The Tender Process Explained

Imagine you own a construction company. Your work is currently coming in at a slow pace and it’s having a detrimental impact on your income. With staff and suppliers to pay and future plans to realize the investment, you would like to try something to bring more business in.

So, what does one do?

The most logical action to require, during this situation, would be to use for long-term contractual work. If you'll secure future contracts, you'll find that it stabilizes your income and allows you to run a sustainable business.

But, how does one leave and win these long-term contracts?

This is where the tender process comes into play.

By understanding the tender process and knowing the way to write a successful bid, you'll secure the long-term work that’s getting to have the most important impact on your business.

Before we get too excited though, let’s breakdown what the tender process seems like and the way you'll utilize it to your business’s advantage.

What is a tender?

An invitation to tender is often defined because the formal offer to bid for work/projects.

A tender document may be a document that a supplier will submit in an effort to win the work.

A tender document, sent out by an organization, will be got to include:

Description of products and services to be procured

Conditions of tender e.g. qualifications, experience, etc.

Evaluation criteria

Submission content and format

What is the tender process?

For some companies, tendering can cause all kinds of headaches. If you're not conversant in the method it can seem daunting, complicated, and slightly overwhelming.

But, we are here to help!

With over 10 years of experience in helping businesses win bids, we have a deep understanding of the tender process that we are happy to share with you!

So, let’s break it down into chronological steps below.

1. realize the bid before it lands on your desk

you simply are often in-the-know about future bids. a couple of those might be through software to trace upcoming bids, notifications, networking, meet the customer events, desktop research, and even stories within the media. If you recognize a few bid before it goes public, you'll put yourself during a far better position and prepare In a perfect world, you'd already realize a bid before it's gone public. There is a spread of the way that yourself for when it goes live!

2. Initial bid/no-bid decision on whether to travel for it or not

Bidding isn’t simply a numbers pool. Bidding can take tons of your time and resource, so it’s imperative that you simply specialize in the bids you're genuinely keen to win and deliver. By being selective together with your bidding, you'll increase your win rate and spend some time and money more efficiently. So, before you plow ahead and submit a bid, first assess whether or not you ought to be bidding then make the rational decision.

3. Research the client

If you've got made the choice to bid, you now have some work to do! we might always recommend that you simply research the client, so you'll get a far better understanding of their business and the way you'll fulfil their needs. Essentially, by researching and understanding the client, we will determine what their goals are, what makes them tick, what issues they need had within the past - these are samples of "hot buttons". the thought is then to supply a service/product (solution) which will address these.

4. Assessing the likely competition

As well as doing the research on the client, you furthermore may got to know who you're rising against. Unfortunately there’s no way of directly knowing who else are going to be bidding alongside you but keep your competitors front of mind when developing your own bid response.

You will got to stand out from your competition so as to win the work, so it’s always helpful to know your position amongst your competitors. How is your offering different to theirs? What USP does one have over them? How are you able to catch up on possible advantages they'll have over you? you would like to think about of these options and establish an understanding of your competitors.

5. Build a perfect solution to the clients needs

Once you've got an honest understanding of your client and your competition, you'll now start to create a perfect solution for the client, meeting their needs and business objectives. believe how you're getting to use stats, figures, previous work and more to validate your points and position yourself as a far better choice than the competition.

6. Bid documents arrive

Depending on how you've got been monitoring an upcoming bid, you'll be notified when the bid documents become available to you. If you're employing a procurement portal, the documents are going to be available to you online. you'll then print them off, if necessary, and make notes on them as you would like. Alternatively, you'll be emailed the bid documents, so it all depends on the client and the way they're publishing the bid.

7. Final bid/no-bid decision

After you've got hung out watching the bid document, it's now time to form a final judgment and choose whether you're getting to bid or not. At this stage, it's imperative that you simply understand the questions being asked and therefore the requirements that you got to meet. Having an honest understanding of what the client wants, and an awareness of whether or not you'll fulfill their needs will make the ‘bid or no-bid’ decision much easier to form.

