Believe you can and you WILL, Believe you can’t and you WON’T

Posted on 18th January 201826th January 2022 by John Hudson

Believe you can and you WILL, Believe you can’t and you WON’T

You know what they say – believers are achievers!

Corny I know, but the principle DOES apply when tender writing. You can never just hit it and hope for the best – this isn’t snooker! Each piece of work you bid for should have been accurately assessed to make sure this is a good opportunity for your business (see our ‘to bid or not to bid’ blog for further information).

The point is, you have to go in fully prepped with the clear mindset of achieving this piece of work. If you are not fully confident that you can win the work, then don’t bid for it. Simple.

If you feel you are in with a good shot – then make sure any doubts or reservations are left at the door, as you don’t want these to be identified by the evaluator.

Remember to be descriptive, be assertive, but most importantly be positive!

You should:

use phrases like ‘We will …’ – no one cares you if you are attempting to do something – this is your piece of work – be confident and state you WILL deliver all that’s expected;
demonstrate your willingness to adapt, conform and collaborate with the buyer – always demonstrate further added value and what more you can do for the buyer – think of the positive effects this has socially and economically;
validate your company – describe not only what makes you different, but what makes you BETTER? Explain clearly why the buyer should choose you and not your competitors – why do YOU stand out?

You’ll find that if you’re below 80% sure to whether or not you should bid for the contract – this tends to show less confidence on paper. The better the opportunity that is right for you, the better your proposal will be projected. Unbeknownst to many, on a subconscious level, if we believe we are NOT destined to win the work, we will in many ways lag behind our competitors in that all-important tender.

Never go for any opportunity! Always go for the ones you believe in!

Get in touch with our bid writers today. We can help you believe what’s best for you!

New Facebook Business Update – How this affects you?

Posted on 12th January 201826th January 2022 by John Hudson

New Facebook Business Update – How this affects you?

Can you hear that?

That’s the sound of creative agencies everywhere gasping at the recent news that Mark Zuckerberg wants to make Facebook’s news feed more ‘meaningful’ and ‘personal’.

One of Facebook’s biggest “focus areas for 2018 is making sure the time we all spend on Facebook is time well spent.”

This is the opening line in Mark’s latest monologue, posted on 11^th January, where he states that consumer research has led them to the realisation “that public content — posts from businesses, brands and media — is crowding out the personal moments that lead us to connect more with each other”.

With changes already underway as of last year, Mark has promised all Facebook users that within a few months’ time “you can expect to see more from your friends, family and groups’ and seeing “less public content like posts from businesses, brands, and media”.

Apparently, this research has resulted from various studies carried out, including that on mental health and social media, in which Mark states “when we use social media to connect with people we care about, it can be good for our well-being […] we can feel more connected and less lonely, and that correlates with long-term measures of happiness and health.”

So, how will you be affected?

The Creative Industry will undoubtedly be hit the hardest, due to many core services being the management of Social Media. Of course, we still have the likes of Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest and Snapchat. But Facebook, as many will know, is key into retaining new customers and serves a great platform for consumer interactivity. With less and less engagement toward Facebook by the end of 2018, is this the beginning of the end for Facebook targeted ads? Or are prices going to seriously rise in order to pull your content through to your engaged audience? This will become increasingly limited over the next few months!

Although millions of pounds have been spent by companies since Facebook’s ‘target ads’ launched have begun, it seems there will be a massive drop in the amount being spent to garner consumer and business leads through this platform going forward.

Thinking ahead…

Bad news for some businesses and consumers who don’t mind receiving the odd advertisement now and again. Engagement between businesses and audiences will be reaching an eventual all-time low by the end of the year. Mark warns us that time spent on the platform and “some measures of engagement will go down.”

It’s time to get your experts to think ahead on ways in which B2C and B2B engagement can be driven elsewhere. Make sure your strategies for both yourselves and your clients consider this vital update. Facebook goes “from focusing on helping [consumers] find relevant content, to helping [them] have more meaningful social interactions.

