How to create your swipe proposal

Summary:

Learn how to create and customize a Swipe proposal in OpenSolar. Swipe proposals provide an interactive, chapter-based experience designed for residential sales, allowing customers to move through system details, savings, pricing, and next steps on any device. This guide covers creating a reusable Swipe template, customizing pages and content, applying it to a project, and sharing the finished proposal with your customer.

Table of contents

• Swipe vs Scroll proposals
• Before you start
• Create a Swipe proposal template
• Preview and edit your Swipe template
• Customize your Swipe template
• Open a Swipe proposal on a project
• Customize the proposal for a specific project
• Send and share the proposal
• Limits and troubleshooting
• Related articles

Swipe vs Scroll proposals

OpenSolar offers two proposal experiences: Swipe and Scroll.

	Swipe	Scroll
Style	Interactive, chapter-based proposal	Long-form, scrolling document
Best for	Visual residential sales presentations	Detailed proposals, quotations, and PDFs
Template	Swipe	Scroll, tagged Classic
Commercial projects	Not available	Available

You can create and use both template types within your organization and choose the experience that best fits each project.

This article focuses specifically on Swipe proposals, previously known as Sales Machine.

For a more detailed overview of all Swipe functionality, see the Swipe Proposal User Guide.

Before you start

Before creating a Swipe proposal, make sure your organization and project are ready.

Organization requirements

• Swipe must be available for your organization. If you do not see a Swipe template card, contact OpenSolar Support.
• You need permission to manage Proposal Templates.
• Add your company logo and highlight color under Control > Company > Business Info so your branding appears correctly throughout the proposal.

For more information, see How to Add or Update Business Information.

Project requirements

Before opening Swipe on a project:

1. Make sure the project is residential. Swipe is not available for commercial projects.
2. Complete a valid Design with at least one system.
3. Add Payment Options if you want to display savings, financial information, or checkout.
4. Make sure six or fewer systems are selected for the proposal, including electrification systems. If more are selected, reduce them from the Payments tab.
5. Add a customer Contact if you plan to email the proposal through OpenSolar.

Note: Swipe template previews use standard Design projects rather than Quick Quote projects.

Create a Swipe proposal template

Swipe templates are created at the organization level, allowing you to configure them once and reuse them across multiple projects.

To create a Swipe template:

1. Open Control from the top-left corner.
2. Go to Purchase Experience > Proposal Template.
3. Click + Proposal Template.
4. Under Sales Machine Proposal Templates, select Swipe.
5. Optional: Select Demo on the Swipe card to preview a sample proposal before creating your own.
6. Enter a Title for the template, such as Residential Swipe.
7. Add an optional Description, Template Image, or archive status.
8. Save the template.
9. Select Full Screen to begin editing the proposal using live project data.

The Template Image appears as the thumbnail your team sees when choosing a proposal template from a project.

Unlike Scroll templates, Swipe templates do not use the same Is Default setting. Your team selects the Swipe template from the template library on the project's Proposal tab.

Preview and edit your Swipe template

The template editor lets you preview the customer experience while making changes.

Select a preview project

Choose a residential project with completed systems and payment options so the preview can display realistic project information.

For the best results, select a project that represents a typical customer sale.

If you see the message:

This project doesn't contain enough information to generate a Sales Machine Swipe proposal

select another project with a valid design and payment options.

Open Full Screen

Select Full Screen to open the full Swipe editor.

The editor includes:

• A live proposal preview
• Page controls
• Editing tools
• Proposal settings
• Device previews

Use the device selector to preview the proposal on desktop, tablet, and mobile.

Where available, select View as customer to experience the proposal as your customer will see it.

When you're finished editing, select Save from the full-screen toolbar.

How customers navigate Swipe

Swipe proposals are organized into chapters.

Common chapters include:

• Home — Cover and introduction
• Energy — Energy usage and proposed system
• Savings — Bill savings and financial information
• Go — Quotation, next steps, and checkout

On mobile and tablet, customers swipe between pages.

On desktop, customers can move through the proposal using the on-screen arrows or keyboard arrow keys.

Customize your Swipe template

Swipe gives you control over the proposal structure, page content, branding, financial displays, and checkout experience.

Some settings are available from the main Proposal Template page, while page-level design and content changes are made in the Full Screen editor.

Featured Figures

Choose the headline metrics you want to highlight throughout the proposal, such as:

• System size
• First-year savings
• Payback period
• Other financial or system metrics

Select figures that best support your sales process and are most useful to your customers.

Disclaimers

Add or customize disclaimers for different sections of the proposal, including:

• Hardware
• System performance
• Bill savings
• Quotation
• Cash payment options
• Loans
• PPAs
• Leases

Advanced Settings

Use Advanced Settings to control additional proposal behavior.

