In order to provide the company with effective development and automation of all processes subject to it, progressive management is resorting to e-bidding tools. A lot is said about their advantages over traditional trades, but not everyone can call themselves their supporters.
At a time when a large number of state and commercial institutions have long been working effectively with electronic tendering systems, others are stubbornly refusing to use them. Each of them has their own reasons with subjective degrees of validity. Some have a negative first experience and just do not want to continue, others generally have no desire to start because they read and listened to negative reviews.

Major barriers to effective bidding

Conservatism

Classical procedures, standard rules and lots of paper – some companies believe that there is no reason to deviate from this scheme. This is especially true for those who have heard about cyber-attacks and are convinced that this will necessarily happen with their tender and with that electronic platform, which they have unfortunately chosen.
Similar concerns are unfounded – for example, the SmartTender platform is completely safe in terms of cyber-attacks and hacking. All documents that were previously in paper form retain all aspects of the content and are simply transferred to an electronic form. This makes them accessible to authorized staff at any time and from any electronic device.
Some large companies have long been working with one supplier or buyer and do not want to give up their habits. They are not interested in finding new partners in the small and medium-sized business. At the same time, changes occur on the market every day, new methods of manufacturing different products appear, innovative approaches to the organization of services and work develop. Excluding the possibility of cooperation with progressive companies, the enterprise deprives itself of new prospective development paths and loses touch with reality.

Fantastic expectations

A wide public response around e-commerce and the abundance of laudatory articles have become the reason for excessive expectations for many people. In particular, some companies have decided that an electronic trading platform is a full-fledged artificial intelligence. Accordingly, it is enough to formulate the request and just wait for the result. Faced with the need to study the instructions for work with the website, the independent search for customers and suppliers, the analysis of applications and the compilation and loading of tender documents, people are disappointed and cease to use the system.
It also includes cases where the company places its hope on the electronic system in terms of finding a product that it cannot find on the market. However, this product just cannot magically appear on the platform. Alternatively, the company wants to buy a large batch of different products and seeks to find one universal supplier. Maybe this is possible, but whether it will be effective – it's a big question.
Working with the platform, you follow its rules, use its functionality and gain access to tools that facilitate trading, and not make it for you. No one will choose a business partner as well as determine the best application for you. The platform automates the procedures, but does not eliminate the need to control them, because only this way you can get a guarantee of the desired result.

Lack of strategy

A company decides to try to work with the e-procurement system without setting a specific goal. It does not have an urgent need to find a supplier or buyer; it simply conducts a kind of testing. As a result of the superficial approach and the lack of elementary knowledge, the tender does not get a logical conclusion, the participants are outraged, and the company does not see all the benefits of electronic tenders.
If you want to try your hand, it makes sense to use the test tender service. You can create a test tender on SmartTender, look at the features of the interface and then translate it into real format.

Negative experience

The supplier who breached the terms of delivery and disrupted your quarterly plan, the organizer who disqualified you a step before winning – it is unlikely that such cases could serve as a motivation for further work with electronic trading systems.
Indeed, it is impossible to predict how the supplier will behave. However, you can try to calculate it by taking advantage of analytics tools. You will see the ratings of the performers, the number of successful and unsuccessful transactions, and you can make preliminary findings on the portrait of the supplier.
The same goes for the organizer. In order to fully protect yourself from the possibility of being disqualified, follow all the points indicated in the tender documentation. If the terms seem unfair to you, ask to change them. Provide yourself with space for a fair fight.
Electronic procurement system is a promising area that will evolve and cover more and more enterprises and spheres. Any innovation requires the abandonment of old techniques and flexibility in adopting new ones. So in the current competitive space, only those companies that are ready for change occupy worthy places.