subject: Making The Winning Bid [print this page] Your small and medium sized business too can achieve success through the opportunities presented by public sector contracts. If you have an understanding of the public procurement process, then you have a much better chance of making the winning bid.
If you have been invited to tender, then you must make an effort to completely understand the way public procurement works. This knowledge will help you to succeed in bagging a tender. Also, when you are tendering make sure that you are timely and adhere to the announcement requirements. Your companys tender responses must also be clearly detailed as well as formatted in the order that has been followed in the notice lists. Do not forget to index any additional information in the right manner.
While tendering, you must be very careful and must always comply with even the smallest detail. Most tender announcements follow a format determined by the European legislation. This makes them all very similar to each other. For instance, the details and items expected from you in the advert will be almost always the same for all public departments. That is why many smart businesses have made their task easier by building a database of required information. This database also allows for a genuine consistency of your response all the time and you can respond to the tender announcements in a fully informative and satisfying manner.
Once you know what you will write about your company, your next concern must be the manner in which you submit information as it is equally important. Your tendering response is a reflection of your company and its professionalism. So if it is ill-presented, inaccurate or unintelligible, then your companys reputation will be deeply affected. So, make sure that you present content in a presentable, clear and defined manner to win the bid. The officers at the government body look for ways to reject applications and if you have submitted an attractive clear response, then you can come out of the selection process successfully.
To produce technically and commercially high scoring bids, you must frame your responses in a manner that they are geared towards the specific tender requirements. Also, base your costing too on the precise details expressed by the public authority in the Invitation to Tender (ITT). To go through this check point safely, you must have a clear understanding of the contents of the ITT so that you can interpret it in the right manner.
Remember that your business can get the chance to supply to the local bodies and can make a winning bid, if you and your team know and understand the tendering procedures and practices used by public organisations. Also if you are aware of the legislative framework which binds and defines the government bodies actions, then you will know how to go about making a successful bid. You must also know and understand the criteria under which your bid will be evaluated.
You can gather all this information from the copies of publicly available documents like Standing Financial Instructions and Standing Orders, from the local body in question. You can also ask the local bodies for guides on selling to the government. These guides have details on their procurement and tendering process as well as the norms and conditions the suppliers have to comply with.
Keep all these pointers in mind while preparing your tender response and present a winning tender.
