Bid Management Consultancy Archives - Tender Consultants

Strategic Bid Management: Everything You NEED to Know to Succeed!

John Hudson — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 08:00:23 +0000

Here’s what you should know about strategic bid management

Got questions about strategic bid management? You’re in the right place! Here at Hudson Succeed, we thrive off teaching you anything and everything about the tendering process. Part of that process is strategic bid management. So, do you want to know what it is and how to conduct it successfully? Keep reading and you’ll learn our secrets!

What is strategic bid management?

Strategic bid management is a way of staying organised and on track when you embark on a bid. Producing a bid proposal is no easy task. There is a lot of work involved. This includes a lot of different stages and processes that can easily become overwhelming. Those that don’t value strategic bid management are likely to struggle during their tender writing process.

Tips from our experts for strategic bid management

We sat down with several of our Bid Writers to see what goes into bid management and planning for success.

1. Check you are eligible for the opportunities you source

One of the first stages of strategic bid management is checking you are eligible for opportunities. You would be surprised how many businesses ignore this factor. Read ALL of the tender documents thoroughly. Note down any key details that stand out.

If the buyer states they want the supplier to have a certain qualification, then pay attention to this. If you don’t, but you bid anyway, you’re very unlikely to win. You’ll be wasting both yours and the buyer’s time, and this won’t leave a great reputation on your part.

2. Consider exactly what the buyer requires

When you read the buyer’s documents, you need to show you have a grasp of what they’re asking. Plan out your answers to their questions. This way, you can ensure you don’t ramble and go off topic. If you do this, the buyer will grow bored and believe you can’t focus on what’s important.

3. How to create your strategic bid management plan

When you are creating your strategic bid management plan, you should consider the following:

Who will be responsible for developing responses?
How is the work to be submitted? Some buyers require physical submissions as well as online.
What format do they require your responses in?
What do you need to attach for each question?
Where is the response to be submitted and with what deadlines?
How long will each individual question take?
Do you need to create case studies for responses?

Having the answers to these questions ensures you are as prepared as possible. This also means you’ll complete the bid on time and have enough time for proofreading and reviewing. Remember: it is essential to have your bid in on time. If it is late by even a minute, you’ll lose your chance of being considered. So, create your strategic bid management plan and you’ll be set to win tenders!

Summary

Here’s a summary of what we covered:

What is strategic bid management?

To ensure your bid process runs smoothly, you need to be prepared. Bid management is the key to ensuring this. You’ll be able to stay organised and no small but essential details will go unacknowledged.

Tips from our experts for strategic bid management

Check you are eligible for the opportunities you source
Consider exactly what the buyer requires
How to create your strategic bid management plan
- Who will be responsible for developing responses?
- How is the work to be submitted? Some buyers require physical submissions as well as online.
- What format do they require your responses in?
- What do you need to attach for each question?
- Where is the response to be submitted and with what deadlines?
- How long will each individual question take?
- Do you need to create case studiesfor responses?

Want to learn more about strategic bid management? Contact us to speak with our experts and we will answer your questions!

Need help searching for tenders?

You may be wondering where you can find a tender for your business. There’s no shortage of websites offering multi-sector tendering opportunities and leads. Ideally, you should be searching for a sector-specific site that posts all unique, public and private sector opportunities.

Our sister company, Hudson Discover, has 11 sector-specific tendering portals. One centralised and easy-to-navigate portal can help you save time, streamlining the process.

Once signed up, you’ll have access to your own dedicated Account Manager. They’ll be able to answer any questions you may have about public sector contracts. You’ll also get an email alert when new and relevant tenders are uploaded to your sector.

A subscription to one of our industry-specific portals will include:

Unlimited portal access. You can browse your industry’s portal to your heart’s content. See the hundreds of opportunities that are available, intuitively categorised, and easily accessible.
A daily email bulletin. When you sign up to a portal, you’ll receive an email alert when new tenders are uploaded.
A dedicated Account Manager. They’ll handle any questions or queries you may have about the portal.
A free 20-minute phone consultation with a Bid Writer. Our expert Bid Consultants will chat with you about anything tender related.

What opportunities can I expect from a tender search on a Hudson Discover portal?

We host all kinds of tenders in both the public and private sectors. These are inclusive of, but aren’t limited to:

Open tenders
Restricted procedure tenders
Competitive dialogues
Negotiated tendering procedures
Innovation partnerships
Single supplier contracts
Framework agreements
Dynamic Purchasing Systems.

What we can do for you

We have over 60 years of bid writing experience and an 87% success rate. Whether you’re completely new to tendering or aren’t seeing results – they can help. There are four bid writing packages available:

Tender Writing

Once you’ve found a tender you’d like to go for, send it over to us. One of our professional Bid Writers will write the tender response for you. They’ll provide a full Tender Writing breakdown and even submit it on your behalf.

Tender Mentor

Tender Mentor can give your tender response a once over before you submit. The Bid Writing Team will analyse your response, notifying you of any errors and opportunities for improvements prior to submission.

Tender Ready

During the Tender Ready service, our team will create professional policies, procedures, and case studies in your company branding. If you already have this content, we will review everything carefully to ensure that nothing is missed. This service also helps businesses who are new to tendering with terminology and industry knowledge.

Tender Improvement

The Tender Improvement package can help those who have tendered before but aren’t seeing results. Our Bid Writers will assess your previous responses and work with you to develop improved content.

Get in touch to find out how we can help your business grow.

Vocal

Our support doesn’t end there! Our creative content agency, Vocal, are on hand to help.

The Vocal Team are not afraid to stand up and be heard. And we make sure our clients aren’t either! From small, micro businesses to large organisations, we are vocal about the things that make your business unique.

Our creative service is dedicated to growing your business through striking and thought-provoking content. Our team specialise in six areas, including:

If you’d like to know more about what we can do for your business, introduce yourself to the team!

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post Strategic Bid Management: Everything You NEED to Know to Succeed! appeared first on Tender Consultants.

Where to Find Bid Writing Services in the UK

Georgie Morgan — Wed, 15 Dec 2021 07:00:21 +0000

How can I find the best bid writing services in the UK?

Are you wondering where to find bid writing services in the UK? You’re not alone. Outsourcing bid writing services can give you a significant advantage over your competitors when tendering for contracts.

So, where can you find bid writing services in the UK?

You could try typing ‘bid writing services UK’ into a search engine. This may draw up bid writing businesses near you. Additionally, it may bring up other bid writing consultancies that are based further afield. Luckily for you, if you’re reading this blog, here at Hudson Succeed, we offer our own bid writing services.

What are the advantages of outsourcing bid writing services in the UK?

Increased quality

You may be wanting to find bid writers near you, but proximity doesn’t guarantee quality. You may find the best bid writing services in the UK that’s based on the other side of the country. They may have a higher success rate and more experience. Pay attention to the business sectors they specialise in.

Remember, they do this for a living, so they are likely very good at what they do. Using a bid writing professional can increase your chances of success. They know how best to tailor your business expertise in line with the specification, error-free.

More time

When you use bid writing services in the UK, it can give you more time. This time can be spent on the day-to-day running of your business. Depending on the size of the bid, they can take as little as one day, or up to three months. This is a long time.

By using an external bid service, you can carry on with the running of your company, uninterrupted. Neither you nor your staff has to sacrifice their daily tasks. This optimises the use of your time can only offer benefits. After all, nothing ventured, nothing gained!

They can save resources

Bid writing services in the UK can save on your resources. You don’t need to hire anyone and spend your time and money training them. You can carry on knowing your bid is in safe hands.

In summary

When searching for bid writing services in the UK there are a number of things you should consider. Outsourcing to a bid writing company can greatly increase your chances of success. You can focus on the running of your business knowing that your tender is in good hands. Bid Writers are experts in what they do – writing winning bids. You can trust them to know what they’re doing.

Using bid writing services can save you time and resources while increasing the quality of your submission. If you can’t write the bid yourself, there are options.

Need help writing your next tender?

If you need help with a bid, we can help. Our Bid Writers have over 60 years of tender writing experience and an 87% success rate. We know that writing isn’t everyone’s strong suit. But that doesn’t mean you should lose out on winning new business contracts. We offer four levels of bid writing support.

Our services

Tender Writing

Once you’ve found the perfect bid for your business, send it our way. Our Bid Writers can take care of the whole thing for you they’ll even submit it on your behalf. They’ll let you know what they need from you, providing you with a full Tender Writing breakdown.

Tender Ready

Our Tender Ready 4-week programme is perfect for businesses that have never tendered before. A Bid Writer will work with you to ensure you have everything in place to tender successfully. They can also help you better understand the tendering process. Tender Ready offers your business:

A 12-month subscription to one Hudson Discover.
Access to Global Bid Directors and Senior Bidding Professionals.
An Organisation-wide Bid library, including 3 case studies, 5 CVs and policies.
Additional flexible benefits.

Tender Improvement

If you’ve been tendering but aren’t seeing success from your current efforts, our Tender Improvement package can help. Our Bid Team will assess your previous responses and tender documents. They will work with you to improve for future submissions. This package includes a 12-month subscription to a Hudson Discover portal and additional tendering development services.

