Do you ever feel like you’re putting hours into preparing custom bids only to lose out on project after project? You know you came in near the client’s budget, but for some reason, you don’t get it.
Maybe you had a lead on a home remodeling project similar to ones you’ve handled before, making you the perfect choice for it. In the middle of juggling a bunch of challenges for another project, you lost track of the lead and missed out.
If you feel like you’re spinning your wheels trying to make headway, you’re not alone.
Poor bid management wastes your time and energy, ultimately crushing your profit opportunities and growth potential.
It’s time to take a step back and reevaluate your approach. Learn how you can separate yourself from other remodeling contractors by systematically managing bids and opportunities to increase your conversion rates without sacrificing profits.
What’s Hurting Your Bid Proposals?
Things can go wrong at many points in the process. Figuring out where your holes are is the only way to plug them up.
You’re Spending Too Much Time With Limited Returns
How much time do you spend preparing a bid proposal? If it’s easier, come up with an average of how many hours per week you spend researching and writing bid proposals.
Do you have that number?
Now, dig a little deeper by figuring out your bid win rate.
An average bid-win rate is around 17%. However, that means that on average, teams land less than one of every five jobs they bid on. That’s not exactly a sustainable path for most home remodeling contractors.
If you’re looking at low bid win rates and excessive amounts of time spent preparing those bids, you’re probably feeling frustrated and exhausted by the whole process.
Even if you have fair bid win rates, spending significant time on estimates might be cutting you off from more productive tasks.
Balance is the key to finding a better way to manage the time spent drafting bids with a better conversion rate.
It’s Tough Keeping Tabs On Your Bids
From missing proposal deadlines to losing potential leads altogether, it can be a challenge to keep track of all opportunities when you’re juggling so many tasks.
It’s not easy to handle everything, and a string of unexpected challenges can set off a chain reaction.
Losing track of potentially profitable opportunities and missing follow-ups on bids you’ve placed is sure to impact your bottom line. You can’t afford to let anything fall through the cracks, but that means figuring out a system to handle everything without creating more work.
If you’re struggling to keep track of your bids, contractor proposal apps can give you better oversight while making your process more efficient.
You’re Struggling To Compete With Larger, Established Contractors
It’s no secret that large construction firms have the capacity to take on more projects. Unfortunately, it turns out that firms making over $100 million per year in revenue are also winning far more projects than smaller companies.
While the numbers include everything from commercial and infrastructure projects, the power of large construction firms is having a ripple effect.
Some of the power comes from having more resources, but at the end of the day, it often boils down to a better sales process.
How can a smaller independent company compete with established firms?
It seems impossible, but with the right strategies and a shift in approach, smaller companies can find a way to thrive despite the larger firms.
You Don’t Know What’s Working…And What Isn’t
What if you can’t figure out where things are going wrong? It’s not unheard of because many companies don’t track key information.
If you can’t find a problem anywhere else in your system, there’s a chance that you’re wasting time and energy on the wrong targets.
For example, if you aren’t tracking marketing efforts, you won’t know what’s giving you the best return on investment. You also won’t know which efforts are costing you more than anything.
It’s necessary to figure out how to track the time and money you’re spending along with the returns for each facet of your marketing and bid processes. Sadly, many companies don’t take the time to track these numbers and never figure out where they’re missing out.
How To Win More Projects With Better Bid Management
Once you figure out where things are going wrong, it’s time to plug up those holes, so you can work toward winning more bids and boosting profits.
Organization is crucial to every aspect of every project you work on, so why wouldn’t you take the same care with your approach to bid management?
Create a Functional Sales Process
Successful home remodeling contractors treat bidding as a systematic sales process rather than a one-time event.
Understand that creating a sales process that you can repeatedly use does not mean using a one-size-fits-all approach to your bids. It simply means standardizing as many steps as possible, with room to customize so you never miss anything.
- Identify leads through multiple avenues. If you rely solely on word of mouth, you might see more qualified leads, but you may not get enough to meet your needs. Likewise, focusing too much on paid advertising could mean you’re missing the mark
- Qualify your leads. You might be able to eliminate some leads off the bat because their projects don’t fit with your goals. A ranking system can help you identify the most lucrative and appealing leads, then focus your efforts on those.
- Prepare competitive proposals. Creating a customizable template can save you time and ensure you don’t miss anything while preparing estimates.
- Follow-up with all potential clients. Not only do you demonstrate how much their business matters to you, but you can also answer any questions they might have.
A checklist is the simplest option for managing your sales process. However, you need to consider the best way to track where each potential client stands and ensure nobody slips through the cracks.
