Comparison
A DocuSign alternative for small services businesses
DocuSign is very good at what it does, and for a lot of companies it is the right answer. This page is about the case where it is not: a small services business where the same person writes the quote, drafts the contract, sends it for signature and chases it.
The short version
Choose DocuSign if…
Choose DocuSign if you need qualified electronic signatures, remote notarisation, SSO, a deep integration with Salesforce or a specific line-of-business system, or if your counterparties are large enough that they expect to see the DocuSign envelope. None of that is a small requirement, and none of it is something we do.
Choose DraftYourBid if…
Choose DraftYourBid if signing is the last step of a job that starts with writing a proposal or a quote, and you would rather not run two subscriptions and copy client details between them.
DraftYourBid vs DocuSign, feature by feature
| Feature | DraftYourBid | DocuSign |
|---|---|---|
| Electronic signature | Yes, all plans | Yes, all plans |
| Certificate of completion and audit trail | All plans, including free | All plans |
| Qualified electronic signature (QES) | No | Paid add-on, per recipient |
| Advanced electronic signature (AES) | No | Enterprise tier |
| Writes the proposal or quote for you | Yes, from your own past documents | No |
| Client pipeline | Included | Via integration |
| Bulk send | Solo and above | Business Pro and above |
| Automatic chasing of unsigned documents | Solo and above, on a 3/4/7-day cadence | Yes |
| Contract renewal warnings | Included | Via the agreement-management product |
| Pricing model | Per plan, with seats included | Per user |
| Integrations | Few | Over a thousand |
| Single sign-on | No | Enterprise tier |
What DocuSign does better
- Qualified and advanced electronic signatures, which matter for a narrow but real set of documents in the EU
- Over a thousand integrations, including a Salesforce managed package
- Remote online notarisation
- Single sign-on and organisation-wide access controls
- Brand recognition — some counterparties simply expect a DocuSign envelope
- Compliance depth and certifications that an enterprise procurement review will ask for
What we do better
- The proposal, the quote, the contract and the signature are one workflow, not two products
- A light client pipeline is included, so the contract is attached to a client record rather than floating in a folder
- Document allowances are monthly on paid plans, not an annual bucket you can exhaust in March
- The full certificate of completion and audit trail are on the free plan, unwatermarked
- Team and Agency include seats rather than charging per user
- The whole product and the documents it generates are available in eleven languages
How DocuSign prices it
We do not quote anyone else’s prices here. They change often enough that a number on this page would be wrong before you read it, and the shape of the pricing matters more than the figure anyway. Both live pricing pages are linked below.
- Priced per user, per month, on the team plans
- Envelope allowances rather than unlimited sending — the entry plan is a small monthly number, and the team plans are an annual allowance per user
- Qualified electronic signatures are a paid add-on charged per recipient
- Advanced electronic signatures require talking to sales on the lower tiers
DocuSign’s public pricing and feature pages were last read on 21 September 2026. If something here no longer matches what they publish, their page is right and ours is out of date — tell us and we will fix it.
The real difference is where the document comes from
DocuSign starts when you already have a finished document. That is the correct design for a company where the contract was written by legal, approved by finance, and handed to sales to send.
In a small services business none of those handoffs exist. The same person scoped the work, priced it, wrote it up and is now trying to get it signed before the client goes quiet. In that job, "upload the finished PDF" is not the start of the process — it is the middle.
Envelope allowances are the thing to check
E-signature pricing is usually quoted per user per month, which makes it look comparable to any other seat-based tool. The number that actually bites is the envelope allowance, and on several plans across the industry that allowance is annual rather than monthly.
An annual allowance is fine if your sending is even across the year. If you send most of your contracts in two busy months, work out what happens in month three before you commit.
When DocuSign is simply the right answer
If a counterparty specifies DocuSign, use DocuSign. If you need a qualified electronic signature under eIDAS, use DocuSign — we do not offer one and pretending otherwise would waste your time. If you are being asked for SSO and a security review, that is an enterprise requirement and we are not an enterprise product.
We are a good fit for a much narrower situation: a small team that wins work by sending documents, and wants one tool for the whole of it.
Frequently asked questions
Is DraftYourBid cheaper than DocuSign?
Not always, and it depends entirely on what you are comparing. DocuSign has an inexpensive single-user entry plan for e-signature alone. Our equivalent plan costs more but also drafts proposals and quotes and includes a client pipeline, so the comparison is only fair if you would otherwise be paying for two tools. Check both current price pages and compare what is in each plan rather than the headline figure.
Can I import my existing DocuSign templates?
Not directly. You can upload the underlying PDFs and place signature fields on them, which takes a few minutes per template. There is no migration tool.
Are your signatures as legally binding as DocuSign’s?
For ordinary commercial contracts, both produce signatures recognised under eIDAS in the EU and UK and under the ESIGN Act and UETA in the US, evidenced by a certificate recording who signed and when. DocuSign additionally offers qualified electronic signatures, which carry a higher evidentiary status and are required for a small number of document types in some countries. We do not offer those.
Do my clients need a DocuSign account to sign?
Neither product requires the signer to have an account. In both cases they open a link and sign in the browser.
Try it on a real document
The free plan sends three documents a month with the full certificate of completion. That is enough to judge it on your own work rather than on a comparison table.
Start for freeFree plan available · No credit card required
DocuSign is a trademark of its respective owner. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by them. This comparison reflects their publicly published pricing and feature information on the date shown above, and is our own reading of it.