Steps to Preparing a Tender Response

Register the tender in your tender management system. Track it even when you decide not to bid. This shows your win rate over time.

Print two pages per A4 sheet, back and front. Flip on the long edge. This makes review quicker. Skip this step if you need large print.

Read the whole document. Highlight the key points. Write down the closing date and time. This is your fixed deadline.

Work out your chances of winning.

If your chances are low, decide whether to bid. Sometimes other benefits are worth the cost.

Companies that don’t choose tenders carefully often “shotgun” their proposals. They hope something hits. This causes problems:

• More volume pushes staff into templated responses. Templated responses become templated losses.
• Random effort wastes critical resources.
• Poor quality bids reduce your chance of winning.

Once you decide to submit, set a realistic budget.

Disciplined companies work out bid costs by activity, not by salary.

As a benchmark, bidding for $500,000 worth of work should cost around $11,200. It should take about 224 hours of internal staff time.