Some of my SME and small construction clients have asked for advice on how to identify future and current public sector construction and property management tendering opportunities. Below is the basic advice I give to anyone who hasn’t been actively tracking public sector ‘OJEU’ notices.
1. Know what you’re looking for What works can you best deliver? Understanding this will ensure that you only look for those bidding opportunities which you have a chance of winning and can avoid wasting time, money and resources.
2. Use freely available tender trackers OJEU procurements for works contracts over £4,104,394 must be ‘advertised’ on the Government’s Contracts Finder website, and frequently, contract opportunities of much lower values are also promoted via the service. Opportunities can be filtered to match your interests. https://www.gov.uk/contracts-finder
Equally as good is Tenders Electronic Daily https://ted.europa.eu/TED/main/HomePage.do
Both services can provide email alerts of opportunities matching your interests.
3. Assess each potential opportunity This goes back to point 1 of understanding your sweet spot. A bid/no bid form is a useful tool to analyse whether you should be bidding for opportunities that arise. Typically the form will look at project value, location, client (and your relationship with them), scope of works and your relevant experience and capture any salient points from the SQ/PQQ or Invitation to Tender documentation. Email me at mark.cole@constructionbid.co.uk for a free bid/no bid template.
4. Get to know your potential clients This is essential, both in terms of knowing what contract opportunities are coming out, and understanding your potential clients’ needs. Use networking, meeting and any other engagement with your potential and existing clients to get advance notice of future contract bidding opportunities.
5. Register with client portals Linked to the point above, find out what ‘portals’ your clients use to manage their procurements. Portals are web based document services, whereby clients publish the details and requirements of SQ/PQQ or tender stage bidding and buyers register their interest, and ultimately upload pricing, quality submissions and any supporting documentation.
By registering with these portals you should be able to receive email updates when a new procurement exercise is to be launched.
6. Build a pipeline Record your intelligence gathered from the above activity into a pipeline document. In its simplest form this is a record of forthcoming contract opportunities of interest, likely values and the date(s) upon which the various procurement stages will take place.
Once you have identified an opportunity Construction Bid can support you in creating a winning quality submission. We also have access to independent estimators. Get in touch with me to find out more about our services mark.cole@constructionbid.co.uk