> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://reyda.mintlify.site/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Writing good requests > How to brief Emma well, plus a prompt library for every bid stage from discovery to submission and automation. Brief Emma the way you would brief an experienced bid manager. Say what result you need, what it is for, and what is already decided. This page explains how to write a good brief, then gives example prompts for each stage of a bid. ## Brief Emma like a colleague > [!TIP] > > **The short version: outcome, source, limits.** Say what you want back, point Emma at the tender or document it's about, and give > the limits that matter, such as word count, deadline or weighting. Most weak requests are missing one of the three. For bigger jobs, a good request answers most of these questions. You rarely need all of them. 1. **What outcome do you need?** "Decide whether to bid", "a first draft of question 3.2", or "a list of what blocks submission". Ask for a result, not a series of steps. 2. **Which tender, room or document?** Ask from the right page, or use **@** to mention the tender, document, section or snippet. Emma then reads the actual source. 3. **What are the constraints?** Word or page limits, weightings, deadline, language, the buyer's template, tone. 4. **What evidence should she use?** Name the case studies, rate card or policies, or let her search the Library and your past projects. 5. **What is already decided?** Bidding as prime or in a consortium, your price position, staff you will name. Emma won't guess these, so telling her up front saves a round of questions. 6. **What should she give back, and where?** A summary in chat, a Working document in the Bid Room, a filled copy of the buyer's form. You don't need to tell Emma how to research. She reads the tender, your profile and the Library before she asks you anything. Match the mode to the job. See [Choose a mode](https://reyda.mintlify.site/emma/working-with-emma.md#choose-a-mode). ### Weak and strong requests **Deciding whether to bid** Weak Is this tender any good for us? Strong Should we bid for this? Check the mandatory eligibility and selection criteria, the deadlines and the award criteria against our profile, certifications and past projects. Give the reasons that decide it, and list anything you couldn't check. Why it works: * It asks for a decision, not a general opinion. * It says what to check, in the order that matters: hard conditions first. * It points Emma at your own evidence, so the answer is about your company, not tenders in general. **Drafting an answer** Weak Write the social value section. Strong Draft our answer to question 5.1 Social value in the buyer's response template. It is worth 10% and limited to 750 words. Base it on the apprenticeship scheme and local supplier spend in @Social value report 2025, and lead with the buyer's priority on local employment. Leave out any figures you can't source and list them for me. Why it works: * It names the exact question and where the answer goes. * It gives the limits that shape the answer: weighting and word count. * It names the evidence and the angle to lead with. * It tells Emma what to do with gaps instead of letting her guess. **Getting ready to submit** Weak Are we done? Strong What still blocks submission? Split everything into done, needs review and needs a person, and name who or what each open item is waiting for. Why it works: * It defines "done" as nothing blocking submission. * It asks for the result in a shape your team can act on straight away. ## Prompt library by bid stage Copy these prompts and change the details. Replace the text in square brackets with your own. Each label shows where to ask and, where it matters, which mode to use. Prompts without a mode work in **Default**. ### Discover Find opportunities worth a closer look. Emma searches live and historical notices, Reyda's market data and, when needed, the web. Anywhere · Research mode Find open tenders for \[grounds maintenance] in \[Ireland] with a deadline in the next six weeks and an estimated value under \[€500,000]. Shortlist the five best fits for our profile and, for each one, say why it fits and what could rule us out. Anywhere Which contracts in our CPV codes expire in the next 12 months in \[Germany]? Group them by buyer and tell me which buyers have re-tendered similar work before. Anywhere · Research mode Who are the biggest buyers of \[IT managed services] in \[the Netherlands] over the last three years? Show their spend, their main suppliers and the typical contract value. Opportunity page Find notices similar to this one from the last five years. Who won them, at what value, and does the same buyer come back to market on a regular cycle? Opportunities Create a search profile for \[facilities management] in \[Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg] using Smart search, limited to CPV \[79993000] and \[90910000]. ### Qualify Decide whether to bid. Emma screens hard conditions first, such as eligibility, certifications and deadline feasibility, then fit and competition. She gives you a recommendation, but the decision to bid or not is yours. Opportunity page Should we bid for this? Check the mandatory eligibility and selection criteria, the deadlines and the award criteria against our profile, certifications and past projects. Recommend pursue, hold, monitor or decline, and give the reasons that decide it. Opportunity page Add this to the pipeline, then generate the bid/no-bid report and the buyer activity report. Pipeline item List every exclusion ground and selection criterion in the tender documents. For each, tell me whether we can evidence it from our Library and profile, and what is missing. Pipeline item What has this buyer bought in the last five years, from whom, and at what values? Is there a likely incumbent, and when does their contract end? Pipeline item Draft clarification questions for the buyer on anything ambiguous in the specification and the pricing schedule. Cite the page for each question and note the deadline for questions. > [!NOTE] > > Emma drafts clarification questions but never sends them to the buyer. You submit them through the > buyer's portal or process. ### Plan Turn the tender into a plan your team can work from. Emma maps every deliverable the buyer asks for, then builds a response plan with owners, dependencies and open decisions. Bid Room · Plan mode Take this bid through to a submission-ready package for the \[14 November] deadline. Work out