Tender Mentor

If you’ve written your own tender response and need it double-checked for errors, Tender Mentor can help. A Bid Writer will proofread your work for any inconsistencies, grammar or spelling mistakes. They will also ensure it’s in line with the specification before you submit. This can help you formulate a winning submission.

Additional support

If you only need assistance with PQQs or SQs we can help. Send the information over to us and we can provide you with a quote for the work involved.

Discover Elite

Upgrading to Discover Elite can help optimise your tendering efforts – even when you’re busy. Our two new time-saving tools can improve your competitor awareness and success rate when bidding for a contract.

The Ultimate Time Saver package offers your business:

A maximum of five tender breakdowns per month.
An annual subscription to a maximum of two Hudson Discover sector-specific portals. This option can help businesses that overlap two industries such as Healthcare and Technology, for example.
Pre-market and award engagement notices monitored on your behalf.
Buyer portal management, including registration, password management, downloading documents and assessing viability based on your bid or no-bid strategy.
Weekly phone calls with your dedicated Account Manager to discuss viable tendering opportunities.

The Become a Pre-Bid Master package also includes:

All of the above.
Up to seven tender breakdowns per month.
A Bid Strategy delivered by a Senior Bid Manager with a minimum of 5 years of experience. It will also be managed by our Global Bid Director.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post Where to Find Bid Writing Services in the UK appeared first on Tender Consultants.

What to Expect From a Procurement Tender

Georgie Morgan — Wed, 01 Dec 2021 07:03:26 +0000

5 ways to win a procurement tender

When writing a response to a procurement tender, you want to make it stand out from the crowd. There may be tens of other applicants competing for one tender.

You want to persuade and demonstrate to the buyer that you’re the best business for the job. Producing a winning bid takes time. You don’t want to be rushed or leave it last minute.

The average bid takes 23 hours to complete end-to-end. Therefore, it’s best that you get on the case as soon as possible. This can help you avoid unnecessary stress and account for any unexpected delays. Working back from the submission date can help you form a timeline. Remember to consider time for proofreading and revisions.

If you don’t have this time to hand, there are options. You can outsource it to a bid writing professional who will also have a better win rate.

5 ways to win a procurement tender

Quality assessing questions

When you complete a procurement tender, you can expect to be asked quality questions. The actual weighting of evaluation will likely be split between price, quality and social value (for government tenders).

Quality questions will be assessing your competence. For these, you can expect to demonstrate your capabilities and experience. You should break the question down into subheadings to make sure you’re answering every aspect of the question.

Include any relevant qualifications or accreditations that you and your staff hold. How much combined experience do you have? What other contracts have you fulfilled that’s similar in scope and style.

Address the specification

Each procurement tender is different. There is no winning formula that will work across the board. This is because each buyer has different needs. You should be tailoring your tender response to the specification and the buyer’s needs.

Reading the tender documents can help you gain a better understanding of what the buyer is expecting and wanting. Within them, it will detail certain things you need to include. It will give you a better idea of the aim of the contract and what the buyer is trying to achieve. It’s up to you to write the best answer including this information to win the contract.

Demonstrate previous contract experience

Every procurement tender will require you to have a bank of experience ready to show. Buyers will require up to three case studies of past contracts you have delivered. These will likely need to be within the last three to five years.

They should be similar in scope, scale and complexity to the one you’re applying for. Including key challenges you encountered can strengthen your bid. This shows your flexibility and problem-solving skills. Both of which are essential to tendering for work.

Keep up to date with changing legislation

It shouldn’t be surprising when I say that a winning bid from three years ago may score poorly now. Procurement legislation is always changing and it’s essential that you keep up to date with best practice.

You should be reviewing your approach to responding to procurement tenders to stay ahead of the curve. Due to the changing nature and priorities with government procurement, it’s best to pay attention. For example, social value wasn’t compulsory before 1st January 2021 – but for public sector tenders, it now is. If you submit a procurement tender for the public sector without addressing social value, you will lose marks.

Demonstrate added value

When tendering for contracts, continuously ask yourself how you’re going to add value to the buyer. It’s not enough to just say how you meet the requirements. You need to state how your goods/services/business will benefit the buyer.

This may be via reducing carbon emission targets or using eco-friendly cleaning products. Including added value can help you write a winning bid. Government buyers have certain targets and initiatives they need to meet. Do your research and say how you can help them meet these.

For public sector contracts, the tender will be awarded to the MEAT. This stands for the most economically advantageous tender. It’s when a buyer will assess tender responses on more than just price. You should consider:

Quality
Technical ability
Sustainability
Price
Innovation
Customer service
Accessibility
Ability to deliver on time.

Where can I find a procurement tender?

Half the battle is finding the right procurement tender for your business. There are hundreds of websites posting multi-sector contracts opportunities. Filtering them out can be a challenge and relying simply on CPV codes can lead to missed opportunities.

Ideally, you should be looking for a sector-specific portal that posts all tendering leads from your industry. Our sister company, Hudson Discover, hosts 11 sector-specific tendering portals.

What makes it unique, is that you’re able to filter search results by location, keyword, budget and more. This helps you find the right procurement tender for your business – streamlining the process and saving you time. They also host public, private and unique tendering opportunities, giving you more choice.

Our portals cover the following industries:

Once you’ve found the right bid for your business, you should ask yourself the following before you progress:

Am I eligible?
Do I have the necessary qualifications/accreditations?
Can I actually deliver the work?
Do I have the necessary experience?
Do I meet the economic-financial standing?
Can I write a winning bid by the submission deadline?

If you’ve answered yes to all the above questions, then it sounds like the right opportunity for your business.

In summary

Hopefully, you now have a better idea of what to expect from a procurement tender. You want to ensure that you make your tender stand out from the crowd. Demonstrating your business capabilities is essential to success. Think about how you can present added value to the buyer and read the tender documents carefully.

Keeping up to date with the ever-changing procurement legislation can help. Remember how things might differ with private buyers over the public sector. When looking for sector-specific tendering opportunities, one of our 11 portals can ensure you find the right tender.

Need help writing your next procurement tender?

If you don’t have the resources in house to submit a winning tender, we can help. Here at Hudson Succeed, we pride ourselves on being procurement tender writing experts. Our Bid Writers have over 60 years of collective bid writing experience and an 87% success rate.

You may not need the whole bid written for you. You may simply need it proofread before you submit it. We offer four bid writing support services:

Our services

Tender Writing

Tender Ready

A 12-month subscription to one Hudson Discover.
Access to Global Bid Directors and Senior Bidding Professionals.
An Organisation-wide Bid library, including 3 case studies, 5 CVs and policies.
Additional flexible benefits.

Tender Improvement

Tender Mentor

Additional support

If you only need the assistance with PQQs or SQs we can help. Send the information over to us and we can provide you with a quote for the work involved.

Discover Elite

The Ultimate Time Saver package offers your business:

A maximum of five tender breakdowns per month.
An annual subscription to a maximum of two Hudson Discover sector-specific portals. This option can help businesses that overlap two industries such as Healthcare and Technology, for example.
Pre-market and award engagement notices monitored on your behalf.
Buyer portal management, including registration, password management, downloading documents and assessing viability based on your bid or no-bid strategy.
Weekly phone calls with your dedicated Account Manager to discuss viable tendering opportunities.

The Become a Pre-Bid Master package also includes:

All of the above.
Up to seven tender breakdowns per month.
A Bid Strategy delivered by a Senior Bid Manager with a minimum of 5 years of experience. It will also be managed by our Global Bid Director.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post What to Expect From a Procurement Tender appeared first on Tender Consultants.

Tendering for Work: The Complete Guide

Georgie Morgan — Wed, 10 Nov 2021 07:00:10 +0000

3 Ways Tendering for Work Can Benefit Your Business

Tendering for work can be difficult if you don’t know what you’re doing. There’s a lot of confusing terminologies and it can be difficult to know where to begin with your tender response. The tendering process can be long and arduous with the average bid taking around 23 hours to complete.

Luckily for you, we are experts in tendering for work, having over 60 years of collective experience. Our Bid Writers have an 87% success rate. So, we thought we would share our knowledge to help get you on the path to success.

Here are three ways tendering for work can benefit your business

Secure a pipeline of work

Tendering for contracts can help you secure a pipeline of work. Securing a new business contract means that you will have a pipeline of work. Particularly if you secure a place on a Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS) or framework agreement. These tendering processes are often used within an array of sectors including construction and healthcare. The benefit of these is that they can run for years at a time. Some even have the possibility of an extension.

Guaranteed pay when tendering for work in the public sector

One of the biggest advantages of tendering for work is guaranteed payment. In the public sector, suppliers benefit from guaranteed pay upon winning a contract. This is because the Crown Commercial Service must pay contractors within 60-days of invoicing. They must do this to comply with the Prompt Payment Code. This is obviously a great benefit to your business, and it can take some of the pressure off, too.

