To win a tender, it's important that your plan of action be properly evaluated. But how do you convey your message well on paper? What makes a text persuasive?

Of course, the content of your text is important. That's what you will ultimately be judged on. But the way you present that content is just as important. If a reader has to make an effort to understand your text or keep his attention, he will drop out. Chances are the content will not be remembered, no matter how beautiful it is.

Make your text scannable with a logical structure

You can cram a page full of text and make sure all the information is there. This does not mean that the reader will remember all the information. On the contrary. A text must be scannable. Make sure readers can find the most important information right away and remember it after reading it once. You do this by adding a logical structure to your text. Below we give 5 tips for the structure of your plan of action from our 16 years of experience with tenders.

TIP 1. Build your text according to the sections in the guide

The client has worked out a number of aspects with corresponding numbering in the tender instructions. In principle, never deviate from these. So if a client asks for a. Phasing, b. Planning and c. Environmental management, then you build your document in exactly that way. After all, the text must be recognizable and you want to prevent the reader from having to search for information. Sometimes there are good reasons to deviate from this. Make sure you include your readers in this decision so that the structure is logical for them as well.

TIP 2. Start with the most important information

Apply the so-called pyramid principle, putting the most important information at the front. After all, the reader has limited time and needs to get the gist immediately. Use this at every level of the text: at chapter, paragraph, paragraph and measure level. A useful tip here is to always show the gist in the headings, for example by summarizing measure and effect. That way, the reader only has to scan the headings to get a good idea of the added value in your plan of action. Just be careful not to make headlines too long.

TIP 3. Write short paragraphs

A paragraph is limited to one subtopic. An average paragraph is 5 to 7 sentences long and the average sentence length is 10 to 15 words. For long sentences or paragraphs, check if you can split them, but don't stare blindly at the exact number of words and sentences. The most important thing is that the text is easy to read. Therefore, provide variety in sentence length, because all 10-word sentences in a row is not nice either. There should be some dynamics in the text. By the way, this is 7 sentences in 94 words, so perfect.

TIP 4. Use plenty of whitespace

Just as important as the actual text, are the white spaces on a page. A waste of space, you may think, because you have so much to say. So fill it with information. But white spaces are essential to making a text scannable. Use whitespace between all paragraphs and use acceptable margins. In formatting, check how a page looks to you without reading the content. Too busy? Too crowded? Does it make you sad or angry? Adjust! Above all, have an outsider judge the document in this way, independent of the content.

TIP 5. Use different building blocks

Listings, text boxes, tables, visualizations, different colors ... you can do quite a lot to make your text stand out. Draw attention to the essence by placing key words in bold or a different color. Put important information in a text box. Use symbols in the margin to make important information clear. Summarize text in a clear image. These are all ways to make your text more appealing and make it easier for readers to scan your text for important information. Don't overdo it, or it will become too busy and achieve the opposite of what you wanted to achieve.

More writing tips

These tips are all about the structure of a plan of action. To write persuasive texts, you need to pay attention to more aspects. Consider writing style, style and tone. Would you like to learn more about this? Get in touch with our specialists. Or register for the one-day training course Written impact in tenders.