Finding Public Sector Tenders - supercharge your approach
Public Sector tenders over specific values must be advertised in a tender notice. Your challenge is finding those notices and making sure that you do so quickly enough that you have time to respond.
I search for tenders for a number of clients each week and in doing so have learnt what works and what doesn’t. This blog will help you to make sure that you are maximising your chances of finding the perfect opportunity for your organisation.
Where to find them
So the basics, where should you be looking? There are lots of different websites out there to look on but if you start with the few listed below you’ve a good starting point.
https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Search
https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Search
https://www.sell2wales.gov.wales/
https://www.publiccontractsscotland.gov.uk/
https://etendersni.gov.uk/epps/home.do
https://ted.europa.eu/TED/main/HomePage.do
For lower value contracts, some local authorities and NHS organisations run closed Request for Quotations (RFQ’s) to meet their local Standing Financial Instructions or Delegated Authorities and only invite a limited number of suppliers. It is best to contact local procurement teams to directly register for these opportunities.
How often should you search?
As a minimum I recommend searching once a week or as a very minimum fortnightly. Develop a list of key words that cover the types of contract you could deliver and search the above websites once a week as a great starting point.
You need that level of frequency as you will only have a limited time to respond to a notice and you want to maximise the time available to you to do so.
Use the language your potential customer uses
A common mistake I see is where people try to use key words to search on that use language that their customers would never use. This tends to happen quite a bit when companies are trying to sell an innovative product or service or a different way of doing something. The person letting the contract is very likely to be using traditional language to describe their contract so make sure you are searching on those words.
The above websites will still show you old tender notices for contracts let previously. Using those as a source of key words to find out the language your customer uses can be really helpful.
Avoid generic language
When creating your list of key words try and be mindful of all of the different results a word could throw up. Some words are guaranteed to show 100s of results e.g. management, strategic, innovation, health.
It is a balance between being specific enough that you are seeing the opportunities you want to and not being too specific so as to miss a tender.
Are there busier or quieter times of year?
I’m always being asked this and the rough rule of thumb is that it tends to be quieter January to March as budgets are running out and the next years budget is being signed off. August too can also be quiet. There tends to be a spike in activity in September as procurement activity starts up again.
That said this may not be true for all industries so you need to keep looking even during the traditionally quieter months. Prior information notices are published all year around and projects come up unexpectedly so a year around search is needed.
Sound like a lot?
The secret is consistency, you can’t dip in and out of this or you will miss tender opportunities or find out about them too late to respond.
If this all sounds like another thing to add to your to do list which is already quite long enough, I do complete tender searches for clients.
It is a once a week search using ten words to criteria that we agree. E.g. contract size, location, types of client you want to work with.
If you are interested in finding out more about how I can support you in searching for public sector tenders for your organisation to respond to contact me on hannah@whiteraft.co.uk.