Gain experience

If you’re a newly formed company, tendering for work is a great way to gain experience. This is particularly true if you’re able to gain a place on a framework or DPS. Buyers will require 2 – 3 case studies of past contracts you have delivered. They need to be within the last 3 – 5 years. They should be similar in scope and style to the one you’re applying for. Securing smaller contracts can help you build up that experience. The more experience you have, the bigger the contracts you can go for. The bigger bids you can go for, the bigger your business can grow.

It’s often advised that it’s common for buyers to ask to see at least two years’ worth of accounts when tendering, this is not always the case with smaller contracts and sometimes strong case studies can be used instead.

Remember these tips when tendering for work:

Be clear and concise

You want to make sure that your tender response is clear and the language is concise. If you use complicated language and long sentences, a buyer may lose what you’re trying to say. They then might not understand your point and you may lose marks. Keep sentences short and sweet.

Stick to the word count

Word/page/character counts are there for a reason. If a buyer thinks that a response needs a 1000-word answer, write a 1000-word response. Don’t go over and try not to write an answer that’s too short of the word count either.

Avoid overly technical jargon

Often, a buyer won’t be an expert in your industry, hence why they’ve put the contract out to tender. So, it’s important that you don’t use overly technical jargon. Use laymen terms were possible and explain processes in a step-by-step way if you can.

Format your responses

Formatting your response can help you subconsciously get in the reviewers’ good books. Breaking your text up with subheadings and bullet points can help. A buyer would rather see this than blocks of text. This can also help make sure that you have answered every aspect of the question. Tender questions are known for asking three questions in one.

Leave enough time for a bid review and proofreading

A common mistake that many suppliers make when tendering, is that they don’t leave enough time for proofreading. This is an important part of tendering for work. You want to ensure that your response is free of any grammatical and spelling errors. This may give off the impression of laziness and lack of attention to detail.

In summary

Tendering for work can have many advantages. These include securing a pipeline of work, guaranteed pay and gaining experience, helping your business grow.

Our services

Tender Writing

Tender Ready

A 12-month subscription to one Hudson Discover.
Access to Global Bid Directors and Senior Bidding Professionals.
An Organisation-wide Bid library, including 3 case studies, 5 CVs and policies.
Additional flexible benefits.

Tender Improvement

Tender Mentor

Additional support

If you only need the assistance with PQQs or SQs we can help. Send the information over to us and we can provide you with a quote for the work involved.

Discover Elite

The Ultimate Time Saver package offers your business:

A maximum of five tender breakdowns per month.
An annual subscription to a maximum of two Hudson Discover sector-specific portals. This option can help businesses that overlap two industries such as Healthcare and Technology, for example.
Pre-market and award engagement notices monitored on your behalf.
Buyer portal management, including registration, password management, downloading documents and assessing viability based on your bid or no-bid strategy.
Weekly phone calls with your dedicated Account Manager to discuss viable tendering opportunities.

The Become a Pre-Bid Master package also includes:

All of the above.
Up to seven tender breakdowns per month.
A Bid Strategy delivered by a Senior Bid Manager with a minimum of 5 years of experience. It will also be managed by our Global Bid Director.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post Tendering for Work: The Complete Guide appeared first on Tender Consultants.

How to Tender for Council Work

Georgie Morgan — Wed, 20 Oct 2021 07:00:17 +0000

Advice on how to tender for council work

So, you may be wondering how to tender for council work. It can be a great opportunity for your business and tendering for contracts has many advantages. However, the tendering process can be a difficult and confusing one to navigate.

Some advantages include prompt payment and securing a pipeline of work for your business. Remember, when council tendering, you’ll likely need up to three case studies. This is something that people often overlook when considering how to tender for council work. They must be similar in scope and complexity to the contract you’re applying for. This gives the buyer confidence that you know what you’re doing and have successfully done it before.

How to tender for council work

Read the tender documents carefully

You can find most council tendering opportunities on their websites or on tender portals. Here, you can register your interest and gain access to the tender documents. Remember to read these documents carefully. They’ll state what qualifications and accreditations are needed and other important information.

Structure your response

If you’re wondering how to tender for council work, you could consider the structure of your tender response. Avoid overly technical jargon and be clear and concise with your language. The council likely won’t be experts in your area, hence why they’re outsourcing it.

Using bullet points can help you include vital information while saving on the word count. Subheadings can also help you break down the question and structure your response. They can help make sure you’re answering every aspect of the question, too.

Don’t skimp on social value

Social value is a critical aspect of any public sector tender response. The council, obviously, is no different. Public sector tenders have a minimum weighting of 10% on social value, therefore, it’s not something you should consider as an afterthought. Councils want to see value for money and innovation. They care about their local communities and the environment.

Take a look at their websites to see what initiatives they support. This can help strengthen your application, including how you can add value if you win this contract. After all, they want to get the most bang for the taxpayer’s buck.

Have strong policies and procedures

The council has to uphold quality assurance. They expect your business to do the same. Do you review your policies regularly and update them? If you’re wondering how to tender for council work, you should ensure you’re upholding best practice. Councils want to be assured that the work will be completed to the highest standards with minimal risk.

Can you demonstrate quality assurance and health and safety qualifications such as ISO9001? Do you have a safeguarding procedure, environmental or equality and diversity policy? Technical Bid Writers can help you get the most out of your response, conveying what procedures you have in place.

Proofread your response before you submit

You want to submit the best tender you can. Therefore, you should ensure you proofread your response before you submit it. A good way to make sure it’s error-free is by getting someone else to read it. They can then check it’s in line with the specification and you can make any adjustments you need before submission.

So, now you know how to tender for council work. If you follow our advice on structuring your tender, reading the tender documents carefully, you’ll be well on your way. Remember to not skimp on social value and give quality assurance. Having strong policies and procedures can also help as well as proofreading your response before you submit it.

Need assistance with your next tender?

Although you’re a bit more familiar with what’s required for council contracts, you might still be looking for some support with your tender. Writing isn’t everyone’s strong suit and that’s ok. Outsourcing to bid writing specialists can help you secure that next contract and grow your business.

Here at Hudson Succeed, we pride ourselves on being bid writing experts. We hold an 87% success rate and have over 60 years of collective bid writing experience.

We offer four levels of bid writing support to suit every business need. You may not need the whole tender written for you; you may simply need it proofread before you submit. We can help with that.

Our services

Tender Writing

Tender Ready

A 12-month subscription to one Hudson Discover.
Access to Global Bid Directors and Senior Bidding Professionals.
An Organisation-wide Bid library, including 3 case studies, 5 CVs and policies.
Additional flexible benefits.

Tender Improvement

Tender Mentor

Additional support

If you only need the assistance with PQQs or SQs we can help. Send the information over to us and we can provide you with a quote for the work involved.

Discover Elite

The Ultimate Time Saver package offers your business:

A maximum of five tender breakdowns per month.
An annual subscription to a maximum of two Hudson Discover sector-specific portals. This option can help businesses that overlap two industries such as Healthcare and Technology, for example.
Pre-market and award engagement notices monitored on your behalf.
Buyer portal management, including registration, password management, downloading documents and assessing viability based on your bid or no-bid strategy.
Weekly phone calls with your dedicated Account Manager to discuss viable tendering opportunities.

The Become a Pre-Bid Master package also includes:

All of the above.
Up to seven tender breakdowns per month.
A Bid Strategy delivered by a Senior Bid Manager with a minimum of 5 years of experience. It will also be managed by our Global Bid Director.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post How to Tender for Council Work appeared first on Tender Consultants.

How Can Tender Writing Consultants Help You?

Millie Newbold — Wed, 13 Oct 2021 10:46:55 +0000

Thinking of hiring tender writing consultants? Here’s what you need to know

Hiring tender writing consultants can massively increase your chances of success when tendering for work. There is a lot of expert knowledge and skills that tender writing consultants possess. Since we want to help people learn, we will be covering how tender writing consultants can benefit your business.

Tender writing consultants offer industry knowledge

Since tender writing consultants are so familiar with the process and their industry, they know how best to advise clients. This means they can clarify which opportunities you are eligible for. Tender documents can be long and chock-full of information, so it can be easy to miss key information. Tender writing consultants can look through these for you and break them down into the key information. These breakdowns will include information such as the contract price, deadlines, what work is needed, and so on.

Tender writing consultants are experts at bid writing

As you might guess, consultants of tender writing need to be talented writers. They use their writing and language skills to persuade the buyer why you should be awarded the contract. They also use their skills to make your tender response interesting and engaging to read. You don’t want the reader being bored to the point they don’t even want to read your proposal. The very point of your proposal is to make you stand out! It goes without saying that they are also skilled proof-readers. So, they can check over proposals for grammatical errors and punctuation and spelling mistakes.

Whether you are wanting your entire proposal written or you need advice, tender consultants can help. They know exactly what is expected and how to make sure your proposal is of the highest standard.

Tender writing consultants have excellent communication skills

As a proposal is used to show the buyer what you can offer, it needs to be communicated clearly. Tender writing consultants are professionals at clearly stating your values and attributes. They will showcase your business and explain why you should be awarded the contract. They won’t waffle about points that are irrelevant to the questions as this would lose you marks.

