Why you should walk away from "me too" quotes

You should walk away from most "me too" quotes because you've been invited late to price a solution someone else designed, and the only way left to win is to be the cheapest. AI has made these bids almost free to write, which makes them more tempting than they've ever been and no easier to win.

I first wrote about this in 2011, when I was managing a sales team that was ahead of target with a pipeline that looked full to bursting. Looking at how they spent their days, I could see them drifting from being salespeople into being order takers, and one of the biggest reasons was the time they spent on me-too quotes. Fifteen years on, AI has made the same trap much easier to fall into.

What a me-too quote looks like

A prospect turns up with a bill of materials, a tender, or an RFP with a requirements spreadsheet attached. Someone else has already shaped it: an incumbent, a competitor who got in early, or a consultant with a favorite. You've been asked to fill in the price column.

That tells you three things. You're coming in very late. You aren't the incumbent. And if you offer like for like, price is the only thing left to compete on.

Winning on price is a poor prize. It doesn't buy loyalty, it squeezes your margin, and a customer who chose you for being cheap will leave for whoever is cheaper next. Sometimes it's worse than that. The buyer has already decided and needs a second or third quote to make the process look competitive, or to push their favorite's price down. In Curiosity I call that being the stalking horse. You're there to sharpen someone else's pencil, and no amount of good selling wins a race you were only entered to make up the numbers.

AI made answering cheap, so teams stopped choosing

For a startup, the old brake on me-too bids was effort. A long RFP took days of somebody's life, so you thought hard before starting one. That brake is mostly gone. Upload the document, point an AI tool at your past answers and your website, and you'll have a decent first draft before lunch.

The numbers show what happens next. Loopio's 2026 RFP benchmarks report, based on 1,533 survey responses, found that 79% of teams used AI in their RFP work in 2025. They submitted more bids (166 on average, up from 153), the share using any go/no-go process fell to its lowest since 2021, and average win rates dropped from 45% to 39%. Loopio puts some of that down to a tougher economy, which is fair. It also notes that teams aren't listing better win rates among the benefits of their AI. Faster answers, more answers, fewer wins.

Writing the bid was always the smallest cost. The bigger ones are the demo you run for a buyer who's already chosen, the security questionnaire, the pricing approval, the founder's evening, and the deal nobody worked on that week because this one had a deadline. AI cut the cheapest line on that bill.

Most deals are decided before you're invited

The other half of the problem is timing, and the research here is blunt. 6sense's 2025 B2B Buyer Experience Report, built on more than 4,000 survey responses from B2B buyers, found that buyers first contact sellers about 61% of the way through their buying process. By then, 94% of them have already ranked their shortlist in order of preference. The vendor in front at that point goes on to win 77% of the time, and the eventual winner was on the day-one shortlist 95% of the time.

So when an RFP lands from a company you've never spoken to, the odds are you're number three or four on a list someone ranked before they ever called you. The signs are usually there if you look for them. You came in after the process was shaped. Nobody will give you proper access. The person who'll decide stays out of reach, and discovery stays shallow, because nobody intends to let you understand them.

How to reshape the deal or qualify out

Some RFPs are worth answering. The trick is finding out which ones before anyone writes a word. When a spec-led deal arrives, this is what I'd have a startup team do:

• Ask what they're trying to achieve. Before writing anything, ask for a conversation about the problem behind the spec. Who wrote the requirements, and what were they reacting to? What happens if they do nothing?
• Ask for access. Request time with the people who'll make the decision. A serious buyer will usually find you some. If the answer is a flat no, that tells you which kind of deal this is.
• Look for a better way to the outcome. If you can solve their problem in a way the spec didn't imagine, say so and propose it. That's how you change the game.
• Find out where you stand. Ask how they built the shortlist, who they've already spoken to, and whether the incumbent is bidding.
• Use the 2011 rule. If they won't tell you what they're trying to achieve, or your answer would look nearly identical to everyone else's, politely decline to quote.
• Decline well. Thank them, say briefly why you're passing, and ask to be brought in earlier next time. People remember how you said no long after they've forgotten the spreadsheet.

AI earns its keep here too, in a different place from where most teams put it. Use it to research the company in ten minutes before you decide whether to bid: what's changed for them lately, who the likely incumbent is, which problem the spec is trying to fix. That sharpens your first question and speeds up your go/no-go call. Then check anything you plan to lean on, because these tools state wrong facts as confidently as right ones.

When a me-too quote is worth it

There are exceptions, and I allowed for them in 2011. A me-too quote can be a fair way to break the ice with a customer who's strategically important to you, as long as you use it to get involved earlier next time. Go in knowing it's a door-opener and price it as one, so nobody mistakes it for pipeline.

I also allowed, back then, for the occasional very low bid to make life uncomfortable for a long-standing incumbent. I'd be more careful with that now. For a startup, a price you can't sustain has a habit of becoming your price.

Qualifying out is a skill

Salespeople, and founders even more so, tend to believe they can win anything if they just get the chance. It's a useful belief most of the time and an expensive one here. Qualifying a deal out is every bit as much a skill as qualifying one in, because every deal you chase that was never going to close is time taken from one that might.

It's also one of the questions I ask in every loss review: did we shape this deal, or did we come in late as a me-too quote? If the honest answer keeps coming back the same, the fix sits upstream, in where your pipeline comes from and how early you reach buyers. That's the kind of problem we dig into in revenue consulting, starting with win rates by how each deal began.

If you've never spoken to anyone at the company and the deadline is Friday, the most commercial thing you can send is a polite no.