Existing Suppliers
Information for Suppliers
Local Buy pre-qualified supplier Arrangements are used by a broad range of customers including Local and State Government in Queensland and the Northern Territory. Other Local Buy customers include government owned corporation’s, charities, not-for-profit entities and educational institutions such as schools and universities.
As a valued Local Buy supplier, we want to see you win more work from Local Buy customers.
To maximise your Local Buy pre-qualified supplied status, we recommend that you set yourself up for success by following our guide below.
Keys to Success
Ensure your VendorPanel profile is up-to-date
Consider your VendorPanel profile is your “shop window” for our customers who use VendorPanel to find out about your business. Your profile should clearly indicate what goods/services you offer and your industry experience.
Add your colleagues in VendorPanel
Each Request for Quote (RFQ) that is issued to you from a Local Buy customer is a business opportunity. Please ensure that there is more than one contact for your company in VendorPanel to ensure opportunities are not missed. This is especially important for organisations who have more than one office as customers can search geographically to capture suppliers who have an office location in their region.
Ensure your compliance documents are current
The insurances, licenses and pricing schedules (where applicable) are available for customers to view and download. Therefore, we strongly encourage you to ensure all documents are current otherwise you may miss out on opportunities. If you are the primary contact in VendorPanel, you will be alerted 4 weeks out from when your documents are expiring.
Prepare a marketing plan
Local Buy have over 4000 suppliers across 50 pre-qualified supplier Arrangements, therefore it’s important for you to form a marketing plan to maximise your Local Buy pre-qualification. Watch the marketing your business webinar.
Read RFQs when they come through VendorPanel
Each time a customer sends you a RFQ in VendorPanel it is a business opportunity. Please ensure you add noreply@vendorpanel.com.au to your “safe recipients” list in your email providers. Additionally, our customers can see when the RFQ has been read by a supplier and there is an opportunity for you to indicate to the customer if your business intents to respond or declines to respond. You can also provide feedback on why you do not wish to respond. Perhaps the timeline is too short, or the specification not clear, feedback on this will be advantageous for the customer to hear. Our customers use these statistics to monitor their requests, so please do jump in and read and respond when a customer sends you a request.
Other hints and tips
- Council websites and meeting minutes are a great source of information about forthcoming projects. They are all publicly available.
- Attend Conference and Events pertaining to your industry such as LGAQ Conference, IPWEA, LGMA. Many councils run their own Supplier Engagement or Meet the Buyer events which enable you to speak to council procurement teams.
- Promote your Local Buy pre-qualification on LinkedIn and follow Local Buy.
Local Buy Engagement
Local Buy have a team of four dedicated Engagement Managers whose role is to promote the use of Local Buy Arrangements across our customer-base. We cannot promote one supplier over another, but we are constantly encouraging our customers to procure using Local Buy to streamline procurement. You will see us out and about attending a wealth of conferences and events, so please be sure to come up and introduce yourself.
View your key contacts.