Tender writing consultants know exactly how to manage their time and workload

One of the greatest skills of tender writing consultants is that they are organised. They know how to break down their workload and can do the same for clients. This is to ensure deadlines are never missed and work is done in advance. This way, there is no stressful rush at the last minute to submit. Technical Bid Writers know how to manage their time in order to get your bid proposal submitted on time, if not early.

Summary

Let’s summarise just some of the many ways consultants of tender writing can help you.

Tender writing consultants have industry knowledge

Being familiar with their industry is a crucial asset for consultants. They know what is expected, so they can offer expert advice.

Tender writing consultants are experts in their field of writing

They have written hundreds, sometimes thousands, of bids. So, they have perfected their writing skills to create high-quality proposals.

Tender writing consultants are excellent communicators

They are able to clearly communicate why a client should be awarded the contract.

Tender writing consultants have great time and project management abilities

The process of tendering and writing bids can be tedious, but they know how to manage their workload. Tender writing consultants will not miss deadlines and will have work done in advance to avoid stressful, last-minute submissions.

Need assistance with your next tender?

Although you’re a bit more familiar with what’s required, you might still be looking for some support with your tender. Writing isn’t everyone’s strong suit and that’s ok. Outsourcing to bid writing specialists can help you secure that next contract and grow your business.

Here at Hudson Succeed, we pride ourselves on being bid writing experts. We hold an 87% success rate and have over 60 years of collective bid writing experience.

We offer four levels of bid writing support to suit every business need. You may not need the whole tender written for you; you may simply need it proofread before you submit. We can help with that.

Our services

Tender Writing

Once you’ve found the perfect bid for your business, send it our way. Our Bid Writers can take care of the whole thing for you, they’ll even submit it on your behalf. They’ll let you know what they need from you, providing you with a full Tender Writing breakdown.

Tender Ready

A 12-month subscription to one Hudson Discover.
Access to Global Bid Directors and Senior Bidding Professionals.
An Organisation-wide Bid library, including 3 case studies, 5 CVs and policies.
Additional flexible benefits.

Tender Improvement

Tender Mentor

Additional support

If you only need assistance with PQQs or SQs, we can help. Send the information over to us and we can provide you with a quote for the work involved.

Discover Elite

The Ultimate Time Saver package offers your business:

A maximum of five tender breakdowns per month.
An annual subscription to a maximum of two Hudson Discover sector-specific portals. This option can help businesses that overlap two industries such as Healthcare and Technology, for example.
Pre-market and award engagement notices monitored on your behalf.
Buyer portal management, including registration, password management, downloading documents and assessing viability based on your bid or no-bid strategy.
Weekly phone calls with your dedicated Account Manager to discuss viable tendering opportunities.

The Become a Pre-Bid Master package also includes:

All of the above.
Up to seven tender breakdowns per month.
A Bid Strategy delivered by a Senior Bid Manager with a minimum of 5 years of experience. It will also be managed by our Global Bid Director.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post How Can Tender Writing Consultants Help You? appeared first on Tender Consultants.

How to be a Successful Bid Manager for Rail Tenders

Georgie Morgan — Wed, 24 Feb 2021 07:00:20 +0000

How to be a successful bid manager in the rail industry

If you’re a bid manager for rail contracts, you know what the end of the railways franchise means for business. You’re aware of the precise and time-focused nature of rail industry contracts. The new Emergency Recovery Management Agreements (ERMAs) is most likely going to result in more tenders over a shorter period.

This means in order to keep the business running smoothly, you must have the relevant project management strategies in place. Efficiency is key as the ERMAs will need to be applied for more frequently, unlike the old franchise system. In the majority of cases, buyers will require:

Case Studies – A comprehensive collection of previous contracts that have been fulfilled
Company CVs – Relevant records of employee’s and their respective experience
Financial Accounts – Allowing you to showcase your financial suitability for the role. If your annual turnover is less than half of the contact then you’ll be unlikely to be picked
High quality written responses – Grammar, spelling and errors are high priority
Evidence of relevant qualifications, accreditations, and policies – Quality assurance policies, health & safety policy, adequate training of your employees, equality/equal opportunity
Pricing documents.

The benefits this give your company are:

Having consistent and well-developed content to showcase your business’ organisation and professionalism
Maintaining a bank of information that can be called upon with each tender
Improving consistent growth and developing a robust bid management strategy for future tenders
Showcasing your staff and company’s experience in the best possible light.

Any bid manager tendering for contracts knows these must be of the highest quality to secure a contract. The new contracts hope to drive growth while encouraging innovation. You can expect more demanding management agreements with tougher performance targets that need to be met.

What does it take to be a successful bid manager for rail contracts?

Time management

Time management is key to bid writing – it’s no different if you’re a bid manager for rail contracts. It might seem obvious, but you’d be surprised just how many failed submissions there are due to poor time management.

The first thing you must do is establish the submission deadlines, both date and time. It’s useful to set internal deadlines too, so you can keep on top of things. It’s best to establish the following when the tender specification is released:

Submission date and time
Site visits
Clarification deadlines
Presentation dates.

You should factor in enough time for any potential unexpected challenges along the way that may delay you. This extra time should allow for any last-minute changes before you submit the tender response.

Keep your finger on the pulse of the rail industry

You must be up to date with any new policies, qualifications and accreditations that are needed for tender responses. These are updated and renewed every now and again, and you need to know what’s changed and when. For example, a Recognised Accreditation Scheme could include any of the following diversity accreditation schemes:

Investors in Diversity
Clear Assured
National Equality Standards
Diversity Development Standard
Inclusive Employers.

Big projects such as HS2 have provided a wealth of bidding opportunities within the rail sector. It’s a landmark project that’s creating a huge variety of opportunities to those within the Logistics Sector. The government is always looking to update the rail network. This means you should be able to find the relevant opportunities for your business.

A bank of evidence

Rail tenders often require a great deal of technical responses, supported with hard evidence. A bid manager within the rail industry should have ordered, easily accessible evidence for all matters relating to the tender. There’s a great emphasis on health and safety with all rail tender quality responses. As stated above, a bid library can save you time.

It’s best to get as much evidence as you can well in advance. Responses require hard and thorough evidence of case studies or financial accounts. You don’t want to be rushing around last minute trying to collect this information.

Detailed and technical writing abilities

The quality of your written response counts. Buyers want to see technical, factual and detailed information in front of them. You and your Bid Writing Team must write clearly and concisely in line with the specification. A high level of attention to detail is an essential quality for a bid manager. Although rail tenders tend to require technical responses, you should avoid including unnecessary technical jargon.

How to make your internal processes more efficient

You must create somewhat of a masterplan to success if you’re a bid manager for rail contracts. Here are a few pointers that may help:

Block out distractions

This sounds simple but too many contractors kill time by becoming distracted from the task. This can manifest in any way such as:

Social media
Emails
Texts

All these components can detract minutes and, eventually, hours away from worktime. A good method for organising your time is through blocking your days into sizeable chunks. This allows for less wasted time.

Ultimately, ensuring that you allocate time effectively can boost your productivity.

Create a writing plan or style guide

Through the creation of a style guide, you can ensure a consistent response. This is particularly useful if multiple people are working on a tender response. It helps create a clean looking document too. You should distribute this to all team members and include things such as font, tone of voice and writing style. Buyers are expecting a coherent and consistent response.

Holding regular meetings

Team meetings are a good way to ensure your team is on the right track (if you pardon the pun). This is applicable now more than ever, as more employees working from home. Regular meetings provide time for your colleagues to voice any concerns or share useful information with each other. It also helps keep priorities straight as the project might need more attention on something one week. However, it’s also important to note that overindulging in meetings can end up being a drain of time and attention. Ensure that the meetings you have are highly efficient, and that people take accurate notes so that further meetings aren’t needed.

Back up your claims

The rail industry is precise and data heavy, and this means that you’ll be allowed less leeway for unsubstantial claims. So, make sure that whatever statistic you’re giving, or claim you’re making, is backed up by hard evidence. It won’t reflect well on the credibility of your company if you’re fact-checked and your information is false. In fact, the result of this might be the rejection of your bid from the bidding process. A good way to avoid this is through proofreading, as you’ll be able to check the document for untrue claims.

Set early internal deadlines

As mentioned in the time management section above, setting internal deadlines can be an effective bid management strategy. Allow enough time and then some in case of unexpected challenges. This will help reduce stress as the deadline approaches and enables you plenty of time to proof before submission. Time management should be key in your bid management team.

Record progress

Recording your progress is not only useful, but satisfying too. Making a checklist and being able to check tasks off is rewarding and can boost morale. Each member should have access to a bid management progress chart. Then they’re able to see the response coming together. This ultimately stimulates a sense of achievement for the team, leading to further cohesion.

Establish roles and responsibilities early on

If there are multiple people working on one tender response, establish each person’s role and responsibilities early on. This can help avoid confusion and ensure that everyone has their own task to be getting on with. You don’t want to end up with duplicated responses from miscommunication as it’s a waste of everyone’s time. Communicating this and coming up with a timetable can help, particularly if your team’s members are working remotely.

