To answer a bid document in Answertree, first we turn the document into a Project. The project still looks like the original document, but each question has been turned into a ticket that can be assigned, answered and completed, so you can work together effectively with your team, and track progress.

The first step is to click on the 'New Project' button in the projects home screen. You'll need to drag in a Word, PDF or Excel file that contains your questions.

The next step is to select questions from your document. If your document is well formatted, this will usually only take a few moments, but it can get quite complicated, so it's worth reading this guide and knowing where to get help if you get stuck:

For Word and PDF documents, click 'Auto-select Questions'. This will traverse the document using AI and highlight lists and tables of questions it can identify. In many cases, this is sufficient, but by no means all documents can be fully selected automatically, so the next step is to review the questions it's found and make any changes using the unique selection mechanism built into Answertree. See Making Changes below.

To select from Excel files, you must first drag the cursor around each table of questions you are interested in, then select the question structure match type from the right. In our example below, the user has dragged a box around a table of questions, and Answertree has identified the selection as a table with 7 questions (one per row). Next, click on 'Select', and Answertree will use AI to identify which columns/rows are for the answer and which columns are part of the question.

Once you have a list of one or more selections in the right of the screen, you can click on them again to make changes. Here you can also configure advanced properties like Word Count limits and where the answer should be placed. You can also change the meaning of rows and columns in table selections.

To make new selections, just drag the mouse over the paragraphs / table cells or list that make up the question(s) and then select the correct structure from the options on the right. In the example below, the user has selected a list of questions from within a Word document where each bullet is a separate question.

Selection should never take more than a few minutes, but given the huge variety of potential formats that documents arrive in, it's easy to get stuck (especially when the source document is confusing to start with!).

Technically, there isn't a document that you cannot select from in Answertree, and there are some powerful features within selection that experienced users can draw from. A complete breakdown can be found here.

That said, Answertree is a productivity tool, so it's not providing value if it takes too long to select questions, especially when you're starting out. If you get stuck, we first recommend reading the Selection Troubleshooting Guide. If that fails, then the fallback option is to reformat the original document so it's simpler, or use our simple question template and copy and paste the questions into here and then work from that. It's not ideal, but remember that most of the benefits in Answertree are automatic question answering and collaboration, so it's not the end of the world either. When you have the time, checkout our advanced selection guide to turn yourself into a selection Ninja.

When you're happy that all of the questions in your document are selected, click 'Finish' to review your questions and select from the Project Options. You can always click away from the dialog if you need to make any changes at this point.

Options Available

Finally, click 'Create Project' and Answertree will transform your document into a project and let you open it.

Once you've reviewed the selection of questions and set the project options, you can go ahead and create the project. For the next steps, read our guide on Completing a Project.