RFPs: Why they can set your project up for failure or suboptimal results

Requests for Proposals (RFPs) could be so much better, but they are usually quite broken. Here are the scenarios I see:

1. The client wants everything but the kitchen sink, including “custom AI chatbots” and “extensive user research,” but doesn’t have a budget that’s even close to sufficient.
2. The client has chosen a platform that a 3rd party has deceptively sold them, rather than doing an RFI (Request for Information) or letting that platform choice happen during the RFP process itself.
3. The client will not have a conversation or allow any consultative dialogue because the RFP process says they can’t.
4. The client sends the RFP to tons of companies and advertises it publicly, leading to an RFP cattle call.
5. The client selects the RFP winner based mostly on price, rather than any relevant business KPIs produced or long-term value delivered.

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

What happens as a result?

1. The vendor who wins promises to deliver everything but the kitchen sink at the lowest price, but later in the process points out that their RFP response said that all of their promises were “pending discovery.” After the discovery period, they inform the client that it will take 3 times as much money to do all that they want — either that or they have to trim project scope. So, they’re left whittling down scope after discovery, which leads to inefficient results and nobody is happy.
2. The chosen platform has plenty of limitations, is actually hard to use, is bad for user adoption, isn’t future-proof, is hard to maintain for developers, tends to be difficult to find quality developers for (thus increasing maintenance cost), leads to vendor lock-in, and will probably be in popularity decline or possibly even shut down 5 years from now. The vendor who does win is one of a very select few who specializes in this often-eccentric platform.
3. The expertise of companies like ours — where we make this our life’s work and do this stuff every day — is completely lost in the process. No conversations, no dialogue, no shared vision, just “build it and collect your check.” Furthermore, there is no opportunity to suss out things like trustworthiness or how well we’ll work together. Thus, the flashiest, most deceptive PDF with the lowest price wins.
4. An RFP cattle call ensures that right-sized local companies are scared away and only the largest, lowest-value/highest-price out-of-state companies snatch it up.
5. Truly, 100%, honestly, the most deceptive RFP response wins.

Because of this vicious cycle, and our desire to seek out long-term relationships, true strategic partnerships, and win-win engagements with our clients, we rarely respond to RFPs. We have probably responded to at least 100 in the history of our company, which is where these hard lessons have come from.

Our Evaluation Criteria

Of course, we do respond to certain RFPs. Before we even begin to engage with an RFP, they have to pass these criteria:

Locations: (where we have a clear advantage)

• Anywhere in the state of Minnesota .
• The state of Wisconsin, North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa: We are right next door to these states and they don’t have that many agencies or dev shops nearby.
• Out-state NY: We have a large client list there.
• Illinois: On a case-by-case basis.

Sectors: (where we have a clear advantage)

• Academia / education / university / public school
• Business (SMBs, especially B2B but also B2C)
• Non-profit organizations
• Health / wellness / healthcare
• Senior living
• Music industry
• Art museums
• State or local government if in a neighboring state.
• Manufacturing
• Media / publications

Qualifying Questions

Once an RFP has made it through our evaluation criteria, we will proceed to ask the qualifying questions below:

• How much of a factor is location? Will you accept firms that are not in the same city/state?
• Is there a target budget amount you are looking for? Even a range would be helpful.
• Do you currently have an incumbent agency providing these requirements? If so, who?
• Did another company help you prepare this RFP?
• Is this bid open to any respondent, or have you only sent it to a pre-qualified list?
• About how many firms did you send this RFP to?
• About how many responses are you expecting?
• Is the reason for this RFP because your current RFP is expiring, or are you looking for a new partner to deliver the requirements?
• Are you open to a conversation / phone call / meeting with us before the RFP is due? We find that this helps relieve a lot of the uncertainty that RFPs tend to induce.
• What are you looking for in terms of our design expertise?
• How important are our company values to you in your decision-making process and which values matter to you most?

Evaluating Response to Qualifying Questions

Below is how we evaluate our response to qualifying questions.

Preexisting relationship with vendor / incumbent agency

• If they already have an incumbent agency providing these services, and it’s not clear that they’re unhappy with that agency or if that agency has been invited to bid as well, do not bid.

Another company helped prepare the RFP.

• Just be wary. Not disqualifying in and of itself.

Location

• If location is AT ALL a factor, then do not bid on the opportunity, unless the location is in one of the “clear advantage” locations in our Evaluation Criteria.
• If location is NOT a factor but they still require on-site consultation, then the opportunity must exceed $75K, because that’s going to be a good amount of travel time and context-switching for our team.

Open to any respondent / pre-qualified list / how many responses

• If the RFP is open to any respondent OR over 15 firms have been sent the RFP directly, we should only respond to the opportunity if we have a clear advantage from our Evaluation Criteria, and if the Deal Owner can make a compelling case to a C-level member of our company.

In general

• In general, if they are not willing to answer, or answer coldly / do not answer our questions in a way that gives us information, we should not bid on this opportunity.

Conclusion

An RFP process has the potential to be a successful way to compare multiple proposals and arrive at the best solution and vendor relationship. Ideally, that means:

1. Talk with a subject-matter expert or company like ours before you generate your RFP, to make sure you’re not unnecessarily asking for the kitchen sink and exploding your budget.
2. Don’t choose the delivery platform before the RFP unless it makes sense and you have truly done your due diligence and explored all possible platforms out there.
3. Talk to your vendors and allow for dialogue and communication in the process.
4. Send your RFP to a small, targeted, well-researched list of firms, say 5 to 7, and keep the process intimate.
5. Choose the vendor who you can trust, who focuses on your business goals and KPIs rather than the one who sells to you the best or proposes flashy solutions that will just end up disappointing you in the long-run.