the plan, start everything you can, and ask me only for the decisions you can't make from the documents. Bid Room Create a response plan for this Bid Room. Include the buyer's priorities and evaluation criteria, every deliverable and where each answer goes, our evidence and gaps, owners, review points and the decisions still open. Bid Room List every document the buyer wants back, with its format, page or word limit, template, filename rules and whether it needs a signature. Flag any we can't evidence yet. Bid Room Extract every deadline in the tender documents with date, time and time zone, including the clarification deadline and any site visit. Which one constrains us first? Bid Room Our win themes are \[fast mobilisation] and \[local presence]. Check them against the award criteria and our evidence. Which are credible, which need proof, and what would a competitor say against them? ### Draft Write the buyer-facing documents. Emma writes into the buyer's own templates and forms where they exist, keeps their structure, and saves each change as a new version. Buyer-facing documents contain only the response: gaps and assumptions go in her report to you, not into the document. Bid Room Draft our answer to \[question 3.2 Methodology] in the buyer's response template. It is worth \[30%] and limited to \[1,500] words. Use our case studies on \[hospital cleaning] from the Library, and leave out any figures you can't source. Bid Room Fill in the buyer's pricing schedule using the day rates in @\[Rate card 2026]. Don't change formulas or layout. Tell me which cells you couldn't fill and why. Bid Room Complete the supplier declaration form with our company details from the profile. Leave signatures, attestations and anything that needs a director's confirmation for me, and list them. Bid Room Write a two-page experience annex in the buyer's format using our three past projects most similar to this scope. Include buyer, value, dates and our role for each. Bid Room Draft the method statement in German to match the tender documents, then give me a short English summary in chat. Document · Instruct AI Tighten this to 250 words and lead with the benefit to the buyer. Keep the figures exactly as they are. > [!TIP] > > For edits to a passage, select the text in the document and use **Instruct AI**. Emma proposes a > change you can accept or reject. See [Documents Emma creates](https://reyda.mintlify.site/emma/documents-emma-creates.md). ### Review Check the work as an evaluator would. Emma reviews the saved drafts against the actual requirements, and her findings name the location, the severity and the fix. Bid Room Red-team our technical response against the award criteria as a time-pressed evaluator would. Give each finding a location, a severity (critical, important or suggestion) and a concrete fix, and tell me what is already strong. Bid Room Check the whole package for consistency. Staffing numbers, timelines, service levels and prices must match across every document. List every mismatch. Bid Room Run a compliance check for this Bid Room and list anything missing, partial or blocking submission. Document Address all open comments on this document and tell me which ones you couldn't resolve. Document Compare the latest version of this document with the previous one and summarise what changed and why it matters. ### Submit Get ready to upload. Emma prepares and checks the package, but you submit it through the buyer's portal. Bid Room What still blocks submission? Split everything into done, needs review and needs a person, and name who or what each open item is waiting for. Bid Room Make a final pre-submission checklist: filenames, page and word limits, required signatures, separate envelopes, the portal route, and the exact deadline with time zone. Bid Room Check the buyer's portal to confirm the deadline hasn't moved and whether any clarifications or addenda have been published since we downloaded the documents. Bid Room Save the strongest paragraphs from our final quality answers as snippets tagged \[facilities] and \[social value] so we can reuse them on future bids. ### Automate Hand Emma standing work. A routine runs on a schedule or when something happens, and Emma posts the result in the chat where you set it up, and in Slack if you choose. If nothing has changed, she stays quiet. Anywhere Every weekday at 8:00, check for new opportunities that match our profile and post the best three to #bids in Slack, with one line on why each fits. Anywhere Every Monday at 9:00, summarise every Bid Room that is in progress: deadline, what changed last week, what is blocked and who it's waiting for. Bid Room Every morning until the deadline, check this tender's notice for changes or new clarification answers. Tell me only if something changed. Mailbox Set up a mailbox rule so emails from \[evergabe-online.de] are analyzed and newsletters are ignored. Emma shows a confirmation card before she creates or changes a routine. See [Routines](https://reyda.mintlify.site/automation/routines.md). ## Follow-ups that improve results * **Push for depth.** "Section 4 is thinner than the others. Deepen it with evidence from our Dublin contract." * **Give the missing fact.** "We will bid as prime with \[Partner] as subcontractor for the catering lot." Emma picks up the work that was waiting on it. * **Correct, don't restart.** "Keep the structure, but swap the second case study for the Galway one." * **Ask what she assumed.** "What did you assume in the pricing schedule?" ## What to avoid * **Asking her to make up proof.** If a certification or figure isn't in your workspace, Emma leaves it out. Upload the evidence to the Library instead. * **Several unrelated bids in one conversation.** Start a **New chat** for each bid, or work from inside its Bid Room. * **Assuming she knows what was said in another chat.** Point her at what is saved in Reyda instead: documents, the Library, your profile and the Bid Room. * **Asking her to submit the bid.** She prepares everything up to that point and leaves submission to you. She can email a buyer, but only once you approve the message, unless an admin has let her send on her own. ## Related > [card] [Questions and approvals](https://reyda.mintlify.site/emma/questions-and-approvals.md) > > How Emma asks for decisions and approvals. > [card] [Use cases](https://reyda.mintlify.site/use-cases/overview.md) > > End-to-end examples of working with Emma. This documentation is built and hosted on [Mintlify](https://mintlify.com), a developer documentation platform.