8. Kick the bid off - decide who is doing what and when it's being done

Assuming that you simply have gone ahead and decided to bid, you'd now got to decide who will perform each section of the document and establish when it must be done by. it's going to be that you simply need a couple of people to figure on the bid, not only to save lots of time but also as individuals, they'll have specialist knowledge that they will apply to certain sections of the document. there'll even be a deadline that the bid has got to be submitted by, which suggests you would like to plan and prepare well beforehand so you aren’t rushing.

9. Plan the bid - storyboard the bid and agree to win themes

Now for the interesting part; the design of the bid. Once you recognize who is doing which a part of the bid and when it must be finished , you'll now start to structure and storyboard your pitch. The storyboard is crucial as that's exactly what you're doing; telling the story of why you're the proper business to hold out the work.

You can then establish your ‘win themes’ which are essentially; themes that tell the client what’s in it for them and why they ought to select you, over your competitors. Win theme’s can provide the hook to draw the client in, so confirm you get them right!

10. Write the bid

The most important a part of the tender process has arrived. You’ve researched your client and competitors, you’ve proposed an answer , prepared your storyboard and now it's finally time to write down your bid. When it involves bid writing, many of us are inexperienced, lacking in writing ability or just don't understand the way to construct a winning bid.

If you're trying to find assistance with a bid, it's always an honest idea to contact knowledgeable bid writing company and obtain them to assist or write your bid for you. At Tender bidding, we are bid writing experts with a win rate of over 75%. So, if you would like help together with your bid, get in-tuned with us!

11. Review the bid

Before you plow ahead and submit your bid, it's important that you simply review the document (we suggest twice) and confirm to iron out any mistakes. once you review your bid, put yourself within the customer's shoes and think “would I work with this business supported their proposition’.

The more you'll view your bid from the purchasers perspective, the higher insight you'll get into whether it'll be a hit or a not. Alternatively, Tender bidding have a bid review service where we will either: review and discuss your bid, review and improve or work on your strategy, review then improve the bid.

12. Submit the bid

Once you've got finished your bid, and you're happy to send it to the client, you'll now plow ahead and submit your bid. It’s crucial to stay an eye fixed on the deadline through the entire tender process. there's nothing worse than having a couple of days to organize , structure and write a bid, all because someone did not keep track of the deadline. Once you submit the bid, the work doesn’t stop there either.

13. Assess what went well and what didn't go well

After submitting a bid, it’s always an honest idea to assess how the method went for you. Did your team work well together? Did something delay the process? Did you effectively establish your win themes? How did you manage some time up to the deadline?

To make the tender process easier for next time, ask yourself the questions above and reflect on the ways you'll improve. It’s useful to write down this information down and feed it back to your team so most are on an equivalent page for subsequent bid.

14. Possible interview/presentation

If you were successful in your bidding attempts, you'll now be asked to possess an interview or present your pitch to the client.

15. Possible negotiation

If all goes to plan, the client might want to barter on the terms and conditions, and even the prices too.

16. Contract award

At the ultimate stage of the tender process, you'll be notified if you've got won the contract or not. If you were successful, you now have secured long-term work for your business - cheers to that! Now you'll prepare to hold out the work and take the initial steps required to maneuver the method along.

For future bids, it’s always good to think about why you've got won the contract and confirm to stay a record of your bid for reference. Usually, you'll be scored or given feedback on whether your bid was successful or not. This feedback is crucial to your business and wishes to be considered for future bidding.

How to learn more about the tender process

If you're new the tender process, you'll still have many questions and not be 100% clear on how you'll get the results you would like . Luckily, you don’t got to be a bid writing expert to win bids for your business.

All you would like is that the right guidance and to follow the bid writing principles which will set you up for fulfillment . one among the simplest ways to find out about the tender process is to hunt professional advice from bid writing companies/tender writing consultants.

Tender bidding we’ve been helping companies win more contracts for over 10 years. So, we've a superb understanding of the tender process and the way to urge the results you would like .

We can work directly together with your company to supply your bid submissions and make sure you win the contract you desire the foremost .

Alternatively, if you'd wish to get a more hands-on approach and learn the fundamentals yourself, we also offer bid writing and tender training courses. In our courses, you'll learn to write down clear, concise and compelling bids that cause you to stand out from your competitors.

Not only will you walk off equipped with bid writing know-how but you'll be awarded CPD points for completing our training courses.

To find out more information on our bid writing training courses, visit our page here.