Focused growth continues at Creative Tenders

Posted on 7th August 201610th January 2022 by John Hudson

Focused growth continues at Creative Tenders

Creative Tenders are growing once again with their latest recruit, an MBA graduate from Durham University.

Adhitya Vohra has joined Creative Tenders for a 3-month project looking at how the business will successfully launch the Creative Tenders product into international markets. The project is a critical step to forecasting how the management team will dominate the tendering market. This is not only in the UK but also internationally.

“We believe that geography should no longer be a factor into where we seek new business or our suppliers. With the ever changing landscape of technology and how we communicate with our clients and suppliers, we can see huge scope in bringing additional work to the UK from other markets” said John Hudson, Managing Director.

“Our marketing director Jill Hudson drives forward this strategy every day. We currently communicate with 850,000 businesses in the UK selling the services of Creative Tenders and Creative Finder. We want to double this within the next 12 months and we will continue to work hard to grow the creative industries” he added.

Jill Hudson added “Adhitya joins us with not only an impressive MBA from Durham University but 4 years professional experience working for organisations like Deutsche Bank and Citicoro Services India. He officially starts in our company on the 11^th July 2016 and we are looking forward to seeing the end result and being able to drive forward our international strategy”.

WE SOURCE CREATIVE CONTRACT OPPORTUNITIES FOR;

Book a free live demo with Creative Tenders to see how we can help your business grow.

Do you think you miss tendering opportunities because you didn’t see them in time?

Posted on 2nd June 201626th January 2022 by John Hudson

Do you think you miss tendering opportunities because you didn’t see them in time? Or the deadline had just passed?

My biggest bugbear over the last 16 years in the industry is finding the perfect tender at 9am only to find out the deadline is 12noon – THE SAME DAY. Very annoying, but it used to happen all the time.

Do you ever find this in your agency?

This was one of the main reasons for launching this system, and developing it specifically for creative businesses. In the early days of the business we were asked by an investor why we are minimising our potential client base by only populating it with creative opportunities? That’s simple, creating something as fantastic as Creative Tenders, takes sector commitment, sector knowledge and more importantly a desire to grow the sector.

We know we are fantastic at generating creative sector opportunities so we created a system that allows us to take that online. That doesn’t mean to say we won’t create a Professional Tenders, or an Engineering Tenders, we might, but it will still be sector specific to those industries so they get the same value you do from Creative Tenders.

Our core goal is to make sure you don’t experience the same bugbears we have over the years and ensure you are made aware of opportunities the same day they are published. If we see you haven’t logged into the system, your dedicated account manager will give you a personal call to ensure you’ve not missed it. We are not a technical product with zero face. We build relationships, the better we know your agency the better we can support you and help you to grow.

Don’t be that Company who see’s their life changing tender 2 hours before submission, give yourself the best possible chances of success by giving yourself time to produce a winning bid submission.

Have you had a demo of the Creative Tender business development portal yet? Creative Tenders Reviews

Posted on 23rd April 201626th January 2022 by John Hudson

Have you had a demo of the Creative Tender business development portal yet? What do you think? Creative Tenders reviews

We are so keen to hear people’s thoughts on the Creative Tenders portal. Have you had your demo yet? We are so pleased at how well the take up has been since we launched the product. It’s very exciting that people also see the value in our product from what has been a year’s worth of planning and development.

Our promise to our clients is that we will constantly develop this system to be the best tendering product on the market for creative businesses, but in order to do that we need your feedback.

Creative Tenders reviews

Feedback we have had so far has all been positive and includes the following reviews

“Amazing product, a good mix of public and private tendering opportunities”

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“We have the confidence that you are finding 100% of the public tenders we want to bid for, something we have not had from other systems we have used in the past”

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“Totally worth £12 per week, it helps our sales team dramatically and save’s so much time searching for opportunities”

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“So good we want to go for more tenders ”

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So basically we want to know the good, the bad and the ugly. If you have seen a demo but don’t think it’s for you, we definitely want to hear from you so we can create a product you want to use. If you’re a current client and think the product is fantastic, let us know why, we don’t want to change any features that work for you.

