Drawing clear lessons from the EU election results is proving taxing for political pundits. For me, there is no clear message, except one. And it’s a message that anyone involved in submitting bids and tenders would do well to heed.

The parties that did best in the elections were the ones with the clearest proposition. Whether it was pro or anti Brexit, people knew what they stood for. Parties that tried to sit on the fence and appeal to all shades of opinion ended up satisfying very few and getting punished at the polls.
 
These same parties also tried to distract the voting public with other issues to be considered within the “who to vote for” debate, hoping that these less divisive areas might provide a stronger platform.  Clearly the voting public had a clearer set of priorities.

A Clear Value Proposition
So what’s the relevance to bids and contracts? Experience tells me that  having a clear and well articulated vision of what you stand for, and showing how this is in tune with your clients’ needs and aspirations, is every bit as important.

Like Brexit, there could be differences in perceived needs from differing stakeholders within the decision making process, especially if the decision is contentious. The way to address this isn’t to make your proposition so vague and loose that nobody could object - that just means that nobody will prefer it either. Far better to argue your case with conviction and make sure that everything you communicate reinforces a clear position about what your solution stands for.

Clearly there is a risk. Picking the wrong side could mean handing success to a competitor. But it would at least avoid the muddled middle ground of no-one being quite sure what your position is. 

If you have a defined rationale behind the bids you pursue you will be on much safer ground when sticking with your beliefs. You should already have weeded out the contracts that aren’t a good fit, where objectives are unclear, and where you aren’t in a strong position.

Evidence or Belief?
Permit me another brief side-track into the world of Brexit for a moment. What strikes me about the debate is how much it is belief-based. Attempts to introduce facts, evidence and methodical research are generally shouted down as people feel comforted by what they want to believe. 

I’ve seen bid teams attempt this as well. When research and evidence point to the fact that a client’s vision may not be in tune with theirs it’s still hard to change tack. Some teams would prefer not to go looking for the evidence at all because it complicates the process. Teams with the best winning records are never fazed by facing up to the reality of clients’ real needs and aspirations.

Pulling Together
An unambiguous position makes it easier for the team to get behind a vision and then do everything within their power to convince the client that their solution will deliver the best outcomes. This can be supported by focusing on the 2-3 most important factors that support your solutions and arguing against the validity of the counter arguments that might be being put by your competitors

Know Where You Stand
In politics, everyone’s views and opinions are well known to the competition. But with bidding there isn’t the same degree of transparency.  So understanding what position the competition might take is much less obvious. 

For me that means making sure your solution is as unambiguous as possible is even more critical. In most cases it can only be measured by the procurement team by what they read within formal documents. If it isn’t clear it won’t score well. 

Procurers may be also be marginally influenced by what they see or hear through any less formal business communication channels. Whilst these might not be ‘scorable’ they help to build an impression in clients’ minds about your overall value proposition as a business. This may have a slight influence when it comes to scoring the documents. 
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With the difference between winning and losing often being less than 1% ,“every little helps” (as they say). But only if the message is consistent and totally clear.

In a recent article we looked at how the perception that your clients and prospects have of your business will affect their decisions. Their perceptions may not be 100% accurate but they exert a powerful influence.

Here, we are going to look at some of the ways that we’ve helped businesses to change the way that they are perceived to open up further contract opportunities.

First off, you don’t have to play fair. As well as changing the perception of your own business, the client’s perception of your competition can be also changed (especially if you have a direct relationship with the client). 

Without being derogatory or negative (never do this!) it is possible to influence the client to see that your strengths are key to delivering the project and business objectives, and that the strengths of your competitors may be less so.

Play to Your Strengths
Emphasize how your strengths align most closely with those needed to deliver the project. Play up those criteria which suit your strengths best.

The Bid Coach uses a matrix to measure the factors that the client deems important versus your and your competitors strengths and weaknesses. Once you have this information (gathered as objectively as possible) it's possible to look for ways to make the factors that match your competitors strengths seem less significant. And you can improve the perception of your business in these same areas. 

You might not need to score the highest in every single area (in fact, this would be damned near impossible), but if your overall score is highest then you will be in a strong situation.