Proposal checkout

Choose whether customers can accept the proposal online.

You can:

• Enable checkout
• Disable checkout
• Automatically disable checkout when the proposal expires
• Add a custom message when checkout is unavailable

Bill savings chart

Choose whether to hide the export credit breakdown from the cumulative bill savings chart.

Net financial impact chart

Lock the minimum and maximum chart axes so different payment options use the same scale, making comparisons easier for customers.

Template Image

Add an image to represent the template within the project template library.

This can help your team quickly identify the correct proposal when multiple Swipe templates are available.

Customize pages in Full Screen

Open Full Screen from the organization template or from a project's proposal.

The left sidebar includes three main areas:

• Pages
• Edit
• Settings

Pages

Use Pages to control the structure of the proposal.

Depending on the page type, you can:

• Add pages
• Hide pages
• Rename pages
• Reorder pages
• Delete supported pages

Select Page to open the available Page Templates.

Available templates can include:

Brand pages

• Cover Page Style 1
• Cover Page Style 2
• Cover Page Style 3
• About Us
• Customer Testimonials
• Our Solar Services
• Video Page

Graph pages

• System Performance
• How Your System Works
• Bill Savings
• Net Financial Impact

Layout pages

Where available:

• Blank Page
• 1 Column
• 2 Column
• 3 Column

Swipe pages use predefined, structured layouts rather than free-form drag-and-drop placement.

For more information, see Pages and Edit in the Swipe Proposal Editor.

Edit

Select a page and open Edit to change supported content.

Depending on the page, you may be able to update:

• Text
• Images
• Typography
• Other page-specific content

Select an editable area directly from the preview to open its available settings.

Changes appear in the proposal preview as you make them.

For more information, see Editing in the Sales Machine Proposal.

Settings

Use Settings to manage proposal-level options such as:

• Language
• Valid Until date
• Contract Template

Save your changes from the full-screen toolbar before leaving the editor.

Open a Swipe proposal on a project

Once your template is ready:

1. Open a residential project.
2. Make sure the Design and relevant Payment Options are complete.
3. Go to the Proposal tab.
4. The template library will open with the message Choose a template to create a proposal for your customer.
5. Select the Swipe template you want to use.
6. OpenSolar will generate the proposal using the project's design, payment options, and your Swipe template.

On a new project, the template library may open automatically the first time you visit the Proposal tab.

If both Swipe and Scroll templates are available, you can choose which experience you want to use for that customer.

Customize the proposal for a specific project

You can make project-level changes without changing the organization template.

Open the project's proposal and select Full Screen.

From here, you can update:

• Pages
• Page content
• Language
• Validity date
• Contract template
• Other supported proposal settings

These changes apply to that project only.

If the organization template is updated

If the original Swipe template is changed after a project proposal has already been customized, the template card may display Updated.

When you select the updated version, OpenSolar may warn that applying it will overwrite the project's current proposal.

Choose:

• Override — Apply the latest organization template and overwrite the project's customized version.
• Cancel — Keep the project's existing customized proposal.

Use Override carefully if the project contains customer-specific page or content changes.

Send and share the proposal

Once the proposal is ready:

1. Open the project's Proposal tab.
2. Select Send Proposal to Customer.
3. If you have unsaved changes, select Save & Send instead.
4. Choose how you want to share the proposal.

Available options can include:

• Email — Send directly through OpenSolar. A customer contact with a valid email address is required.
• Share link — Enable link sharing and copy the proposal URL.
• Direct sharing — Send the copied link through your preferred communication method.

Customers can open the proposal on desktop, tablet, or mobile and move through the available chapters.

If checkout is enabled, they can also accept the proposal online.

Limits and troubleshooting

Situation	What to do
You're working on a commercial project	Swipe is not available. Use a Scroll proposal instead.
Too many systems are selected	Reduce the number of selected systems, including electrification systems, to six or fewer from the Payments tab.
The Swipe card is unavailable or greyed out	Check that the project is residential, has a valid design, and does not exceed the supported system limit.
There is no Swipe template in Control	Swipe may not be enabled for your organization. Contact OpenSolar Support.
The preview says the project doesn't contain enough information	Select a residential preview project with a completed design and payment options.
The template card shows Updated	The organization template has changed. Select Override to apply the latest version or Cancel to keep the project's current proposal.
Checkout is disabled	Enable checkout under Advanced Settings, or update the proposal's Valid Until date if checkout is configured to stop after expiry.
The proposal looks different on mobile	Use the device preview in Full Screen to check desktop, tablet, and mobile layouts before sending.