Background
Our client, a security service firm, had a long-standing relationship with a city Council and provided services under contract throughout their area. They also had several smaller contracts with other clients, however the majority of their work was delivered to the Council and formed a major contribution to their revenue.
Challenges
The contract renewal was approaching and the bid was due out when the client contacted Tender Victory for bid management services. Although our client had written successful bids previously, this contract was so critical to the ongoing survival of their business, they decided to bring in our expertise. Writing the bid would also be putting a strain on the staff as they all had busy day jobs to do. Furthermore, as well as ensuring that the bid was compliant, they wanted to ensure their quality responses achieved the highest scores they could. The client also needed advice on managing the bid strategy through the procurement process. The new contract also had some material differences to the original contract, giving our client cause for concern about its implementation.
The Council sought to appoint only one supplier and the client’s staff were keen to continue the status quo (as they did not want to be TUPE’d to a new provider).
Implementation
Our writer was briefed on the critical nature of the bid, that the continuation of the business was dependent on a win. Our approach was to ensure every aspect of the specification was covered in the quality responses to make a strong proposal, backed up clear evidence of the good work the client had completed under the existing contract.
We spent the first week of the tender process really getting to grips with our client’s business and their approach, getting a good understanding of how they managed the existing contract successfully . We then used this information to translate their strengths into persuasive responses that answered the tender questions. This was a collaborative process with scheduled and follow up calls/meetings to ensure we understood the detail and were expressing the facets and approach of the business accurately.
We also supported our client in navigating the procurement process throughout (including after submission), and in particular the process of clarifying the aspects of the contract which were due to change.
Result
After a delay in the procurement process (by the Council), the client not only won the contract, but were also asked to extend their current contract (negotiated at a preferential rate) to ensure the Council had a supplier to bridge the gap (created by the delay) between the end of the original contract and the start date for the new one.
Summary
Working closely with the client to understand their business at a very detailed operational level enabled our team to write a compelling, persuasive and compliant bid that ensured their business could continue and they had support in navigating potential pitfalls in the process.