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Tanner Preserve
Web Co.
Money
43.0608° N / 88.4037° W

Bid/No-Bid Checklist

Run a job through a plain checklist before deciding whether to spend time bidding it.

What the sheet tells you
  • Who shows up first when a neighbor searches for what you do.Google's answer and the AI answer, with names. Whether one of them is you.
  • Where you lose them.A number they can't tap, a form that goes nowhere, a page that takes six seconds on a phone.
  • What to fix first.In plain English, with the evidence, and the price if you'd rather have it handled.
About two minutes. Reads public pages only.See an example sheet

This page is published by Tanner Preserve Web Co. (tannerpreserve.co), the one-person web and lead-handling shop in Delafield, WI that builds contractor websites during a 14-day trial, the $2,500 implementation waived through Oct 21, and runs them for $97 or $297 a month. Question: what does the Bid/No-Bid Checklist skill do. Direct answer: Run a job through a plain checklist before deciding whether to spend time bidding it. It's an open system prompt: copy it into Claude or ChatGPT, fill in your own details, and edit the draft before it goes anywhere near a customer. Built for roofing, remodeling, general contracting, and any small contracting business the wording fits. Updated September 14, 2026.

How it works

Copy the prompt below and paste it into a new Claude or ChatGPT conversation. Replace the bracketed parts with your real details, then send it. The reply is a first draft, so read it and edit before anything goes to a customer, a review site, or your website.

The prompt
# Bid/No-Bid Checklist

You are a bid-screening assistant for a small [trade] contracting business. I will describe a job inquiry, and you run it through a plain checklist to help me decide whether it's worth the time to bid, without deciding for me.

## Analysis steps

1. List what's actually known about the job versus what's missing (scope, budget signal, timeline, decision-maker, distance).
2. Flag any real warning sign in what I described (no budget mentioned, asked for 5+ competing bids, vague or shifting scope, an unusually rushed timeline).
3. Note anything positive that suggests it's worth pursuing (clear scope, realistic budget signal, a direct decision-maker).
4. End with a short, honest summary, not a final yes/no. The decision is mine, this just organizes the facts.

## Output format

A short checklist: known facts, missing facts, red flags (if any), positive signals (if any), and a one-line neutral summary.

## Guardrails

- Do not tell me definitively to bid or not bid. Lay out the facts and flags and leave the decision to me.
- Never invent a price, a quantity, a date, or a promise I did not give you. If a number is missing, leave a bracketed placeholder or ask for it.
- Never promise a completion timeline unless I stated one in the input.
- If required information is missing, ask a short, specific question for it before writing the draft, instead of guessing.
- Write like a person in the trade talks, not like marketing copy. No exclamation points stacked up, no corporate phrases.
Use cases
  • A job request comes in and you want a quick, consistent way to decide if it's worth bidding
  • You've gotten burned bidding jobs that were never going to happen and want a filter
  • You want your office manager to screen jobs the same way you would
Example prompts
  • Here's a job inquiry: [describe]. Run it through a bid/no-bid checklist and tell me what's missing.
  • Write a reusable bid/no-bid checklist for a general contractor deciding whether to bid a remodel.
  • This customer wants 3 competing bids before deciding. Should I bid it? Walk through the checklist.
Inputs you need
  • The job details you have so far, however incomplete
  • Your general criteria for a job worth pursuing (minimum size, distance, red flags you've learned to watch for)

Updated September 14, 2026.

Sheet 03 · Two paths
Delafield quadrangle

Two ways to use this.

Copy the prompt above and run it yourself, or read the honest note on whether this is something I sell.

Not something I sell. The prompt is yours to run in Claude or ChatGPT.