(Updated 4/16/2022 with additional benefits information.)
Presumably you saw my earlier post, “I just re-rejoined the Association of Proposal Management Professionals. So what?” This post is a follow-up to the “So what?” part, specifically addressing clients of my consulting firm Bredemarket (marketing and writing services for biometric, technology, and general business firms) who DON’T use me for proposal services.
I said the following in that prior post:
But there are benefits for my Bredemarket clients who DON’T depend upon me for proposal support, but instead depend upon me for content marketing or other marketing and writing services. The same strategies and tactics that contribute to a more effective proposal can be extrapolated to apply to other areas, thus contributing to better white papers, better case studies, better blog posts, better social media posts, better marketing plans, etc., etc., etc. Again, this can help my clients win business.
(Yes, I intentionally used the words “win business.”)
Of course, now I’m in the initial process of making use of my new/old APMP membership by soaking in APMP things (while ALSO hopefully contributing things) that will benefit me and my clients.
I’ll talk about live webinars, the APMP Body of Knowledge, and the benefits for Bredemarket’s non-proposal clients.
Live webinars! Well, sometimes
My first opportunity to obtain value from my APMP membership came on Wednesday July 28, when the Western Chapter (a merger of the California Chapter and other chapters) scheduled a webinar entitled “Persuasion Through Page Architecture.” The presenter, Nancy Webb, offers over 30 years of design expertise. I recall the name, so I’ve probably attended a previous presentation of hers during my second (or perhaps even my first) stint in APMP.
Sadly, I was unable to learn from Nancy Webb on July 28. A major requirement for a webinar is the ability to access the web, and when we all logged into the webinar on Wednesday, we learned that Webb’s Internet connection was out and that the meeting would have to be rescheduled.
Ah, technology.
The APMP Body of Knowledge
But MY Internet connection is working, so on Thursday afternoon I was able to visit the APMP website and poke around some more.
Which led me to the page describing the APMP Body of Knowledge (BOK).
And yes, I’m going to call the Body of Knowledge the BOK from now on. Bok bok bok.
It’s no surprise that the proposals world has a slew of acronyms (more on that later).
One important thing you need to know about the APMP BOK; it’s only for APMP members.
The APMP Body of Knowledge (BOK) is available to all APMP members in good standing.
Well, I haven’t done anything to lose my good standing yet, although if I were to log in to the BOK, copy all of the content, and post it here in the Bredemarket blog, I would obviously get in a heap of trouble. For one thing, Wordman would come after me.
As it turns out, Wordman could come after me in multiple ways. In addition to his superhero status, Wordman (Richard “Dick” Eassom) chairs the APMP Western Chapter, and is also an executive with SMA, Inc. (which I previously joined). I could get kicked out of the APMP AND SMA in one fell swoop!
(I could go off on a tangent and say why Moses was the most evil man in the Bible, but I really shouldn’t.)
(Moses broke all Ten Commandments at once.)
Um, John, let’s get back to the BOK
So I’m NOT going to go behind the firewall and redistribute the internal content of the APMP BOK.
But I CAN note what the APMP publicly says about the BOK.
TL;DR: as I’ve noted when talking about the brouhaha, the BOK and the APMP itself talk about topics that have applicability far beyond the creation of a proposal.
The topics are grouped into seven categories, which represent key practice areas for improving an organization’s business development focus:
Understand business development
Focus on the customer
Create deliverables
Lead a team
Manage processes
Train staff
Use tools and systems
Obviously, all seven of these categories apply to the creation of a proposal.
Benefits for my NON-proposal clients
And all seven of those categories just as easily apply to the creation of a blog post, case study, white paper, corporate strategy, or ANY deliverable for a customer-facing firm.
(4/16/2022: For additional information on benefits, click here.)
Again, I can’t speak about BOK specifics, but I spent part of Thursday afternoon reading about a topic which would have benefited me greatly in one of my NON-proposal positions with IDEMIA/MorphoTrak/Motorola/Printrak. Well, better late than never.
There are a number of helpful pieces of content in the APMP BOK, including…a list of common proposal acronyms. (CPAs??? No.)
For those who don’t know this, the major purpose of acronyms is to allow people of a small group to exchange secret communications in the presence of the non-initiated. “When you complete the response to the RFP for DoD, ensure that the collected KPIs align with the BD-CMM.” (In truth, many of these acronyms are used outside of the proposal profession, but the acronym list collects some of the important ones in one place.)
So I anticipate that I’ll be spending some significant time in the future reviewing the APMP BOK. And if all goes well, I’ll actually RETAIN something from these BOK content reviews that will result in better written content for ALL Bredemarket clients.
(And yes, Dick, I know that there’s also an SMA body of knowledge to which I have access…)
Another acronym is CTA
Incidentally, if you are a biometric (identity) or technology firm that needs a proposal (or content) consultant, feel free to contact Bredemarket.
- Send me an email at john.bredehoft@bredemarket.com.
- Or go to calendly.com/bredemarket to book a meeting with me.
- Or go to bredemarket.com/contact/ to use my contact form.
Bredemarket 
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