the client, and review a digital proof before anything ships.

What Are the 4 Steps to Building an RFP Proposal Online?
What Should You Do After Building Your RFP Proposal Online?
Why Does Building RFP Documents Online Save Your Team Time and Money?
Frequently Asked Questions

Answering and sending RFPs is a mandatory part of doing business, and for many companies it’s the only way to grow sales. Ask any sales enablement and RFP team and they’ll tell you the same thing: building a quality proposal presentation takes time. Between research, internal strategy meetings, building the proposal itself, and finally printing and shipping it, the process can eat up tens of work hours per person. That’s why many large organizations have entire teams whose only job is sourcing, answering, and sending RFPs.

man and woman working on rfp response online

While research and strategy will always take real time, the right tools can streamline the rest of the process and save your team both time and money. Teams that build RFP documents online can cut proposal production time significantly, freeing that time up to perfect the pitch and respond to more RFPs each month.

What Are the 4 Steps to Building an RFP Proposal Online?

Building a professional RFP proposal online takes four steps: pick an on-demand print partner, start from a template, personalize the content, and review a digital proof.

Step 1: Choose an on-demand print partner. Pick a platform with on-demand print solutions, so you’re never stuck printing 15 copies just to hit an order minimum. Order minimums waste money and warehouse space, and they’re not sustainable for a team that needs to move fast.

Step 2: Start with a proposal template. A solid RFP template keeps you from missing key sections or tabs, and gives your team a consistent starting point across proposals.

Step 3: Personalize your RFP. A template gets you started, but personalization is what wins the business. Include tailored language and images, reference current events relevant to the client, and use the requesting company’s colors or logo where appropriate. These 4 tools can help your RFP response stand out even further.

Step 4: Review the online proof. Check that your answers are accurate, your offers are compelling, and your layout holds up. Working with an online print partner means you can route the proof for approval digitally instead of printing and passing around paper copies, which saves time, paper, and money.

What Should You Do After Building Your RFP Proposal Online?

After building your proposal, choose your finishings and print it through the same on-demand platform, then ship it directly to your prospect.

Because you built the proposal through an on-demand print platform, you can stay in the same system to choose finishings that make the RFP stand out: durable binding that holds up to repeated handling, tabs for easy navigation, and a paper stock that feels as polished as the content inside.

From there, print and ship. You can send a single proposal or hundreds, delivered straight to your prospect’s desk. Even working up to the last minute, on-demand print options can get your order delivered by the next morning, anywhere in the world.

Why Does Building RFP Documents Online Save Your Team Time and Money?

Building RFP documents online saves time and money because on-demand printing removes order minimums and cuts out manual print-and-ship steps.

On-demand printing eliminates order minimums, so you’re never over-ordering proposals you don’t need. That alone gives proposal teams back hours they used to spend standing at a printer. When you build your proposal online, you streamline the entire process and cut out the friction of managing it in-house.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long does it take to build an RFP proposal online?

Research and strategy take the same amount of time they always have, but online tools speed up the build, proof, and print stages by removing physical proofing and print minimums from the process.

What’s a competitive RFP win rate?

The average RFP win rate is around 45%, based on a survey of 1,500+ proposal teams. Since this comes from self-reported survey data, treat it as a general benchmark, since your own win rate will vary by industry and deal size.

Do I need to meet an order minimum to print an RFP proposal?

No. On-demand printing lets you order a single copy or several hundred, based on how many stakeholders need a printed version.

Key Takeaways

Building your RFP online takes four steps: choosing an on-demand print partner, starting from a template, personalizing the content, and reviewing a digital proof.
On-demand printing removes order minimums, saving money and warehouse space.
Personalization is what separates a template from a proposal that wins, especially since win rates run around 45% industry-wide.
The right print partner lets you go from a finished digital proposal to a printed, bound RFP on a prospect’s desk, anywhere in the world, by the next morning.

Ready to streamline your RFP process with on-demand printing? Get started with Mimeo today.

Gene Plotkin

VP of Sales

Gene Plotkin is VP of Sales at Mimeo, with more than a decade of experience helping organizations rethink how they create and distribute business documents. A published writer on sales psychology and go-to-market strategy, he's spent his career at the intersection of buyer behavior and business growth. His posts help companies understand the real-world buying decisions behind print, and how smarter document strategies translate into better business outcomes.