Case Study: Proposal Support & Consulting for Women’s Mental Health and Wellness Provider

Once Upon An RFP provides Grant Application Support & Consulting for a Women’s Mental Health and Wellness provider.

Company Overview:

Our client is a woman-owned, small business that builds collaborative relationships with clients to guide them through issues of self-esteem, self-development, family, work concerns, and physical and sexual trauma. Their expertise is in caring for various emotional and behavioral concerns. Services are provided in a comfortable and supportive atmosphere that encourages healing. Our client offers a highly personalized approach tailored to each individual’s needs towards their personal growth.

With a growing client base and a recent uptick in publicly funded programs, and grant opportunities, the client sought Once Upon an RFP’s expertise in responding to several grant opportunities.

Grant applications for these programs are detailed, compliance-driven RFPs, requiring financial, insurance, capacity, and metric-based outcomes assessments, thus prioritizing the need for comprehensive compliance checks, an intimate understanding of HIPPA, and responsive content tailored for each program.

Once Upon an RFP aimed to take much of the administrative burden of proposals from the client’s principals, allowing the client’s team to focus on efficiently serving their existing clients and researching new developments in the industry.

Award Overview:

BGE Energizing Small Business

In 2021, BGE and the Global Entrepreneurship Network awarded 176 small businesses with $20,000 grants through its Energizing Small Business Grants program. This grant program is part of BGE’s $15 million pledge to assist small businesses with COVID-19 relief and recovery and is a multi-year commitment expected to run through at least 2023.

Methodology:

The client shared past RFP wins and losses, brand guides, and company background information.
The Once Upon an RFP team reviews initial grant documents and provides a time estimate.
The Once Upon an RFP team schedules a kickoff meeting with principals.
The Once Upon an RFP team creates a project plan, schedule, and proposal draft for each project, outlining all requirements, including submission information.
The Once Upon an RFP team meets with key client stakeholders and SMEs, including customer support personnel, the technical team, and financial experts, to gather relevant information for the opportunity.
The Once Upon an RFP team generates responsive written and graphic content for the opportunity, adhering to proposal requirements involving formatting, page counts, and volume numbers.
The Once Upon an RFP team engages with relevant submission portals, required registrations, and other administrative tasks ahead of the proposal submission date.
The Once Upon an RFP team meets regularly with the client’s team to share drafts, incorporate edits, and provide updates regarding the opportunity, amendments, addenda, and industry changes.
Once the client approves the final draft, the Once Upon an RFP team finalizes the proposal documents, providing editing, proofreading, and document clean-up; the Once Upon an RFP team then exports the file(s) to the specified format and sends final documents to the client.
For online portal submissions, the Once Upon an RFP team schedules a live call with the client’s team to share and video-record the submission process.
For email submissions, the Once Upon an RFP team coordinates with the client’s team to confirm who will send the email. Once sent, the sender forwards either the original email or a confirmation of receipt for company records.
For physical submissions, the Once Upon an RFP team coordinates with the client’s team to confirm who will print and package the proposal and whether to hand in or mail the proposal.
Once submitted, the Once Upon an RFP and the client’s teams check for award announcements, follow-up questions, or date changes.

Conclusion:

With Once Upon an RFP’s assistance, our client is one of less than 200 $20,000 grant award winners that will be able to expand their practice through a multi-year commitment from BGE.

Challenges and Lessons Learned:

Every grant opportunity is different and can require extremely specific financial commitments from the applicants.
Compliance and post-award reporting is the key to successful grant renewals.
Past award success lays the foundation for future grant applications.