Two apps enter, one app leaves!
A few weeks ago, I had a need I don’t usually have, which was to create a proposal. I figured this was the ideal time to try out a few different proposal-creating apps and compare them in a review…the results are below!
(It’s worth noting going in that I don’t regularly create proposals and have never used a proposal creation tool before, so I may have missed a few things or had a harder time than someone who comes from that background would have.)
The Bidsketch video review:
The Quoteroller video review:
Price comparison:
- Bidsketch: Starts at $29/month
- Quoteroller: Starts at $15/user/month
As you can see, they have slightly different pricing methods; Quoteroller is priced per user for its $15/month and $25/month plans (the $200/month plan includes up to ten users), while Bidsketch has a built in user limit at each price tier (the second tier is $79/month for up to three users.
Features:
- Bidsketch includes analytics, electronic signatures, and custom domains on its basic plan. Additional plans add the features of realtime team collaboration on proposals and permission/role management for your team. The higher priced plans also include more users and more storage.
- Quoteroller’s most basic plan doesn’t include custom template design, and neither does the $25/user/month plan. The most basic plan does include drag and drop design with “content blocks” that you can customize/create templates of, analytics, and custom branding (logo adding and customizing the background–which is interesting because I didn’t come across this feature when creating the test proposals, so it could be a little more obvious). The higher level tiers include custom subdomains, Salesforce integration, customized fields, team user permissions, and an account manager, among a few other features.
Integrations:
- Bidsketch integrates with Basecamp, Freshbooks, Harvest, Highrise, Salesforce, and RightSignature.
- Quoteroller integrates with (among others–this is just a sampling, seriously) Harvest, Freshbooks, Xero, Nimble, Base, Insightly, Highrise, Capsule CRM, Podio, Basecamp, and RightSignature. *whew*
- Both integrate with Harvest (my time-tracking tool of choice) and say that there’s a one-click ability to convert a proposal to a project in Harvest afterwards. I didn’t get a chance to test this, but if it works well that’s a big bonus. Quoteroller also allows for payment directly from the invoice, with the ability to add a Paypal button.
- The Paypal button feature from Quoteroller probably wouldn’t work as well if you were doing a subscription/monthly retainer type service, but for what it’s worth, you could convert a monthly retainer proposal to a Harvest invoice/project, and then make the Harvest invoice automatically recurring on a weekly/biweekly/monthly basis.
Other notes:
When dealing with both instances of customer service, I had no complaints–I had to contact both of them to ask to extend my trial for review purposes and they were prompt and friendly. I also had to ask Bidsketch customer support about a glitch (still not sure if it was on my end or their’s); I couldn’t customize the design on the PDF at the end, but their support was fast and friendly.
Review/showdown conclusion:
- Bidsketch has more features overall, but I found Quoteroller a lot easier to hit the ground running with.
- I had an easier time setting up monthly retainer options on Quoteroller–though again, it’s worth noting that while doing the review I found an easier way to do that–where on Bidsketch, I had a hard time with that.
- Bidsketch, though, has more design customization options. I really liked Quoteroller’s drag & drop blocks and the sections, but I wish I could have at least changed the font options. (In the video, I said that you can’t change the background, and apparently you can even on a basic account, but I didn’t see that as a noticeable option during the proposal creation process.)
In short:
- If aesthetics and customization of the final proposal is your top priority, Bidsketch is probably going to be your winner.
- If quick and super-easy proposal preparation is your priority, Quoteroller might be the way to go.
- Also, Quoteroller kinda beats Bidsketch into the ground as far as integrations go, so if creating a well-integrated suite of applications is a high priority for you (and/or you use several of the apps that it integrates with already), that could be a swaying factor.
They’re both great options, each slightly better suited for different needs…hopefully the breakdown helped some, though! (Also, I’ve got at least one other idea for a similar breakdown/head-to-head comparison post–let me know if you like this format and want to see more of them.)