Now you have some clear objectives to build into your communications, tender and presentation.

Objective Evidence
Next you have to translate this into evidence your client can measure and evaluate. This is the really challenging part. You must have a clear bid strategy with readily identifiable win themes. These MUST translate back to the client’s REAL needs as well as emphasize your strengths. 

The key information needs to be easy to identify, clearly written, and in the required format. It must relate directly to the question that you’re being asked in the RFP and display a benefit for the client. Alongside these criteria you must think about the perceptions you are trying to build.

We often find that bid writers or technical writers focus too much on the technical elements of a question without addressing what things mean to the client. They equally get distracted by one element of a question. They are rarely trying to change a perception.

This immediately limits the mark they can receive because they didn’t answer the question fully or give the client confidence. This could be down to time pressure, carelessness, or lack of knowledge or understanding of what the client wanted. Perhaps a question wasn’t worded that well (yes this does happen). 

Understanding Your Client
Misperceptions about the client are also a significant potential factor. Yes, it’s those pesky perceptions again. 

The objectivity of an external resource can be valuable. We don’t have the same perceptions of your business or your client. We also don’t necessarily have the ‘political’ pressures that can affect internal resources. AND we may well have a broader understanding of what the client is seeking – given our business or client knowledge. 

At the most basic level an external pair of eyes looking at a question can offer a different perspective. We may be better able to see how the answer may influence a client’s perception - negatively or positively.

We are experts at drafting answers that score well and help build the right image of your business. It’s part of what we do for a living. You may have had more hot dinners than the number of bids we’ve worked on, but it’s a close-run thing.  

Photo by Caleb Minear on Unsplash

Our decisions and actions are driven by perceptions. Sometimes these are accurate, sometimes not. Perceptions are hard to change - we tend to look for evidence that reinforces, not challenges them.

Your clients and your prospects will have their own perception of your business. How they view your strengths and weaknesses will heavily influence their judgement about the types of contract you could deliver and the value you add as a business. The perception might not be accurate. And who knows how they formed it (could even be hearsay). But in their minds it’s real and it affects their decisions.

Once businesses grasp the importance of perceptions they are on the road to more successful bidding. They can then understand the evidences, proofs and language needed to change those perceptions in their favour.

Can You Really Change How Others See You?
The good news is that it is possible to change how a business is perceived. Think about Skoda in 1990 compared to Skoda now. It isn’t easy or instant and it needs consistency.

Here are a few pointers:

Face to face meetings. With the right kind of positive relationship you can have a frank discussion. With careful questioning you can tease out how your organisation is perceived and why. You then have something to work with and specific perceptions to target. 

In my experience few organisations want to face up to these questions or will have the persistence to go beyond bland responses. Those who do so tend to be more successful. Getting expert external support to help plan, structure and role play these conversations will help enormously.

Subsequent meetings then have another purpose - to reinforce the perception that you want to create.

Documentary evidence. Every communication and every piece of marketing collateral can either help build the perception you want to create or reinforce what your client already believes. Look for evidence that supports the perception of the ‘real you,’ perhaps projects you’ve executed for other clients (it’s so easy to get pigeon-holed).

Make sure your information reaches the right people, especially those not directly involved in the decision but who may influence it.

Professional help with the content and phrasing of your tender submissions and supporting material can help accelerate the perception-changing process.

Presentations. The appearance, content and delivery of your presentations are vital aspects of building the right kind of image. It’s all too easy to unintentionally send out the wrong messages, which is why an ‘independent eye’ can be so valuable. And there really is no substitute for rehearsal and constructive feedback.

Has Your Business Suffered from Inaccurate Perceptions?
When you previously put a lot of work into a tender that you didn’t win, did you find yourself saying: ‘they just don’t understand our business’? Consider this: your prospect can only measure potential contractors based on the evidence that gets put before them in the RFP documents. Perhaps they were seeing what they expected to see because you didn’t try hard enough to help them see something different?
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In the next article we’ll look at some of the practical ways you can help your clients form a more accurate and positive perception of your business.