Ideas for Writing Your RFP

As the director of business development for mStoner, I do a lot of different things, but the most important part of every day is spent reading and responding to RFPs—sometimes a quick note from a friend or past client, sometimes a 45 page fire drill from a university that we’re just getting to know.

I know that writing an RFP can be a daunting process (just like responding to them), and from time to time, my colleagues and I are asked for advice on how to get started. Every institution is different (a small independent school has both different needs and different legal requirements than a major state-supported university, for example), but here are a few words of advice from our side of the fence.

Tell us a little about yourself. 
We’ll do a lot of research about your institution before responding to an RFP, but it’s still interesting to hear how you describe your institution and the opportunity at hand. If you can share information about the history of the specific publication, project or website that you’re working on now, even better. You’re looking for a partner who represents the right fit for your team and in all honesty, so are we. Being transparent about how you work will give the firms you’re contacting an early idea of whether this is a partnership that might work, and we’ll certainly try to provide you with the same courtesy in return. 


Be clear about what you know you want.
 I know this one seems obviously, but sometimes it is difficult to tell what people are really expecting to come away with at the end of a project. A great design that your in-house IT staff will implement? Or a live, functioning website? The best result of any selection process is that you will be able to sit down and compare apples to apples to make a smart decision about the best partner for your institution. In order to do that, you need to be sure that everyone is proposing the same scope of work. If you have timeframes or budgets in mind, share.


Be equally clear about what you’re not sure of. 
Maybe you know that your website isn’t quite where it should be, but you’re not sure where to start or how much help you’ll be able to afford. Or maybe your viewbook is dated, but you’re not sure where you want to take it next. If your RFP makes it clear that you’re looking for some help with strategy and scope definition, you should be able to expect some interesting suggestions from the proposals you receive. It’s not a bad way to learn how your prospective partners would approach your opportunity, and may help you narrow the field.


If you really want to compare apples to apples, ask vendors to be specific. 
You probably have a sense of how you’ll judge prospective partners for your project. Maybe you know that past experience is particularly important to you, or that you’re looking for precision in the project management process, or that you want someone whose design philosophy meshes with yours. Asking people like us to answer specific questions will allow you to make straightforward comparisons and the best final decision for your institution. It also makes it easy for someone like me to give you exactly the information you need.

Think of this as the beginning of a conversation. 
I can’t speak for my peers at other firms like mStoner, but I’d like to invite you to think of the proposal I send you as the beginning of a conversation between you and I. Not negotiation: conversation! Every project is a little bit different, and one of the things we like about this business is that we learn something new with every engagement. What will we learn together? Well, that’s what we want to start to explore. We can tailor our recommendations (and pricing) a little bit more every time we talk to you about your institution and the work you’re considering. 


And for those of you who want to skip this advice and get straight to the nuts and bolts of the matter, here’s a list of the items that are provided in most of the RFPs that I receive:

History of the institution
Overview/scope of the project
List of project deliverables
List of expected proposal elements
Expectations for timeline and budget

And here’s a list of the things that we’re usually asked for:

Firm contact information and history
Team bios
Process overview
Samples of Work
References
Timeline
Pricing

Look forward to hearing from you!

Posted by Voltaire Santos Miran
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