Five Top Tips for Tendering Success
Millions in work contracts are awarded each year through Council tender processes, so it’s worth your while to learn how to write a good one.
Venture Melton asked tender writing expert Jessie Harman from Harman and Associates for her five top tips to writing a winning tender.
1. Planning is essential
Preparing tenders is time-consuming and requires considerable investment. Set aside time to read and understand the tender documents, prepare a checklist of the information you require and if necessary, organise your bidding team. Make sure you leave time at the end to review and edit your submission and lodge it well before closing time.
2. Consider the bid/no bid decision
Tendering for the wrong business just isn’t worth it, so take time to decide whether you really want this work. Consider things like strategic fit, whether or not you meet the requirements of the job, including things like licences, systems and timeframes. Most important, consider the financial implications of the work – both the cashflow impacts now and your capacity to generate a decent return on your investment further down the track.
3. Demonstrate you can provide a solution to the purchaser’s problem
In the end, purchasers are seeking a solution to a problem. While the attributes of your goods and services are important, more important are the benefits that you provide; benefits like lower whole-of-life costs, faster turn-around times, increased reliability and reduced fail-rates are very attractive to purchasers.
4. Understand the purchaser’s evaluation criteria
To help you frame your tender submission, make sure you understand the criteria purchasers use to evaluate bids. Whilst the words may change, the criteria generally cover four key areas:
Business credibility - your technical capacity, systems, financial capacity, experience
Individual credibility – your credibility as a business owner or the ability and track-record of your team
Project credibility – your approach to the work required
Price
Note also whether some criteria are weighted more heavily than others and remember that multiple people may be involved in assessing the bid.
5. Ensure your bid is conforming
If your bid doesn’t conform with the tenderer’s requirements, it is likely to be excluded at the start. Ensure you use the correct response template, provide all the required information and make sure you possess the relevant accreditations, licences and systems. Demonstrate you have relevant previous experience and lodge your submission, likely online, ahead of closing time.
Responding to tenders isn’t natural for most of us, so use these five top tips to improve your chances, and if necessary, seek additional assistance from your local business advisor, industry association or the Industry Capability Network (ICN).
Whilst tendering may not be something we particularly enjoy; it is definitely something that gets better with experience.
Jessie Harman
Director
Harman and Associates
Finding out about Melton City Council Tenders
Council typically promotes work out for tender via the council website and in the tenders section of the Saturday edition of The Age newspaper.
You can receive automatic notifications about Council’s tendering opportunities by registering your business on our tender portal or via Tender Search, a fee-for-service tenders notification portal that automatically sends Council tenders directly to your email inbox.
For more information on the Melton City Council tender process, procurement policy and standard purchase orders terms and conditions:
Visit the Melton City Council website
Contact Council’s Procurement & Purchasing Coordinator Donna Anderson on 9747 7200 or financesupport@melton.vic.gov.au.