Understanding Keywords Part 2.
Picking up where we left off. If you haven’t read Part 1, I encourage you to read that first.
6. Be Strategic with Your Executive Summary
Your executive summary is often the first (and sometimes only) part of your proposal that reviewers will read in detail. Make sure it includes a concentration of well-chosen keywords that summarize the scope of your project while highlighting its alignment with the agency’s priorities.
ACTION: Review your executive summary to ensure it contains the key terms you’ve identified from the solicitation. Aim for a balance between clearly stating your innovation and signaling its relevance through keyword usage.
If you are debating between synonyms that may convey the same thing, check out the SBIR Research Portal to validate which phrases are more popular in awarded Abstracts.
7. Avoid Keyword Stuffing
While using relevant terms is important, keyword stuffing—overloading your proposal with terms just to fit them in—can backfire. It can make your proposal sound robotic, unnatural, or worse, out of touch with the real challenges you aim to address. Reviewers can spot when a keyword is forced into a sentence or paragraph, and this detracts from the overall clarity and persuasiveness of your submission.
A good rule of thumb is to use keywords where they fit naturally, enhancing rather than distracting from the narrative. If you find that you’ve mentioned a keyword more than three times in a short space, re-evaluate how necessary that repetition is.
8. Use Headings and Subheadings to Include Keywords
Headings and subheadings serve as valuable signposts for reviewers, guiding them through your proposal’s structure. Including keywords in your headings can enhance the readability and ensure that reviewers immediately grasp the focus of each section.
Example:
Original Heading: “Our Solution”
With Keyword: “Cost-Effective AI-Based Healthcare Diagnostics Solution”
This helps clarify what specific problem your innovation addresses and aligns your proposal with the solicitation's focus areas.
9. Leverage Appendices and Supporting Documents
If you're limited by page count in your main proposal, consider using appendices or supporting documents to introduce more detailed technical terms or keywords. For instance, you can include technical data, schematics, or market analysis that uses keywords without disrupting the flow of your main proposal.
This is highly dependent on the Submission Instructions. As a general rule, reviewers are pressed for time and the more flow your main proposal has, the better. The reviewers may or may not spend any time looking at supporting documents.
10. Test Your Proposal with a Readability Tool
After drafting, run your proposal through a readability tool that highlights overused words or complex sentence structures. This can help ensure that your proposal remains clear and readable despite the technical content. Reviewers value clarity as much as innovation—don’t let keyword overload obscure your message. In the current era of AI assistants, this is easier to do than ever, and it WILL pay off.
Conclusion
Strategically using keywords in your SBIR proposal is essential to ensuring that your innovation aligns with both the solicitation's needs and industry trends. By embedding them naturally throughout your problem statement, technical approach, and commercialization plan, you can make your proposal more compelling without compromising the underlying idea. Focus on balance: every keyword should add clarity and purpose, not detract from your innovation’s narrative. With this approach, your SBIR proposal will not only catch the reviewers' attention but also convey a well-rounded and market-ready solution.