Delegation

Following from establishing roles, it’s also important to recognise your capabilities as a bid manager. There’s no shame in admitting that you need to outsource, as this can speed up productivity and efficiency considerably. Other reasons to outsource can be:

There’s a good chance that the company you’re outsourcing to is highly specialised to complete their part of the role. Due to this, when the response is complete, it reflects well on you and your company.
In some cases, its preferable to stretching resources/overreaching in your abilities to deliver a response.
The outsourced company may provide skills and knowledge you hadn’t thought of/ methods you haven’t encountered.
A fear some companies hold is the outsourced company lack of knowledge around the company. But most proficient subcontractors will consult the relevant people to gain the necessary information.
If you can’t afford to sink resources in other areas internally, outsourcing is the perfect option. Its time and cost efficient.
You’re accessing a talent pool you wouldn’t otherwise have.
Your focus can return to the other, more pressing aspects of the contract.

Proofread before submitting

Proofreading before you submit your tender response is a critical step that shouldn’t be overlooked. It may be best if you’ve been working on the tender to get someone else to have a look over it. A fresh set of eyes can help identify any spelling or grammatical errors that you may have missed. They will also be able to identify whether the response answers the question within the specification.

As the ERMAs are for shorter terms, there’s no doubt going to be an increase in competition. You need to stay ahead of the game and ahead of your competitors to win contracts. If you lack the know-how and expertise to stand out from the competition, it may be best to outsource this.

Summary

So, we’ve reached the end of this blog about bid managing in the rail industry. For those who need it, here’s a short recap.

We covered:

What it takes to be a bid manager including:

Keeping a finger on the pulse of the rail industry
Ensuring time management
Having a bank of evidence
The importance of having and maintaining a good level of writing skills

We then went on to some tips that help with efficiency:

Proofreading before submitting
Blocking out distractions throughout the day
Delegating tasks/the power in outsourcing
Establishing roles and responsibilities
Finding the balance between efficient and overly long meetings
Setting internal deadlines
Recording progress
Creating writing plans
Ensuring your claims and statistics are truthful/factual.

Now you’ve got a great idea of how to improve as a bid manager, you may be wondering what we offer…

How can we help?

The tendering process is long and complex but the team are here to assist you writing bids. You can outsource the role to our dedicated Hudson Succeed team. They have 60 years bid writing experience and an 87%I didn’t success rate. Our team have secured contract wins totalling over £300 million for our clients.

We offer four bid writing packages:

Tender Mentor Services

Send your completed rail tender response over to our team. They can take a look at it with a fresh pair of eyes. They’ll notify you of any grammatical or spelling errors before you submit.

A Tender Ready Programme

The Tender Ready programme is for those who have never tendered before. We work with you to ensure you’re on the right track to submitting a successful bid. The 4-week programme will develop your branded corporate literature and case studies. Our team will advise you on what tendering opportunities you should go for and guide your through your tendering response.

Ad-hoc Tender Writing

If you’ve found the perfect rail contract for your business but don’t have the time – we can help. Send it over to our Bid Writing Team and they’ll take care of the rest. They’ll even submit it on your behalf and provide a full Tender Writing breakdown.

A Tender Improvement Package

If you’ve already tendering, but aren’t seeing the desired results from your efforts, the Tender Improvement package can help. Our Bid Writers will assess your submissions and provide guidance and feedback.

Additional support

If you only need the assistance with PQQs or SQs we can help. Send the information over to us and we can provide you with a quote for the work involved.

Sourcing rail opportunities

We source tenders within the Logistics Sector on a daily basis off thousands of sites across the UK. Any bid manager for rail contracts knows how important it is to source the right tender for your business. It can be easier said than done.

You can sign up to our Logistics Tenders portal and start receiving business leads today. Our Opportunity Trackers manually upload thousands of live tenders daily. You’re able to filter the results by keyword, location, budget and more. You no longer have to rely on inaccurate CPV codes to find the right opportunity for your business.

Hudson Elite

Our recently launched Hudson Elite service offers an upgraded level of support to our Discover portals. We can help you with an even more efficient service offering a fully managed tender tracking approach.

Your Account Manager will personally find opportunities for you. They are on hand to help you decide on the ever-important bid question. This can help save you even more time to focus on running your business. This package includes an annual subscription to the portal of your choice and weekly phone calls to discuss new opportunities.

Get in touch for more information.

The Ultimate Time Saver package offers your business:

A maximum of five tender breakdowns per month.
An annual subscription to a maximum of two Hudson Discover sector-specific portals. This option can help businesses that overlap two industries such as Healthcare and Technology, for example.
Pre-market and award engagement notices monitored on your behalf.
Buyer portal management, including registration, password management, downloading documents and assessing viability based on your bid or no-bid strategy.
Weekly phone calls with your dedicated Account Manager to discuss viable tendering opportunities.

The Become a Pre-Bid Master package also includes:

All of the above.
Up to seven tender breakdowns per month.
A Bid Strategy delivered by a Senior Bid Manager with a minimum of 5 years of experience. It will also be managed by our Global Bid Director.

On Logistics Tenders, we post contracts for:

Rail contracts
Courier services
Public transport
Transport services
Logistical planning consultancy
Recycling logistics
School taxi contracts
Bus tenders
and supply chain solutions.

Book a free live demo today for a quick tour of our portal. Get in touch to learn more about our bespoke bid writing services.

Want to save even more time?

Upgrading to Discover Elite can save you even more time, helping you identify tendering opportunities even when you’re busy. Our two time-saving tools can improve your competitor awareness and bidding success rate.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post How to be a Successful Bid Manager for Rail Tenders appeared first on Tender Consultants.

Is your bid management process up to scratch?

Charlotte Jarvis — Wed, 06 Jan 2021 07:30:18 +0000

Improving your bid management process

[Last modified: July 2021]

Your bid management process and approach are crucial to achieving writing bids When entering into the tendering process, you should first consider how you will manage the work. For many industries, it isn’t simply a case of providing a quick quote and moving on. In the majority of cases, buyers will require:

High-quality written responses.
Case studies.
Evidence of accreditations and/or qualifications.
Company CVs.
Accounts.
Pricing documents.

You must craft, collate and submit the requirements to the highest possible standard. In order to do this, you need an airtight bid management process.

The 6-stage process

1. Sourcing the right opportunities for your business

Finding opportunities can feel like searching for a needle in a haystack. There are thousands of websites that publish tendering opportunities across the UK. In order to efficiently source the right tender for your business, you must analyse your goals and eligibility. For example, ask yourself the following:

Which types of contracts do I want to deliver?
What are my service delivery capabilities? This could be geographical. How far can you travel and still make a profit?
Do I have at least three previous contract examples that demonstrate my ability to deliver similar work?
What is my economic and financial standing? Or, in other words, what threshold am I working within?

Answering these questions will help you and your team to efficiently make your bid or no-bid decision.

2. Breaking down the specification

So, you’ve found a tender that you would like to bid for. What comes next in the bid management process?

At this stage, it’s likely that you have scanned the requirements and briefly read the specification. Now, it’s time to take a much more in-depth look at the details. You need to be sure that you are eligible and that you possess the required evidence/information. On page 54 of the specification, there could be a requirement that you cannot meet, such as turnover. Failing to fully read and digest the requirements could result in wasting time in the long run.

Breaking down the specification will also allow you to establish timescales. The word count for the required responses will help you estimate how much time needs to be assigned to each question. A good benchmark would be that the average bid writer can produce around 2,000 words per day.

3. Collating information in advance

If the responses require evidence of financial accounts or case studies, you may need to liaise with other departments. If this is the case, make sure you leave plenty of time to collate the required documents. You don’t want to be rushing at the last minute because you didn’t give Fred from accounts enough time. Always set a slightly earlier deadline for yourself and others to ensure you are ready in time for the submission of bids.

4. Finalising and proofreading

Once your written responses, supporting evidence and pricing are complete, it’s time to proofread. It could be tempting to just submit the work you have done and move onto the next bid. However, you may end up submitting a tender full of errors and ultimately fail. You will then have wasted all the time spent crafting the responses for the sake of a few extra hours.

Check, check and check again. Ask someone unattached to the project to review your work. It’s likely that they will find errors you have missed.

5. Submission

Now, it’s finally time to submit your hard work. This shouldn’t be the first time you have accessed the buyer’s portal. It is good practice to make yourself familiar with the system ahead of the submission. This will eliminate last minute panics when you can’t log in or find the area for the submission.

6. The results

It’s important that your bid management process doesn’t just end with the submission. Learning from the results is crucial to continuously improve your bid writing and overall approach.

Unfortunately, you won’t win every tender that you bid for. But it doesn’t have to be a negative experience. If the buyer doesn’t provide feedback, you can ask for it. We would always recommend asking the buyer to show you where you lost marks. It could be that you won on the quality side but lost out on price. This means that you should provide a more competitive quote next time.

Top tip: In the public sector, buyers will publish details of who won each tender. It is worth reading the award notice because the winning price is normally published also. This will help you to see how much the winner charged so that you can be more competitive in your next bid.

Does your team have the right skills?

