Same Question, 3 Different Ways of Asking Your Suppliers in an RFP

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Same Question, 3 Different Ways of Asking Your Suppliers in a RFP

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Asking the right question is critical in RFPs, but asking them in the right way can boost efficiency, as well as time and cost saving. As we’ve already explained in our post 'Free-text vs. single choice vs. multiple-choice questions in a RFP',  Prokuria offers 3 types of questions. 

Let’s now explore which one you should choose in a real-life scenario: assuming you are doing an RFP, and you need to find out how your supplier can offer support ( be it by phone, email, chat, etc), you can ask this questions in 3 different ways.

1. Free-Text Question

Question: Please describe your company’s support offering.

Answer: free-text

This question will invite a very general answer, covering product documentation, website support, phone support, 24/7 availability and so on. They can also provide additional details and emphasize the parts they consider of particular importance. 

The buyer might view some of these things as important, and others as not. There is no way, however, of reflecting these priorities through only one question.

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2. Multiple Choice Question

Question: Please select your company’s support offering: Answers:

• product documentation

• website support

• phone support

• 24/7 availability

With this question you will have structured data very easy to analyze and compare. Also it will be very easy and fast  for you suppliers to respond.

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3. Series of Single Choice Questions

Question 1: Do you have product documentation?

Answers:

• Yes

• No

Question 2: Do you have website support ?

Answers:

• Yes

• No

Question 3: Do you have phone support ?

Answers:

• Yes

• No

Question 4: Do you have 24/7 availability?

Answers:

• Yes

• No

This questions will required slightly more time from the suppliers, but the data is perfectly structured. it is very useful if  you need to create fast statistics or scoring cards for suppliers.

With Prokuria you can easily select between all these types of questions, turning your RFPs into efficient and successful sourcing events.