Proper Tracking Matters
Proper opportunity tracking and follow-up significantly increase conversion rates. The truth is, systematic bid tracking is the key to increasing win rates and profits.
Keeping that in mind, look at your existing system. How do you currently track leads, potential clients, and clients?
Spreadsheets are a common approach because they are convenient and easy to use with any office software. You can keep different worksheets for various stages and move entries from one to another. The downside is that you must always remember to update them.
It’s too easy to forget an entry or to make an update on a lead, especially if you can’t access the spreadsheet from anywhere other than your office.
You also need to keep track of more than your leads and prospective clients.
If you want to be better at forecasting and building more accurate proposals, you need to track data from past and current projects. It’s the only way to track trends to deliver more accurate estimates. Plus, you need that information accessible every time you write a new proposal.
You might consider embracing a more comprehensive tracking option, like a construction-centric app or software that helps you manage everything in one place.
Address the Three Aspects of Bid Management
Bid management includes proposal presentation, client communication, and competitive positioning. It’s easy to put a lot of effort into one or two because you’re comfortable with them, but neglecting any of these aspects is a mistake.
1. Proposal Presentation
A proposal presentation is about more than your numbers.
Consider two companies vying for the same project. They deliver similar numbers but one offers a cohesive presentation with branded media. The other emails the client a mixture of notes and spreadsheets that aren’t labeled. Which company wins the job?
It’s not difficult or expensive to create a clean, branded presentation. The best part is that you can develop a template that you update for each client.
2. Client Communication
The dangers of letting a client fall through the cracks are apparent to anyone who’s ever missed out on a big opportunity. Being able to track where prospective clients are in your process is critical, and it helps you avoid missing a follow-up.
Further, consider how you plan to communicate with clients. The more reliable the communication method, the better it is for everyone. Ask your prospects what they prefer and make sure you have accurate contact information.
Emails, texts, and phone calls all work, but they all have their downsides. Consider an app that allows for quick, efficient communication with clients while keeping everything in one place.
3. Competitive Positioning
Given the current trends, it’s not lucrative for small to medium home remodeling companies to go up against larger, established firms.
It doesn’t mean you can’t throw your hat into the ring on some jobs that appeal to you. Still, you might want to focus on a blend of jobs you can easily win with those you dream about.
As you complete more jobs, you can build your reputation, which in turn puts you in a more competitive position. Establish yourself as a reliable option with affordable pricing, and you will win more jobs.
Balance Pricing With Profit
It’s simply not viable to lowball every project in an effort to win the contract. Likewise, pricing yourself out of every bid is unsustainable.
Winning profitable work requires balancing competitive pricing with proper profit margins. The only way to find that balance is by tracking trends and tapping into more accurate forecasting.
Compiling historical data on past projects with similar specifications can help you make more accurate estimations. Additionally, being able to identify real-time data, like your materials and tools inventory, can help as well.
When you go into a new bid proposal with all the information you need, you can offer better pricing because you’ve considered all angles.
Again, this balance relies on accurate, reliable tracking. You will have an easier time gauging potential moneypits so you can avoid them. Instead, put your efforts into potential projects that show promise and align with your company’s goals.
Leverage Technology
You can handle all of the key aspects of bid management manually or with limited technology. However, it can get messy and make your life more complicated as you track information across multiple methods.
Stop wasting your time and consider a technology upgrade. The right software or app will save you time and money while supporting your bid management process to increase profits.
Why worry about prospects falling through the cracks or missing a timely follow-up? Home remodeling contractors can save time and respond to prospects more efficiently with a construction-centric platform.
Contractor Foreman provides the tools you need to handle everything from lead to project completion. Easily create a proposal and track responses from one platform that you can access anywhere.
Better Bid Management Lands More Home Remodeling Jobs
Bid management is the foundation for any successful home remodeling company. It’s the process of collecting and qualifying leads to submit bids to the projects you’re most likely to land.
There are too many weak points that make it easy for prospects to slip through the cracks. Those gaping holes can break a company, so you need to develop a viable system.
Take a step back and consider your current system and plug those holes. Templates and tracking systems will keep you organized and on track.
You now have everything you need to do this manually. Set up some tracking spreadsheets and get to work. Just make sure you keep everything up to date. Regular audits might plug some of those gaps and help you catch a missed entry.
There’s a simpler, more efficient option to consider – technology.
Contractor Foreman eliminates the drain on your time and energy by streamlining the entire sales process. You can manage everything from your phone, meaning you can prepare and submit a project proposal from anywhere.
Start your free trial of Contractor Foreman to see how much easier and more efficient your bid management process could be.