To make your bid management process more effective, you can also look at the skills on your team. In order to see successful results, you need access to certain strengths such as:

Time management

In bid management, meeting deadlines is an integral part of the role. If the deadline is missed, buyers do not have to evaluate your bid. Additionally, asking for extra time without a valid reason never looks good. This makes the buyer nervous about your time-keeping skills which will undoubtedly be a key factor on the contract.

In order to effectively manage your time, we recommend developing a bid plan. The plan needs to be standardised but also adaptable to accommodate work that requires a short turnaround.

Of course, you can develop a bid library of documents and responses that are often applicable to most tenders. This will save you time on some questions. However, copy and pasting won’t always work and unforeseen questions will require bespoke responses.

Technical and concise writing capabilities

You don’t need to be a bestselling author to write bids, but you do need a flair for technical, factual writing. The writers on your team must be able to produce short, sharp sentences that concisely convey the important information. It’s great to demonstrate your writing talents but evaluators are reading multiple submissions, don’t make them hunt for the information. They want to see the facts and the direct answers to their questions. If the response requires 500 words, don’t wait to start answering the question in the last 100.

Strategising and planning your moves

When tendering for work in the public sector, you need to think differently than in the private sphere. The best bid managers are able to plan their next move in advance and lay the groundwork. You want to ensure that you are attending site visits and responding to market engagements. This allows you to build a relationship with the buyer and gain further insight. The more information you have about planned procurements, the more room you have for time management.

Working smarter with these tools

Hudson Discover

Hudson Discover houses 11 sector-specific tendering portals, designed to speed up the opportunity tracking process. To effectively track hundreds if not thousands of sites, you would need a full-time employee assigned solely to this task.

As the portals are dedicated to specific industries, this helps to eliminate irrelevant tenders when tendering for contracts. However, the portals can be further tailored to only display tenders of interest to you. For example, you can filter by keywords (the services you offer), region, budget and sector.

Furthermore, each client is assigned an Account Manager to assist you. They will send an email alert when new tenders are uploaded so you don’t have to log in every day.

Visit Hudson Discover.

Bid library

We touched on bid libraries earlier, but let’s take a closer look at maximising this strategy.

Essentially, a bid library is a digital place in which you store everything you might need to bid for work. This could include your:

Policies and procedures.
Accreditations and certificates.
Company CVs.
Case studies that you anticipate will have relevance to the tenders you choose to bid for.
Responses that you frequently use in your previous tenders.

If you don’t have the above documentation, our Tender Ready service can help. Tender Ready is a four-week programme designed to help you prepare to bid for work. Our bid writers will create the documents you will need and professionally brand them. Additionally, you will also receive three days of bid writing consultancy to help you respond to a relevant tender.

The Tender Ready programme.

Tender VLE

It is important to keep learning and expanding your knowledge. Whether you are new to tendering or well-versed, increasing your understanding will only strengthen your capability.

Tender VLE is the UK’s first free, online learning platform for all things tendering related. The masterclasses are led by bid writing and bid design experts. Topics include:

Visit Tender VLE.

5 tips for improving your success rate

1. Hold regular meetings

Holding regular meetings is always a good way to ensure that your team is on track and problems are solved. However, it is especially important currently as most businesses are working remotely. There are many software platforms which host team meetings that we’re sure you’re all familiar with by now.

Many concerns would normally be expressed in general office conversation without realising the importance of the interaction. When working remotely, we have to make a more conscious effort to highlight problems and solve them.

2. Set earlier deadlines

An efficient bid management process will include setting internal deadlines. Try to plan internal deadlines before the final submission date. This will reduce stress and rushed work as the deadline approaches and ensures a smoother submission.

3. Record progress

A simple bid management progress chart will be effective to visually record timescales. Each member of your team should have access to the tracker so that they can see the work coming together. It will also help the bid manager to provide extra support to those who are not meeting the planned schedule.

4. Establish roles and responsibilities

If there are multiple team members working on a bid, it’s important to establish responsibilities from the outset. This means that each person has their assigned role to focus on. Again, this is especially important when working remotely.

5. Ensure contingency by proofreading

When a bid has been written by multiple people, it’s important to ensure contingency. When proofreading, you should already be checking for:

Spelling errors.
Grammatical errors.
Whether or not the response answers the question.
Correctly labelled supporting documents.

However, you should also assess the flow of the bid. Are the facts and statistics the same? Is the font consistent?

Further support

For more information about how Hudson Succeed can help you improve your success rate, please get in touch. We offer four services to ensure that we can support businesses of all sizes with varying levels of tendering experience. Call or email us to arrange a free consultation.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post Is your bid management process up to scratch? appeared first on Tender Consultants.

Bid Writing Services with an 87% Success Rate

Charlotte Jarvis — Wed, 25 Nov 2020 07:30:16 +0000

Bid writing services designed to help your business grow

[Last modified: October 2021]

Our bid writing services at Hudson Succeed are designed to help your business grow and keep achieving your goals.

How do we do this?

When we created our services, we wanted to ensure that we could support all businesses when tendering for contracts. No matter your size, industry or tendering experience, we wanted to be able to help you through the tendering process. As part of the Hudson Group, our goal is to make the procurement process a fairer and more level playing field. To do this, we believe that it starts with supporting all businesses equally.

Our bid writing services aren’t just designed to help you now, but in the future, as you continue to grow. What’s the point in securing one contract only to be back to square one when it ends?

Need help with an imminent tender?

If you need support with a live tender, it couldn’t be easier to get started. Simply upload the tender documents and receive a quote in just four working hours.

Due to current workloads, we will be unable to accept work with a deadline in less than seven working days.

Our bid writing services

In order to achieve our goal, we created four levels of bid writing services.

Tender Writing

Tender Writing is your classic bid writing service. The service includes a breakdown of the tender requirements. This is then followed by the creation of your tender responses, a full review, and the submission of your bid.

We created this service to support those who need to respond to a bid reactively but lack internal resources. In order to write a winning bid, you will need:

Exceptional writing skills
A keen eye for detail
Time to read potentially a 5,000+ word specification
Time to write potentially 10,000 words (we’ve seen bids require even more).

Obviously, not every business will have the above in abundance. This is why our Tender Writing service is so popular with businesses both in the UK and overseas.

Tender Ready

Our Tender Ready package is a unique bid writing service. The four-week programme was designed to help businesses who are new to tendering. Not only does the programme consist of three-day bid writing consultancy support, it also helps you prepare for the future.

Whilst helping you to identify tendering opportunities, the package also includes:

The creation of all the corporate literature you will need to tender for work today and in the future
The design of these documents via our in-house Design Team
12-months access to the Hudson Discover tendering portal of your choice. This will allow you to access all the UK tenders in your field. You will also receive a daily email alert when relevant tenders are published and support from an Account Manager.

Once the programme is complete, your business will be equipped with the knowledge and resources to tender for work effectively.

Tender Improvement

This bid writing service really does what it says on the tin. We understand how frustrating it can be to spend time and (let’s be honest) money submitting bids and losing.

We have been supporting businesses with their tendering efforts for almost two decades. In our experience, there is often a simple explanation for disappointing results. You just need someone external to take a look.

The Tender Improvement programme consists of:

A full analysis of your previous tender responses
Identifying areas of improvement
An analysis of your supporting company literature and, if necessary, the redevelopment of this content
Help to identify the right tenders for your business
12-months access to the Hudson Discover tendering portal of your choice.

If this wasn’t enough, the support doesn’t end there. Once the programme is complete, you will have the choice between:

A full bid writing service for your next tender. This includes the creation of your bid responses to the submission of the bid.

Guided support through your next two tenders. Our team will support you as you write your responses in-house. They will then assess your responses and provide advice to increase your chances of success.

Tender Mentor

Finally, our Tender Mentor service is there to act as a second pair of eyes. When supporting businesses through Tender Improvement, we noticed that many failed results were due to simple, overlooked errors.

Tender Mentor consists of a full proofreading service. Our Bid Writers will then leave comments for ways to improve your tender responses. They will also assess your work against the buyer’s specification. This will ensure that your tender addresses the requirements and impresses the buyer.

Why outsource bid writing services?

So, if tendering is such a crucial element of business development, why would you outsource it?

In the end, it comes down to these all-too-familiar barriers that most businesses face daily – time and money.

Do you have time to:

Learn how to win a tender?
Read and digest seemingly endless specifications?
Write sometimes mammoth tender responses in detail or train a member of staff to do this to an exceptional standard?
Create and professionally brand all your corporate literature including policies, procedures, case studies, company CVs, and more?
Navigate often tricky procurement portals and ensure that the bid is submitted on time?

If the answer is no, you’re not alone. In fact, it is very common for a business to outsource its bid writing. Whilst you might be an expert in your field, that won’t necessarily help you to secure the contract. Especially in the public sector where there can be many hoops to jump through.

We are not experts in an industry. We are experts in bid writing. This means that we can support clients in any industry. From Construction to Healthcare to Technology, we have worked with a vast range of clients.

The tendering process is our speciality and we’re proud of our accomplishments in the field.

These are our 11 sector-specific portals to help you find opportunities:

Hospitality

Find opportunities for catering, events, conference management and more, all under one roof.

