Before you write a word
Work out whether this one is worth bidding for
A week of somebody's time goes into a bid before anyone knows whether it was worth spending. This page is a scorecard you can print and fill in from the funder's or the buyer's own document, and it ends in an answer you can take to whoever signs it off.
Or call 07984 845440, or email [email protected].
An hour with the funder's or the buyer's own document, before any writing starts, is what settles whether to bid at all. This page is that hour, written down.
The questions that stop a bid
Answer these before anything else. A no on any one of them is the answer, and no amount of good writing afterwards changes it.
- Are you eligible on their own stated terms, read from their document rather than from a summary of it?
- Can you meet every mandatory requirement in the selection questionnaire, which is usually accounts, insurance levels, references and policies? The compliance list sets out the rest.
- Can you deliver what they've described, at the price or the budget they've said they'll pay?
- Do you already hold the evidence the scored answers need, or can you get it before the deadline?
- Is the deadline real once your own approvals and signatures are counted?
- If you won it tomorrow, would you want it?
The last question is the one people skip, and it's the one that costs most. Work that fits you badly still has to be delivered after you've won it, usually by the same people who are already busy.
What decides whether it's worth your week
Score each of these 0, 1 or 2 and write the total at the bottom. Some are answered by reading their document again. The rest are answered by looking honestly at your own.
| The question | A zero looks like | A two looks like | Your score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 How close is what they've described to what you already do? | It's next door to your work | It is your work | |
| 2 Have you got named, dated evidence for the heaviest scored section? | Nothing written down | Written down and checkable | |
| 3 Do the criteria and their weightings favour what you're strongest at, once you know how the answers are scored? | The heavy sections are your weakest | The heaviest section is your strongest | |
| 4 Do the numbers in your narrative and the numbers in your budget or pricing schedule agree? | Nobody has checked | Added up independently, and they agree | |
| 5 Have you covered every cost you're entitled to recover? | Not worked out | Worked out and included | |
| 6 Does somebody who didn't write it read it before it goes? | Nobody | A named reader, booked in | |
| 7 Do you know why they're buying this now? | No idea | You can say it in a sentence | |
| 8 Is there an incumbent, and do you know what's changed? | No idea | You know both | |
| 9 Can you answer every question inside the word or character limits? | You haven't counted | Counted, and it fits | |
| 10 What does this cost you in your own time, against what it pays? | You haven't worked it out | You've got a figure | |
| Your total | |||
What the total is for
The number compares two bids you could put in the same week. It isn't a pass mark, and there's no threshold on this sheet. A threshold would be a number nobody has measured.
Count your zeros instead, because every zero is a section you'll lose marks on and each one has its fix written beside it in the second column. Two of them is a week's work to close, and if you can't close them before the deadline, that's your answer.
Two of them are arithmetic
The two about numbers are the ones you can settle in an afternoon with a calculator, and they're the two that go wrong quietly. A narrative total that disagrees with the budget table in the same document is the commonest of the two. More on where the marks go missing, and what a cold reader catches.
Can I print this?
Yes. The button at the top prints the heading and the two lists and leaves the rest of the page behind, so it comes out as one sheet you can carry into a meeting. There's nothing to sign up for and no address to hand over.
What a free read adds
The sheet tells you what's missing from your own side of the argument. It can't tell you how a funder or a buyer will read what you've already got, which is the part that decides the score. That second half is what a paid read gives you.
Send the funder's guidance or the tender pack, your deadline and whatever you've written so far. You get back a fixed fee for the work and a plain answer on whether the bid is worth making. The read on whether to bid is free.
If the draft already exists, a bid review is £195 and comes back marked against the criteria with every change ranked. Every fee is on the pricing page.
The sheet cannot tell you how they will read it
Send the guidance or the pack with your deadline, and that half comes back with a fixed fee.
You hear back within 24 hours. If you send a deadline, you hear inside one working day whether we can meet it, and that comes before you pay anything.