How to Write a Quote That Wins More Jobs (Template)

Here's something I've watched happen too many times: a tradie does brilliant work, prices the job fairly, and still loses it to a competitor who was slower, dearer and not as good. The difference wasn't the work. It was the quote. The other bloke sent a clear, professional quote that afternoon, and our tradie sent a vague text two days later. Customer picks the one who looks like they have their act together.

A quote isn't paperwork. It's the first real proof of how you run your business, and most customers decide whether to trust you with their money based on it. So let's get it right. In this guide I'll show you how to write a quote that wins jobs — what goes in it, how to make it clear, how to be fast, and how to follow up without being annoying. There's a template and a checklist near the end you can steal.

What a winning quote actually does

Before the how, the why. A quote has one job: to remove every reason the customer might have to say no. Price is only one of those reasons. The others are doubt, confusion and friction — and a good quote kills all three.

• It removes doubt. It looks like it came from a real business, not a bloke with a phone and a guess.
• It removes confusion. The customer knows exactly what they're getting, what it costs and what happens next.
• It removes friction. It's easy to read, easy to say yes to, and easy to act on.

If your quote does those three things, you'll win work even when you're not the cheapest. People pay a little more for certainty all the time.

Break the job into clear line items

The single biggest upgrade you can make is to stop sending one lump-sum number. A bare figure like "Fencing job — 4,200" gives the customer nothing to hold onto, so they fixate on the only thing they understand: the total. Break it down and the conversation changes completely.

Line items do two things. They show the customer where their money goes, which builds trust, and they make it obvious how much actual work and material is involved, which justifies the price. A fencing quote with separate lines for materials, removal of the old fence, posts and concrete, labour and rubbish removal reads as fair. The same total as a single line reads as expensive.

How granular should you go?

Enough to tell the story, not so much that it becomes a spreadsheet. Five to eight line items is the sweet spot for most jobs. Group sensibly — "Materials" can be one line if itemising every screw would be silly — but always separate the things customers care about, like labour versus materials, and anything optional they might want to cut or add.

Make it fast — speed wins work

I'll say it plainly: the quote that arrives first usually wins, as long as it's decent. Customers reach out to a few tradies and book the one who makes it easy. If you take three days to send a quote, you've told them exactly what working with you will be like.

The trick to being fast isn't typing quicker. It's never starting from a blank page. If you build quotes in an app where your common line items, your rates and your business details are already there, a quote that used to take half an hour at the kitchen table takes a few minutes on site. That's the whole reason I made editable quotes a core part of Projects Plus — so you can quote before you've left the driveway.

Projects Plus lets you build a clean, itemised quote on your iPhone and send it as a professional PDF in minutes — on site, before the next bloke even gets there.

Send it as a professional PDF

How a quote looks matters more than tradies want to admit. A tidy PDF with your business name, the line items laid out clearly and a total at the bottom signals competence. A number scrawled in a text message signals the opposite — even if your work is far better.

A proper quote PDF should include all of this:

1. 1Your business details — name, contact, and ABN if you have one.
2. 2The customer's name and the job address — so it's clearly for them.
3. 3A short description of the work — one or two lines on the scope.
4. 4Itemised line items — with quantities and prices where it helps.
5. 5The total — clear and unmissable, with GST shown if it applies.
6. 6What's not included and any conditions — deposit terms, validity period, timeframe.
7. 7A clear next step — how they accept and what happens after.

When the customer asks for a change — and they almost always will — you want to edit that same quote and re-send a fresh clean PDF, not start over or end up with five confusing versions floating around. Being able to revise and re-send the one quote is the difference between looking organised and looking chaotic.

Make it easy to say yes

You'd be amazed how many jobs stall not because the customer said no, but because saying yes was a hassle. They have to reply, you have to confirm, someone has to remember the deposit. Every extra step is a chance for the job to go cold.

The best setup lets the customer view the quote, accept it, and sign it digitally — all without printing anything or playing phone tag. In Projects Plus the customer can open the quote, accept it and add a digital signature, so you've got a clear record that they agreed to this scope at this price. No ambiguity later about what was or wasn't part of the job.

Most jobs aren't lost on price. They're lost in the gap between 'I'm interested' and 'how do I say yes?' Close that gap and your win rate climbs without dropping a dollar.

Follow up — once, well

Sending the quote isn't the finish line. A huge number of quotes get a yes only after a gentle nudge, because life gets busy and your email slid down the customer's inbox. One short, friendly follow-up a few days later — "Hi Sarah, just checking you got the quote for the back fence and whether you had any questions" — wins a surprising amount of work that would otherwise drift away.

Don't badger. One follow-up, maybe two. If you're tracking your quotes in one place you can see at a glance which ones are still open and need a nudge, instead of trying to remember who you quoted last Tuesday.

The winning-quote checklist

Run every quote through this before you hit send. If you can tick all of it, you've written a quote that does its job.

• Sent the same day or next day wherever possible.
• Broken into clear line items, not one lump sum.
• States what's included and what isn't.
• Looks professional as a clean PDF with your business details.
• Shows the total clearly, with GST if it applies.
• Has an easy way to accept — ideally view, accept and sign digitally.
• Notes deposit terms and how long the price is valid.
• You've set a reminder to follow up once if you don't hear back.

Want all of that built in? Projects Plus handles itemised quotes, clean PDFs, digital acceptance and the whole job after it. See what's included on the [features page](/features) or check the [pricing](/pricing).

From quote to paid

A winning quote is the start, not the end. Once it's accepted, the same details should flow into the job itself — the deposit you collect, the expenses you track, and finally the invoice you send. When that whole path lives in one place, you never re-type anything and nothing falls through the cracks. If you want to see how the full path works, I've written up the complete quote-to-invoice workflow end to end.

Frequently asked questions