Send a Dubsado proposal to a new lead with AI

1. On the Dubsado Home page, click New project and fill in the Project title, the Contact (pick an existing one or create a new contact) and a Project status, which every project needs.
2. Open the new project, go to the Forms tab, click the + button, pick your proposal in the Apply Form Template to Project dialog and click Apply Template.
3. When you open a proposal that already sits in a project, Dubsado replaces its contract setting with the banner "Please add the contract directly to the project", so a proposal meant to carry a contract needs that contract added to the project as well.
4. Select the proposal, click the pencil to personalize this copy, then open the Share dropdown and choose Send; the composer opens with the Send Form default template.
5. Edit the subject and body and click Send. Every lead from outside the form repeats the whole sequence, and checking that the email is not already a contact with an open project is easy to skip.

Maya Chen (maya@example.com) asked about a spring brand shoot in my Instagram DMs. Create a lead project "Spring brand shoot" and send her my Brand Photography proposal with a short personal note.

1. 01

   Check whether the lead is already a contact

   The agent searches list_clients by the email the lead wrote from. When the contact exists with a project still in a lead status, it stops and asks whether to send the proposal there instead of opening a second project for the same person.

2. 02

   Open the project in the right lead status

   create_project gets the title, email and name from your message and the status you use for this stage, such as "Proposal Sent". If the status name you give is not one of your lead statuses, the agent lists the ones you have and waits; it never guesses between "Inquiry" and "Proposal Sent".

3. 03

   Pick the proposal by name

   list_form_templates with type proposal gives the candidates. One clear match is applied with apply_form_template. Two similar names ("Brand Photography" and "Brand Photography 2025") go back to you as a choice.

4. 04

   Add the contract the proposal expects

   When your proposal template is set to include a contract, the agent also applies your contract template to the project, because Dubsado takes the contract from the project, not from the proposal, once it lives in a project.

5. 05

   Write the email and wait for your OK

   send_form goes out with a subject and a two-line message built from what the lead told you (the date they asked about, the kind of shoot). Without a note from you, your Send Form template is used as is. You see the draft and approve the send.

Maya Chen (maya@example.com): new contact, no earlier projects.
Project "Spring brand shoot" created in lead status Proposal Sent, project date 18 Apr 2027.
Applied: Brand Photography proposal, plus Photography contract (the proposal includes a contract).
Sent after your OK: "Your spring brand shoot proposal", 12 Oct 2026, 09:02.
Not sent: Tom Reyes already has the open lead project "Reyes headshots"; say if the proposal should go there.

• Dubsado public proposals, which create the project when a lead submits them, need the Premier plan and at least one field mapped to Client Email Address; on Starter, proposals can only be sent inside a project.
• Dubsado always generates an invoice from the packages a client picks when a proposal is submitted, even if Include invoice is set to No; that setting only hides the invoice from the client.
• Every Dubsado proposal needs at least one package template from Invoicing > Packages, and editing a package on one proposal does not change the package template.
• The Send Form default template under Messages > Default templates is shared by proposals, questionnaires and sub-agreements, so a note written for a proposal belongs in that one email, not in the template.
• A Dubsado Flow email can carry only one form, while a manual send can link several project forms through the Project links button.

send_form asks for your OK by default. To run it on a schedule without you, switch confirmation off for that tool in your dashboard.

Sources: Dubsado Help: Creating projects · Dubsado Help: Send a proposal, questionnaire, or sub-agreement · Dubsado Help: Connect a contract and invoice to a proposal · Dubsado Help: How to set up a public proposal

curl https://cotlet.dev/api/v1/dubsado/create_project \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $COTLET_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"title":"Spring brand shoot","client_email":"maya@example.com","client_name":"Maya Chen","status":"Proposal Sent","project_date":"2027-04-18"}'

{
  "project_id": "prj_3d81b07e",
  "title": "Spring brand shoot",
  "client": {
    "client_id": "cli_41a7e2",
    "name": "Maya Chen",
    "email": "maya@example.com"
  },
  "category": "lead",
  "status": "Inquiry",
  "created_at": "2026-10-11T09:00:00Z"
}

MCP: add https://cotlet.dev/mcp/v1 with the same key; the tool is dubsado_create_project. Example data.

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