Healthcare

From domiciliary care to medical supplies, nursing recruitment and more, our Healthcare portal has it all.

Facilities

Dedicated to the facilities management industry, we search over 1,000 sources to find the right opportunity for you.

Technology

Takes the headache out of sourcing opportunities within the technology sector.

Construction

Committed to saving you time when searching for new construction contracts.

Consultancy

Dedicated to helping your business grow in the competitive world of professional services.

Creative

Committed to bringing you a multitude of opportunities within the creative sector.

Finance

From accountancy to payroll, our Finance portal is dedicated to helping you connect with new buyers.

Research

From market research to academic, our Research portal sources the opportunities you need to grow.

Logistics

Our Logistics portal sources transport sector opportunities on a daily basis from thousands of buyers.

For businesses in the HR and recruitment industry who want to find new contracts.

What skills do Bid Writers have?

You may be wondering why hiring Bid Writers is often the best option if you want to see success. The answer is quite simple. Bid Writers have a lot more experience with tendering than most company owners. They know the ins and outs of the industry and what is expected of them to win a bid. Here are 4 skills all Bid Writers need:

Excellent writing skills

As you can imagine, a Bid Writer needs to have excellent writing skills. To ensure success, Bid Writers must deliver high-quality proposals. They need to use their skills to efficiently describe different aspects about their client’s company. As well as how they are the best fit to deliver the contract.

Great Bid Writers know exactly how to narrow down their writing, so it is clear and concise, without irrelevant information. Bid Writers also know not to use industry jargon, as they don’t want to confuse the reader.

Another point is that some bids can be gargantuan in size. If you aren’t available and prepared to dedicate this time to writing, it’s unlikely you’ll succeed. Bid Writers have done this plenty of times, so they know how to breakdown their workload.

Communication skills

Perhaps the most important skill a Bid Writer must possess is good communication abilities. The purpose of proposals is to communicate to the buyer why the supplier should be awarded the contract. So, Bid Writers must ensure they clearly answer questions and address the points they need to make.

Many people attempting to write a bid proposal won’t have the experience to know how to do this. That is why using bid writing services can be such a benefit.

Produce error-free proposals

Along with writing skills, the best Bid Writers should also have great editing and proofreading skills. Their writing may be good, but if there are even minor errors, they risk losing all chances of success. In other words, they need to have a keen eye for detail.

So, it is essential for Bid Writers to reread their work multiple times. It can be helpful to have a device read the work aloud to you, making it easier to spot mistakes. This is a technique many Bid Writers use. Bid Writers often proofread each other’s work too. This is another great way of locating anything that doesn’t sound quite right.

This extensive process is essential in making sure a bid is of the highest possible standard. The reader will mark you down if they find grammatical errors, spelling mistakes, or punctuation in the wrong place. They want to be sure that you are thorough in your work. If you can’t perfect your bid, why should they expect you to perfect the work you hope to deliver? The last thing you want is to give the impression you are unprofessional or even lazy. Since Bid Writers are so thorough with their editing, it is unlikely any mistakes will slip by unnoticed.

Highly organised

Organisation skills are essential for the Bid Writers. A lot of the time, bid applications will be extensive and require a lot of work. So, Bid Writers must be able to keep documents organised. They must be excellent at time management to ensure all work is done before deadlines.

Rushing at the last minute is almost certainly going to result in multiple mistakes and you don’t want that!

Bid Writers know exactly how to breakdown their workload and organise when to do each section.

Who else have we helped?

Speaking of accomplishments, let’s take a quick look at just a few of the businesses that we have helped.

Invasion Ltd

Our successful tender secured the next five-years income by winning a £200million contract.
The Succeed Team completed the 21,500-word bid in just 48 hours and submitted the tender during a bank holiday.

MJ Support Staffing

We built an excellent relationship with the client, maintaining a 100% success rate over three bid submissions.
The successful tender increased their annual turnover by 20%.

Oakleigh School

The team’s submission resulted in £350,000 in direct contract wins on three large supplier frameworks.

Imagine You Can

Our Bid Writers completed the 5,000-word submission in just 24 hours. To put this into perspective, normally, our individual Bid Writers aim to produce 2,000-words per day.
The result secured four-years of sustainable income for Imagine You Can.

Barbara B Cooperativa Sociale

Our team worked with the client to help them overcome language barriers in their tender response. This was their first contract in the UK market.
Our Bid Writers achieved a 97% quality score.
£350,000 was secured on their first UK contract.

Why do our clients continue to use our bid writing services?

Our ability to deliver results

Fundamentally, a bid writing consultancy is judged on their ability to secure contracts for their clients. Businesses will ultimately choose a provider who they believe to be capable and trustworthy.

Our clients can rest assured that their bid is in safe hands. We reassure them with our 87% bid success rate and the trust we have earned from over 700 businesses globally.

Multi-disciplinary capabilities

At Hudson Succeed, we are not limited to one particular industry. Our Bid Writers have multi-disciplinary experience across a range of sectors. Over the past two decades, our team have supported clients across industries including:

Healthcare
Construction
Education
Marketing
Technology
Facilities Management
Security
Logistics
Recruitment
Consultancy
PPE
Finance.

Our ability to support so many industries means that we can help more businesses to reach their goals.

No commission or hidden fees

Unlike some other bid writing consultancies, we don’t take a commission for our work. When you win, we see that as a win for us as well, we don’t need an extra monetary reward. It’s no good reaching an 87% success rate if we don’t work to maintain and increase it. Simply, when you win, we win.

Our charges are quoted on a bid-by-bid basis. Every tender is different. Some tenders only require a few thousand words while others require complex, lengthy responses. Once we have assessed the work involved, we will then provide an accurate quote. It is our policy that this payment is then made before the work begins. That’s it – just one fee, no hidden charges.

Integrating within your team, not working against them – and all whilst working remotely

We’re here to support your existing team, not undermine them. Our job is to make sure that your tender is successful in this submission and in the future.

Of course, if you don’t have an in-house team who will be taking over, we can integrate ourselves. We work with clients on an ad-hoc basis. They simply come to us whenever they find a bid, we then offer a quote and complete the work. They deliver the contract and come back to us for the next tender and so it continues. We love to be part of your business development process and watch your organisation flourish.

In the “new normal” of remote working, our clients are maximising the advantages of a remote consultant. It might not be feasible to employ someone internally on a full-time basis. Instead, our clients will outsource our support as and when necessary.

Our promise to you

As part of the Hudson Group, we maintain clear values that we promise to deliver: transparency, innovation and quality.

Transparency

We believe in maintaining an honest approach with our clients. We won’t simply write a bid because you pay us to. If we don’t think the tender is right for your business, we’ll let you know. In some cases, you might be lacking an accreditation or case study that will result in a failed submission. We will always let you know if this is the case and offer our expert advice.

Innovation

At Hudson, we always aim to be as innovative as possible. When presented with a problem, we use our Hudson Labs

to look for a solution. We promise to apply the same innovative approach to all our bid writing services.

Quality

As Bid Writers, we’re always striving for the highest quality possible. We don’t get involved with the pricing aspect of your tender response. We believe that you are the experts in your service. This means that we never stop aiming for that perfect quality score. It is, after all, how we achieve our winning results.

Interested in our bid writing services?

For more information about any of our bid writing services, please get in touch. If you’re not sure which service will be best for your business, we offer a free consultation. Simply call or email us to arrange a call-back time to suit you.

Discover Elite

The Ultimate Time Saver package offers your business:

A maximum of five tender breakdowns per month.
An annual subscription to a maximum of two Hudson Discover sector-specific portals. This option can help businesses that overlap two industries such as Healthcare and Technology, for example.
Pre-market and award engagement notices monitored on your behalf.
Buyer portal management, including registration, password management, downloading documents and assessing viability based on your bid or no-bid strategy.
Weekly phone calls with your dedicated Account Manager to discuss viable tendering opportunities.

The Become a Pre-Bid Master package also includes:

All of the above.
Up to seven tender breakdowns per month.
A Bid Strategy delivered by a Senior Bid Manager with a minimum of 5 years of experience. It will also be managed by our Global Bid Director.

Looking for further writing services?

Grant Writing

Our Grant Writing Service is for businesses who want to start applying for grants, but don’t know where to begin. They can also help businesses who have been applying for grants but aren’t seeing success.

Our Grant Writing Consultants have over 60 years of experience in bidding for funding and grants. From start-up business grants to self-employed business grants. They can take care of the whole thing for you – they’ll even submit it on your behalf.

Get in touch to find out how we can help your business grow!

Grant Tracker

You can find this grant and others like it on our Business Grant Tracker. Currently, we have over 1,700 live business grant and funding opportunities. Our team have manually tracked 1,500+ data streams searching for business grant opportunities. Each one is then uploaded to one central system, streamlining the process.

All you need to do to gain access is sign up for free.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post Bid Writing Services with an 87% Success Rate appeared first on Tender Consultants.

