From ITT to submission-ready narrative

The first thing HelpMeBid asks for is the social value section of your invitation to tender. You can paste the text directly, upload a PDF or Word document, or type the key details manually if you're working from a printed document or a portal that doesn't allow export. There's no requirement to share the full ITT — just the section relevant to social value.

Once submitted, HelpMeBid reads the content and extracts the information that matters for structuring your response. This includes the buyer's actual question or questions, the framework they appear to be evaluating against — PPN 06/20 Government Model, National TOMs, Local Authority Bespoke criteria, or SROI — the percentage weighting of social value in the overall evaluation, any stated word or page limit, and the specific themes or commitments the buyer has listed as priorities.

Consider a real example. A council tender asks: "Describe the social value your organisation will deliver during the contract period. Your response will be scored against our adopted National TOMs framework and accounts for 15% of the total award score. Maximum 800 words." HelpMeBid reads that and returns: framework detected as National TOMs, evaluation weighting 15%, word limit 800, no explicit themes stated — inferred from standard TOMs structure.

A central government contract might read differently: "Outline the social value outcomes you will deliver, evidenced against the PPN 06/20 Model Award Criteria. Maximum score: 10 points." From that, HelpMeBid identifies PPN 06/20, notes the absence of a word limit, and maps the response structure to the five PPN 06/20 themes: COVID-19 recovery, wellbeing, helping local communities, equal opportunity, and net zero.

Every extracted field is editable before you move to the next step. If the framework detection is incorrect — which can happen when a buyer uses hybrid criteria or non-standard language — you can override it. If the weighting was buried in a separate scoring matrix rather than in the social value section itself, you can add it. The extraction is a starting point, not a locked-in assumption.

This step alone removes a significant amount of research time. Most bid writers spend time cross-referencing procurement portals, calling buyers for clarification, or simply guessing which framework applies. HelpMeBid makes the framework identification explicit and editable — so you're responding to what's actually being asked, not a generalised interpretation.

Once the framework and evaluation criteria are confirmed, you move into the commitment builder. This is where you select the specific social value actions your organisation will deliver during the contract — and where HelpMeBid does the quantification work.

Every commitment in the builder is matched to a proxy value: a monetised figure sourced from a published dataset. For National TOMs-aligned tenders, proxy values are drawn from the National TOMs framework itself, maintained and published by the Social Value Portal. These figures are not estimates — they are the values that evaluators using the same framework will recognise and expect. For example: one apprenticeship week delivered is valued at £1,404; one full apprenticeship year at £13,500; one training day delivered at £320; one new local employment opportunity at £12,654. You can explore the full set of proxy values using the free social value calculator.

For tenders evaluated under PPN 06/20, HelpMeBid draws on the Cabinet Office guidance and supplementary datasets — HACT Social Value Bank and recognised equivalents — to provide consistent, citable figures. These aren't headline numbers you've invented; they're the values your evaluator will find if they check your sources.

For tenders specified under SROI methodology, the commitment builder includes adjustment controls for deadweight, attribution, and displacement — the three factors that must be applied to convert a gross social value figure into a defensible net figure. Deadweight represents the proportion of benefit that would have occurred without your contract. Attribution accounts for the contribution of other organisations to the same outcome. Displacement captures any negative impact elsewhere that your activity might cause.

Each of these adjustments has a sensible default drawn from published SROI guidance, but every default is visible and editable. If your organisation has historical data that justifies a different deadweight percentage, you can apply it and it will be referenced in the generated narrative. The goal is a calculation you can defend to an evaluator, not a headline ratio that collapses under scrutiny.

As you select and adjust commitments, a running total shows the cumulative social value figure you're claiming. You can add, remove, or adjust commitments at any point before generating the narrative.

With your commitments built and quantified, HelpMeBid generates a written narrative response. This is not a generic template with placeholders — it's a framework-aligned draft structured to match the buyer's stated evaluation criteria, shaped by the commitments you've selected and the proxy values you've confirmed.

The narrative generator uses a company profile you provide at setup: your sector, delivery geography, typical workforce size, relevant accreditations, and any social value commitments you've delivered on previous contracts. This profile is applied across all generated responses, so the narrative reads as your organisation — not as a generic bid writer's version of a construction company or a facilities management provider.

The system has a built-in filter for overused and penalised phrases. Language like "we are committed to," "we strive to," "we will endeavour to," and similar constructions are automatically avoided. These phrases are well known to experienced evaluators as filler — they add word count without adding evidence, and they signal that a bid hasn't been written to a specific question. HelpMeBid generates specific, evidenced, first-person prose instead.

Every generated response includes a quality scorecard before you export. The scorecard evaluates your draft across five dimensions: specificity (are your commitments concrete and measurable?), framework alignment (does the response address the buyer's actual criteria?), credibility (are the proxy values cited and sourced?), distinctiveness (does the response sound like your organisation rather than a generic bid?), and factual grounding (are all figures traceable to a published dataset?). Each dimension is scored, and the scorecard highlights specific sentences or sections that are pulling the overall score down, so you know exactly where to focus your edits.

The output is a starting point for your final response, not a finished submission. HelpMeBid generates a well-structured, evidence-backed draft that typically needs less editing than a response written from scratch — but it should be reviewed, adjusted for nuance, and signed off by someone who understands your organisation's delivery capabilities before it goes to the buyer. Social value commitments are legally enforceable obligations in most public contracts. The narrative should reflect what your organisation can genuinely deliver.

Once you're satisfied with the response, you can export it as a formatted Word document ready to paste into your bid portal, or copy sections directly into your existing bid document.