You have worked hard at the tender, submitted your response and are awaiting the outcome – but there is no news!

• No news may be good news. (You haven’t been told you’ve lost it.)
• No news may be bad news. (If they are not talking to you they may be talking to someone else.)
• No news may simply mean there is no news. (They may not have moved forward with the project at all yet.)

All this is, of course, highly frustrating. You want to know where you stand, and if there is anything you should be doing. However you don’t want to annoy your prospect with continual phone calls or emails – and anyway, this would all come across as being a bit desperate.

So what can you do? Of course the very best solution is to have a champion on the inside, but that is easier said than done at this stage in the proceedings. (They need putting into place at an earlier stage.)

One ploy that I sometimes use is to send an email saying something like, “I am assuming that, because we have not heard, that we have been unsuccessful on this occasion.” This usually elicits some sort of response, often with clues as to what is happening. If they say something along the lines of, “We expect to make a decision soon”, they are probably negotiating with a competitor (bad news). If they say, “We haven’t evaluated responses yet”, that is neutral (no news). If they say, “We will be coming back to you and other bidders soon with some clarification questions”, you are still in the frame (and maybe it is down to the final one or two bidders – but they won’t say that) (good news).

So my tip is, if you have not heard, ask the questions – but be circumspect, and take care not to sound desperate. Then interpret the response. It may help, but it may not. If not, sit tight and hold your nerve!

Tender Byte No 11 : "Form Filling - Just a Question of Getting Around To It"

Invitations to Tender (or ITTs) can, at first glance, appear to be just another form to fill in.

ITTs, as well as PQQs, RFIs and all those other abbreviated documents, often arrive when you are busy (as if you are ever not busy). You probably browse through them, just so that you have a rough idea of what’s involved, and put them to one side to be dealt with when you have a little time available. All the early questions look quite straightforward; company address, registration number, directors’ information, bankers, insurance and so on – so when you look at it later it should be just a question of assimilating the detail.

Of course it often takes a little longer than expected to get around to it! However the clock is ticking (and nagging away in the back of your mind). Eventually you get around to it, and once you have answered all the straightforward, albeit time-consuming, questions, there is a dawning realisation that the bulk of the responses actually require a huge amount of creative input.

This is the moment of truth! Do you have enough time and resource available to complete the task within the deadline – and to complete it in a way that maximises your chance of success? After all, this is a competitive selling situation.

My tip is this; evaluate the task early and fully. Make sure you understand what’s involved and plan accordingly. Furthermore you should plan to complete the task ahead of schedule. You never know what you might emerge as you go through the exercise.

Tender Byte No 10 : “Exemplify”

Have you noticed a trend with tenders recently? Increasingly often, in order to score good points, you are asked for examples, and in order to score top points you are asked for well-worked examples.

Beware, this is not to be taken lightly.

A training certificate, exemplifying, for instance, the qualifications of your staff, is not it itself an “example”, and is certainly not a “well-worked example”. A well-worked example may be where, for instance, you describe a situation that you have encountered, what you have done to deal with it, what the outcome was, what the benefit to the customer was and what the long term effect on your business has been. In other words - a mini case study. What’s more, using the same example to support responses to different questions, even if it exemplifies different aspects, is not looked on favourably.

Unfortunately there is no easy answer to this. If you respond to tenders regularly you will develop a library of examples over time. But in the short term there is much work to be done.

My tip is this; buckle down when you are next asked to produce examples ... and provide some really good ones! That way you will be working up your library for the future.

Tender Byte No 9 : “Arm's Length”

I’ve often been told that you can’t develop a relationship with your prospective client during the formal tendering process. There is a fair amount of truth in this – they certainly hold you at arm’s length inasmuch as all questions and answers are circulated for all to see, and everything is kept strictly above board.

However, simply asking intelligent questions – over the phone if possible – will begin to create an impression that could work in your favour later.

I’ve been asked by clients, from time to time, to follow up tenders that they have failed to win. I’ve even been told on such occasions that one of the elements that has worked in the successful tenderer’s favour has been the amount of questions that they’ve asked. This has clearly translated into achieving a high score in the tender submission. The point being, the more clarification you seek the better your chance of getting the answer right.

My tip is, be careful how you do it, but don’t assume you can’t develop a dialogue and establish a relationship during the formal tender process – and ask lots and lots of questions.

Tender Byte No 8 : “All you have to do is answer the questions!”

Tenders normally contain a set of questions. Some of them may sometimes seem a little strange, but logic would dictate that just writing an answer should be enough.

However, that may lead to composing an answer that fails to score well. Further analysis of the question could unearth deeper meaning.

Key points to consider:

• Why have they asked the question?
• What is the right answer?
• What information are they looking for?

You may be surprised by what you can glean. The real meaning of the question may be cunningly disguised behind an innocent looking facade! In order to understand this you have to put yourself in the mind of the questioner. What might you be looking for if you were setting the tender?

This may sound over-analytical. Getting it right may shed some light on what appear to be very strange questions, but getting it wrong may cost you the tender.

So my tip is – don’t just take tender questions at face value. A little detective work, some psychology and plenty of verbal reasoning will be of enormous value and could pay off handsomely.

Tender Byte No 7 : "The Value of the Lost Tender"

When you win a tender the value is clear to see. But when you lose one it may all seem like wasted effort. Clearly you haven’t won any business, and if you leave it at that there will be no further benefit to be gleaned.

However, if you regard all tenders that you submit as being part of the overall sales and marketing process of your business much more can be gained. Simply put – always ask for feedback. I find that people are usually very happy to provide feedback, and, although they probably won’t talk about specific competitors, you can get a very good measure of how you stack up against the competition.

Having received the feedback the question is how best to use it. What you are looking for is not just how well you answered that specific tender – but how you are shaped up as a business to address particular issues, and whether you are pitching your business effectively. So, getting feedback from a number of tenders and spotting trends is really important.

My tip is this: always ask for feedback. You may be surprised how much you get, and how useful it can be!

Tender Byte No 6 : "Write the answer ... then read the question"

Of course, you should have read the question before writing the answer. However only reading it before you answer the question is very dangerous. It is surprisingly easy to find yourself answering what you thought the question was, only to find, on re-reading it, carefully, that it actually asked something else.

The temptation at this point is to pretty much make do with what you have written, and just change it a little. However you score no points for a good answer if it doesn’t answer the question! If it requires completely re-writing that is what you will need to do.

My tip is, read the question, re-read the question and read it again. In fact, keep on referring to the question until you are fully satisfied with the answer.