Customizing your Proposal Templates

Summary:

 

The article explains how to create and edit proposal templates in OpenSolar, including setting defaults, customizing content, and managing various sections like Proposal Settings and Cover Page Template. Additionally, it covers creating multiple templates for different needs and applying them to specific projects.

 

Table of contents:

Creating Your Default Proposal Template

Editing Your Proposal

• Proposal Settings Section:
• PDF Content Section:
• Cover Page Template Section:
• Standard Page Template Section:
• Proposal Content Section:
• Advance settings:
• Advanced Settings section

Creating an Additional Proposal Template

 

 

Creating Your Default Proposal Template

You are able to create and edit proposal templates in the Control zone of OpenSolar by accessing Control > Purchase Experience > Proposal Templates.

 

To create a new template, select the + create at the top. Enter the name of the template and save the window. This will create a new template for you. This template will be empty from any custom information and just our default information will show. 

 

Editing Your Proposal

We will overview the four main sections of your proposal:

• Proposal Settings
• PDF content
• Cover Page Template
• Standard Page Template
• Proposal Content
• Advance settings

Note: Any changes you make to the proposal template must be SAVED to take effect.

 

 

Proposal Settings Section:

Validity: The default proposal validity will be how many days you want the proposal to be valid for. 

 

This will impact the date which is shown in the placeholder "Valid Until Date". It will incorporate the date that the project was created and the number of days shown here in order to calculate this date.

 

Proposal sections: You are then able to toggle on/off the visual representations to be displayed in your online proposal and PDF download. Below you can see an example of how the proposal will appear if you were to choose not to display a certain infographic.

OpenSolar allows you to include custom content blocks throughout the proposal. (Ex. ITC Disclosure, Additional Content, Etc.) By default in the Proposal Settings, you will see three different blocks that you can switch on and move through the proposal by using the arrows. In proposal content, with the WYSIWYG editor, you can include images, text, and placeholders in this section.

 

Featured Figures will represent what information will be displayed along the top bar of the online proposal.

You will have 4 sections to choose from. If you do not wish to show a specific item in the section anymore simply select a different item from the list or select none to not show anything for that feature figure:

 

Business Video: Here you are able to paste a YouTube link for additional business or educational material.

 

 

 

Exhibited content: This area allows you to select if you want to show exhibited content or not.

When set to yes, the hardware exhibited information will show: 

When set to now it will not show:

 

Show product types: This section allows you to select the hardware you want to show on the proposal. If you always select other components in the project but do not want to show them on the proposal you can click on the down arrow and click on others to remove this selection:

     

PDF Content Section:

The PDF content section allows you to select the information that will show in the PDF section.

Systems to Include in PDF: This section allows you to select the system and payment options that will show on the PDF once its generated. You can either choose to include the "Selected" system option in the PDF or to include "All" system options in the PDF.

 If the "Selected" option was used then only the 12 Panels would be displayed in the PDF, but if the "All" option was chosen then both the 12 Panel system and the 22 Panel system would be included in the PDF.

 

 

Similarly, with payment options, you can choose to either include the options that are "Selected" or include "All" payment options.

Note: We advise you to choose selected for the system options and all or selected for the payment options.

QR code: Within the PDF proposal, there are two QR codes that can be added. One is to take the customer to the online proposal and the other is to take the customer to the finance application. You can toggle the two options on or off if you want these to show.

 

Cover Page Template Section:

  

This section covers all of the options that are available to you for customizing your proposal (PDF) cover page.

Cover page title: Gives you the option to edit the heading which appears on the cover page.

 

Cover page image: Allows you to change the image shown on the PDF cover page. There is a default image already set up which will be used if you do not upload one.

 

 

 

Cover page image format: This allows you to select if you want the uploaded image to be a full page or just a half page. 

Co-branding logo: If applicable, you have the option to upload a co-branding logo which is used in your proposal.

 

 

Cover page Message: In this section, you can customize the message to the customer. You can write a message to your customer as well as combine it with our placeholders to pull information from the project to the message.

To add a placeholder, click on the icon and choose the placeholder from the drop-down list.

 

 

 

 

Cover page Headers and footers: You also have the ability to edit the Headers and Footers which will appear in the PDF. See the images to understand exactly what is changed by the various text boxes within the proposal template.

 

 

 

 

 

Standard Page Template Section:

  

In this subsection of Proposal Templates you are able to edit the standard page template. This allows you to edit what will be displayed as the footer for each standard page in the PDF proposal.

 

 

 

 

Proposal Content Section:

 

This section, allows you to customize the wording throughout the proposal instead of just selecting what is being shown.

Each of these is text-editors (you can find about how to use text-editors here).  This section is broken down into two subsections, general content and disclaimers:

• General Content
  • About Us
  • Next Steps
  • Quotation Content
  • Content Block 1
  • Content Block 2
  • Content Block 3
• Disclaimers
  • System hardware components
  • System performance
  • Environmental Benefits
  • Bill Savings
  • Daily Energy Flow
  • System Quotation
  • Financial Impact

You can add text, placeholders, and images to customize these sections further.

Customize Headings: This area allows you to customize what the sections are called in the proposal.

 

Advance settings:

The advanced settings section gives you the option to decide what happens to a project once it reaches its validity date. You can find more information on how to handle an expired proposal here: Handling Expired Proposals

 

Creating an Additional Proposal Template

If you wish to tailor specific proposals for special circumstances then you can create additional proposals that have different layouts or focus on different pieces of equipment for example.

 

In order to apply a non-default proposal to a project, see the How to Set Project Proposal Details which explains how to select different proposals for specific projects.