Five reasons a review can improve your tender submission

Having another person review your tender responses ahead of submission is crucial for many reasons: a bid document tends to be lengthy and to consist of various sections, so it is easy to miss something. You can’t possibly proofread your own writing effectively, and as well as removing typos, another opinion can help strengthen and improve your bid score.

We discuss the five main reasons a review can be beneficial in winning you a contract and improving your success rates.

You can’t see the wood for the trees. If you have been working on a bid for a few weeks it is likely that you are susceptible to missing something and aren’t the best placed to check your responses for accuracy and quality. Getting an external source to review your submission can help to point out any areas for focus and possible mistakes, as well as commenting on the overall strength of the tender.

It is impossible to proofread your own work. At Executive Compass we have a lovely proofreader called Jane, because as writers we cannot proof our own work. It is really important not only to have someone else review your work, but to get someone to proofread it, too. Although you are not being marked solely on grammar and spelling, your evaluator won’t take too kindly to a tender document littered with mistakes and typos and this can show you in a bad light.

You might be non-compliant. Bid and tender submissions often include various Excel spreadsheets, documents to upload, appendices and supporting materials. If your tender is being submitted via an online portal (which is very likely) there is usually quite a bit of admin to do, and so it is very easy for a document to be misplaced or a box unticked. A review of your tender submission for compliance is crucial so that nothing is left out – it would be awful to fail due to one box not being ticked!

Improving the quality. A reviewer who can offer a critique is best, as this will force you to evaluate some of your responses and ensure that your final draft is of the highest quality. Ultimately this could make a difference of a few marks; and this could be those few marks that are between you and your main competitor. This may not seem necessary if it is a small bid, but for ‘must win’ bids or contracts that are really important it can literally mean the difference between winning and losing.

Thinking from the evaluator’s perspective. A review from a professional bid writing company can offer an insight into the evaluator’s perspective and help you to identify what the buyer is looking for. This can be through interpreting questions, assessing the specification and essentially marking your tender against the evaluation criteria. At Executive Compass we review a lot of tenders and regularly see well-written responses that just do not answer the question, and therefore will not score very highly. A review can double-check you have responded to the tender in the way intended and whether you are likely to be successful.

To discuss how our review service can take your tender submission to the next level, read more here or contact our team today to discuss. The tender review service is a low-cost, low-risk option but one that can improve your bid submission and ensure you have the best possible chance of securing a contract.