How Hudson Succeed is helping North East businesses to bid for tenders

Charlotte Jarvis — Wed, 02 Sep 2020 07:00:17 +0000

Bidding for tenders – Hudson helps Imagine You Can and APM Cleaning

Last updated: Dec 17, 2021 @ 10:21 am

Bidding for tenders is a vital process for securing new tendering contracts and growing your business. Depending on your industry, it is likely that your competitors are bidding for the contracts they’re securing. As well as other strategies such as marketing, tendering is one of the most effective ways to grow your organisation.

Hudson Succeed is a Durham-based business development consultancy. We were founded by husband and wife team, Jill and John Hudson. Jill has been supporting global organisations with their business growth efforts for almost two decades. Hudson was founded based on her experiences of tendering and procurement.

Across the Hudson Group, our mission is to make the tendering process a fairer and more transparent playing field for all businesses.

Whilst working with the 700+ businesses that we support, we noticed a common misconception from SMEs in particular. It seems that some SMEs are under the impression that they are too small to tender for work. This is not the case.

Our Head of Bid Management, Daniel Hall, said:

“You have to be realistic when making your bid/no-bid decision. You should always consider the contract value and assess the experience requirements before bidding.

However, there are advantages to being an SME when tendering for work. For example, the UK government has a target to spend £1 in £3 with SMEs. This means that public sector organisations want to work with smaller companies.

SMEs also have the advantage of not competing with industry giants on smaller projects. Larger businesses tend not to bid for contracts with smaller values, therefore increasing your chances of winning.”

Since launching our Hudson Succeed suite of bid writing services, we have been thrilled to work with businesses around the world. However, as a company with strong roots in the North East, it is always a pleasure to support local businesses.

Securing 4-years’ income for Imagine You Can UK

Imagine You Can UK is a leading provider of the National Citizen Service (NCS) in Redcar and East Cleveland. They also work across the North of England, delivering opportunities for personal development and employability skills for young people.

The company’s Director approached the Hudson Succeed team and enquired about our bid writing services. They required support with the submission of a tender for the provision of additional delivery partners to provide capacity for delivering an NCS programme.

Challenges

When bid writing, there will inevitably be challenges that you didn’t foresee. With experience, these obstacles become easier to mitigate. Due to the nature of this tender, we knew that we would encounter challenges with sensitive information. The work required detailed information regarding Imagine You Can UK’s safeguarding and data management procedures.

Tight deadlines also posed an issue to our time management. As the company was a new client, we did not have a bank of information at hand, as we do with returning organisations. This meant that the team had to extract the necessary information in a short timeframe to ensure maximum quality marks.

A detailed communication procedure was therefore created to obtain the information needed. The team then underwent a thorough bid plan, outlining the necessary activity for both parties.

Due to the deadline of the tender, work was allocated across our team of bid writers. They proactively took charge of each response and produced high-quality, well-researched and detailed tender responses.

Results

Our team produced 5,000 words within a little over 24 hours of the work being commissioned.

As a result, Imagine You Can UK were successful with their endeavour and they were accepted onto the framework. This secured them sustainable, ongoing income for the next four years.

Due to this success, we have developed an excellent relationship with the company, and we look forward to working with them in the future.

“Daniel and the team gave me excellent instructions on the content they needed to complete this tender. The whole process was seamless and I’m glad to say we were accepted onto the framework. It was a pleasure to work with Hudson and we look forward to collaborating in the future.” – Dave King, Director at Imagine You Can UK.

Find more case studies.

Winning a DPS place for APM Cleaning Ltd

APM Cleaning provides commercial and domestic cleaning services on a national scale. The company contacted Hudson Succeed for support after identifying a tendering opportunity. They expressed concerns with developing the quality responses and providing the evidence required to win a place on the framework.

After our initial consultation with APM Cleaning, the Hudson team found another contract opportunity using our Facilities Tenders portal. The team made the client aware of the second opening which was a Facilities Management DPS with Prosper Housing.

Once the work was agreed, the Hudson Succeed team began working on both tenders for the client.

Challenges

The deadlines were very close together which meant that both submissions needed to be developed in tandem, necessitating splitting the workload between two bid writers. This, combined with ongoing tenders we were already compiling for other clients, posed a challenge to our time management.

APM was also a new client with Hudson Succeed which meant that required company details needed to be extracted.

Through the creation of Hudson’s staple bid plan, a communication procedure was implemented between us and the client. The two assigned bid writers collaborated effectively to ensure no overlapping in requests for information from APM.

Once completed, the tender response underwent a thorough, internal review process. Our Head of Bid Management took the lead on all stages of content development.

Results

Both tenders were signed off and submitted four days ahead of the deadline.

As a result of our team’s combined efforts, we successfully secured APM a place on the second DPS. We were successful in all the LOTs applied to.

We are still awaiting the results of the initial tendering opportunity.

Due to this success, we are pleased to say our working relationship with APM Cleaning has continued. We have since supported the submission of four more tenders. One has been successful. We’re awaiting the results for the others. We also look forward to working with the client on a future bid, later this year.

“The Hudson team was very reactive in their ways of working and handled all communications very effectively and efficiently. This partnership is credit to the recent win for the Prosper DPS for Facilities Management, which we were successful on all LOTs applied. We would recommend Hudson to any company who require bid support of any kind!” – Samantha Reid, Director at APM Cleaning Ltd.

Find more testimonials.

Advice for SMEs

As we begin to emerge from a pandemic, we understand that bidding for contracts can seem daunting. However, it is important to remember that businesses are still actively seeking suppliers.

“The procurement industry hasn’t come to a standstill” – Daniel Hall, Head of Bid Management.

Understandably, some SMEs don’t know how to tender for work. The practice is more prevalent in some industries than in others. In the construction, for example, most businesses are either actively tendering or have been involved in the process before.

However, bidding for tenders does carry advantages. For example:

Public sector contracts guarantee pay

It might seem strange to sign a contract and not be guaranteed pay. Unfortunately, we hear of this happening in the private sector more often than we would like.

The Crown Commercial Service’s Prompt Payment Code means that this won’t happen in the public sector. The code stipulates that invoices must be paid within 60-days. This gives suppliers peace of mind, knowing that income is guaranteed, and the profit can be accounted for.

Build your experience

If you’re a relatively new business, building a portfolio of experience is crucial before you go after the big contracts. By securing smaller value projects, you can demonstrate relevant and impressive experience when the time comes to “bid bigger”.

Also, building a portfolio of experience means building a bank of contacts. Bidding for tenders helps to connect you with buyers that you may not have had access to previously.

Frameworks can help your sustainability

Winning places on long-term frameworks increase your chances of securing contracts sustainably. Some frameworks can last up to 10-years or more. You don’t want to miss the opportunity to bid for this work as the projects are published.

Further information

For more information about any of our bid writing services, please get in touch for a free consultation. Call or email us and a member of the team will contact you as soon as possible.

Whether you are new to writing bids or looking to outsource the process, we have a service to suit you.

We’re here to help you SUCCEED.

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

The post How Hudson Succeed is helping North East businesses to bid for tenders appeared first on Tender Consultants.

Bid Management Consultancy Archives - Tender Consultants

Strategic Bid Management: Everything You NEED to Know to Succeed!

Here’s what you should know about strategic bid management

What is strategic bid management?

Tips from our experts for strategic bid management

1. Check you are eligible for the opportunities you source

2. Consider exactly what the buyer requires

3. How to create your strategic bid management plan

Summary

What is strategic bid management?

Tips from our experts for strategic bid management

Need help searching for tenders?

A subscription to one of our industry-specific portals will include:

What opportunities can I expect from a tender search on a Hudson Discover portal?

What we can do for you

Vocal

Find more helpful tips and advice in our blogs. We cover topics including:

Where to Find Bid Writing Services in the UK

How can I find the best bid writing services in the UK?

So, where can you find bid writing services in the UK?

What are the advantages of outsourcing bid writing services in the UK?

Increased quality

More time

They can save resources

In summary

Need help writing your next tender?

Our services

Tender Writing

Tender Ready

Tender Improvement

Tender Mentor

Additional support

Discover Elite

What to Expect From a Procurement Tender

5 ways to win a procurement tender

5 ways to win a procurement tender

Quality assessing questions

Address the specification

Demonstrate previous contract experience

Keep up to date with changing legislation

Demonstrate added value

Where can I find a procurement tender?

In summary

Need help writing your next procurement tender?

Our services

Tender Writing

Tender Ready

Tender Improvement

Tender Mentor

Discover Elite

Tendering for Work: The Complete Guide

3 Ways Tendering for Work Can Benefit Your Business

Secure a pipeline of work

Guaranteed pay when tendering for work in the public sector

Gain experience

Be clear and concise

Stick to the word count

Avoid overly technical jargon

Format your responses

Leave enough time for a bid review and proofreading

In summary

Our services

Tender Writing

Tender Ready

Tender Improvement

Tender Mentor

Additional support

Discover Elite

How to Tender for Council Work

Advice on how to tender for council work

How to tender for council work

Read the tender documents carefully

Structure your response

Don’t skimp on social value

Have strong policies and procedures

Proofread your response before you submit

Need assistance with your next tender?

Our services

Tender Writing

Tender Ready