Tender alerts: setting up effective monitoring without drowning your inbox

The number one problem for SMBs monitoring tenders isn't missing information — it's getting too much of it. A badly configured alert sends 30 notices a day, 28 of which don't concern you. The result: after two weeks nobody reads them anymore, and the good opportunity gets lost in the pile.

The golden rule: start from the contracts you've won

Before you configure anything, pull the list of your last 10 contracts (public or private). What words keep coming up in their descriptions? Which public buyers? Which regions? Those are YOUR keywords — not the generic terms of your sector. An engineering firm that uses "engineering" as its only keyword will receive every civil engineering job in Québec; the one that uses "culvert replacement," "slope stabilization" and "storm drainage" will receive its contracts.

Three levels of precision

• Trade keywords (5 to 10): the exact expressions from your specs, not vague words. Add the variants: "snow removal" AND "snow clearing."
• Realistic territory: the region where you can mobilize a crew without blowing up your costs. Widening the territory widens the noise.
• Categories: last. The official categories (UNSPSC at the federal level) are broad. Use them as a safety net, not as your main filter.

Relevance ranking changes everything

Even when well configured, an alert stays binary: the notice fits the box or it doesn't. This is where a relevance score makes the difference. When each notice gets a score based on your profile (keywords in the title, territory, sector), you open the 80+ first and skim the rest. Ten minutes in the morning is enough, instead of an hour of manual sorting.

The routine that works

• Every morning (10 min): scan the new notices sorted by score, save the serious candidates.
• Every week (30 min): Go/No-Go decision on the saved notices, update the pipeline.
• Every month (15 min): review the keywords — drop those that only bring noise, add those from recent contracts.