Tendering

Tender FAQs

1. What is involved in submitting a tender?

Tenders present a terrific opportunity to win new work and grow your business. They also require a significant investment of time and resources, with no guarantee of a successful outcome. Writing a winning tender involves careful analysis of the requirements, identifying the key themes of your response, planning and managing input from various authors, checking the terms of the contract, defining your offer (including the price) then reviewing your submission to ensure it is compliant, well written and free of spelling and grammatical errors before it is printed and delivered within the deadline.

2. What is my chance of success?

As with any other sales process, there are no guarantees when you submit a tender. The first hurdle is compliance; that is, your response must meet all the requirements outlined in the request for tender (RFT) even to be considered. If you do make the shortlist, the purchaser will then look at factors such as how well your offer meets their requirements, value for money, your track record and experience in their industry. You need to convince the purchaser that your offer represents the best of all the choices presented to them.

3. How do I decide whether or not to submit a tender?

Before you begin writing, you should first make a realistic assessment of your chances of success. Is the requirement a good fit with your business? Do you have enough time to respond? Is the value of the new business enough to justify the risk and cost involved in submitting a tender? If you aren’t confident of being able to produce a compelling tender in the time available, consider saving your resources for the next opportunity.

4. How should I structure my response?

The purchaser will sometimes dictate the format for responses, possibly even providing a template for you to complete, or they may leave the structure and format up to the tenderers. If it is the former, you will need to follow the instructions closely and provide all the information requested. In the case of a free-format tender, you will need to determine the most appropriate structure and content.

5. What assistance can Red Pony provide?

We can assist in a number of ways, depending on your requirements and your budget. You can bring us in at the beginning to manage the bid process, define a response structure, create a document template, refine key themes and incorporate content as it comes to hand within the master draft of the response. We can identify gaps and suggest improvements to the content and structure, as well as drafting a cover letter or executive summary to ensure you have the attention of your reader right from the beginning. Alternatively, we can just provide an additional pair of eyes at the end to proofread the submission to check spelling and grammar before it is submitted. It’s up to you.

6. Does Red Pony have a template solution we can use?

No, we don’t have generic templates and we strongly recommend that you avoid ‘off the shelf’ content solutions. While there may be common elements, each tender has unique requirements specific to the purchaser. It is vital that you can demonstrate an understanding of these requirements rather than provide generic marketing or sales material. We treat any information provided to us by your organisation in the strictest confidence, and we will not share your documentation with any other client. What we do offer is a number of tools and a robust management process that has been thoroughly tested over numerous engagements to manage all communications and file exchanges throughout the project.

7. How much does it cost?

We charge a flat hourly rate and provide detailed timesheets with all invoices so you know exactly what the costs are. We can provide a ‘time and materials’ estimate at the beginning of the project where we estimate the total hours based on a review of the requirements and our experience with similar projects. The costs will also depend on our level of involvement – if you choose to bring us on to the project from the beginning we can provide a holistic, end-to-end service; alternatively, we can come in at the end to provide a pair of ‘fresh eyes’ to review the final document. Remember, the greater our involvement the more value we can provide.

8. What is the next step?

Contact a Red Pony consultant by phoning or emailing our office to discuss your specific requirements. We can provide a basic assessment and an obligation-free capped ‘time and materials’ quote. If you decide to proceed, all you need to do is sign and return the authorisation and we will set you up with an account in our online project collaboration application.

More information

To learn more about our tendering and proposal writing services and how we can help you, contact Red Pony.

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tendering

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