Please send any product feedback and to enquire more about tender writing support to John at john@creativetenders.co.uk.

Sign up for a free demo of Creative Tenders and review the following opportunities:

Event Tenders

Website Tenders

Printing Tenders

Video Production Tenders & many more.

Are you looking for a new creative agency to work with? Creative Agency Tenders

Posted on 15th April 201626th January 2022 by John Hudson

Are you looking for a new creative agency to work with? Look no further

Businesses work with creative agencies for different reasons, and you don’t have to be a multi million pound business to benefit from an agency relationship. Branding in a business is so important and people follow brands sometimes without realising due to their creative marketing campaigns and strong communications.

This should be the same for all businesses, no matter of size, sector or service offering. Everything consistent, from the use of colour, how you use your logo on printed and digital materials, the type of imagery you use, even the messages you put down on paper.

What’s the best way to do this? Find someone to look after your brand.

A proactive agency will present new ideas and concepts to you to support with the growth of your business. It doesn’t have to cost a fortune but you should consider putting a dedicated budget in place, no matter how small for the consistent management of your brand.

We have a pool of hundreds of UK based agencies

We have a pool of hundreds of UK based agencies and freelancers on our books. These agencies and freelancers work with businesses to help them grow, support with creative ideas and engage new customers.

Creative Finder works with marketing managers, business owners and senior business professionals with the responsibility of marketing. These businesses work with us to ensure they find the right agency relationship for their business, the wrong relationship can be costly and brand damaging.

The businesses post opportunities on our system and agencies will showcase their experience, their ideas, and any sector specific case studies they may have suitable to your bespoke requirements. Everything is managed on our system from uploading the ITT to organising shortlisted presentations. Meaning you won’t be bombarded with emails from the agencies that use our system.

The support doesn’t end there. Our experienced marketing team works with businesses to help specify their needs or help them identify what type of agency would be best to support their specific needs.

If you are interested in finding out more about Creative Finder, and how we have helped other businesses to find suitable suppliers, contact Jill on jill@creativetenders.co.uk.

What percentage of your work comes from tendering?

Posted on 10th March 201626th January 2022 by John Hudson

What percentage of your work comes from tendering? Do you think you maximise this sales channel?

After me moaning last week about what people find difficult about tendering for the creative sector, I thought I best discuss something a little more lighthearted. Success rates!

As I have worked in all size agencies in my career, tendering success rates have been different. Mainly because there was no standard format in place, they were usually rushed due to studio time not being available and sometimes winging it a little with the hope that we might be in with a chance.

If I look at the most recent agency I supported, we can see that around 50% of the overall business we won came from public tendering, which for an agency of only 5 people is quite high.

Design is a very personal thing

Obviously it helped that I know how to write bids and more importantly how to write a winning tender so our success rate stood at about 80% for those projects we did bid for, but we never included creative artwork. This is a bugbear of mine. How can we actually develop creative material when we haven’t even met the client, haven’t discussed the brief properly, don’t really understand their client base or even their core objectives. Design is a very personal thing and we don’t believe that a tender should be put to one side based on a tiny fraction of the information provided.

Many people probably don’t maximise tendering as a channel to winning new business because of the studio time needed to produce the tender. I am pleased to say though that fewer tenders these days actually ask for artwork to be created, something we will also advise for those clients we work with on Creative Finder.

We’ve all sorts of standard templates to help our clients be more successful with tendering, one being a tender checklist, if you don’t tick all the boxes, don’t waste the time submitting the tender. Be ruthless.

If you want to access the standard documents we have in place, or even want me to take a look at one of your tenders, send it over, we are happy to help.