Stop Chasing RFPs; Focus on Deal Creation

I recently asked government contracting officers what they would ask Santa for, if indeed there was a Santa just for government contracting officers.  In particular, I wondered what would be on their wish list of improved business practices from you, their government vendors?  I also asked them what you could do better to improve agency/vendor relationships and the value you deliver?

Since 2009, thousands of small businesses have weathered the economic storm by taking advantage of federal programs designed to channel federal contracts to small firms.  Two of the more valuable programs include the GSA schedule program and the Simplified Acquisition Procedure program. 

Many of you may have spent a lot of time in the past few weeks playing games with your children or grandchildren.  Or perhaps some of you are kids at heart and received some of your own games during the holidays.  Many of these games were probably electronic PlayStation, Xbox or Wii games.  But what about the good old fashioned board games.

GSA Contracts: Minimize Your Competition within the Rules

TurboGSA has petitioned the President of the United States to increase opportunities for small businesses to win Federal contracts by raising the Simplified Acquisitions ceiling to $500,000.  This petition was filed on the White House’s new “We the People” website.  This petition requires 5,000 votes for it to be considered by the White House.  Your support would be greatly appreciated. If a petition gets  enough support, the Obama Administration will issue an official response. You can view the petition by visiting the White House site here: http://wh.gov/gA3 

An update to our earlier articles about A recent rule (February, 2011) from the U.S. Small Business Administration that offers preferential government contracting to Women Owned Small Businesses in 83 industries.  The Small Business Administration  has finally approved four organizations to act as Third Party Certifiers under the WOSB Program. The four organizations and contact information are:

Subpart 51.1 of the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR), Contractor Use of Government Supply Sources, prescribes the policies and procedures under which federal contractors can use government supply sources, like GSA Schedule Contracts, to facilitate the completion of their contract.  Traditionally, this allowance only enabled Prime contractors to purchase certain supplies and services not requiring a statement of work if they were on a Cost Reimbursement Contract.  In 2009, GSA established a deviation to FAR 51.1 that allowed contractors to purchase from other contractors under both Cost Reimbursement and Time & Materials Contracts.

FedBid, the “reverse eBay” of federal contracting websites, is quickly growing into a powerful contracting tool.  Its goal, which it largely succeeds in fulfilling, is to provide federal buyers and contractors with a simple and responsive online marketplace.  Federal Agencies and Departments create a listing on FedBid.com for the specific products or simple services they need.  Companies then search those listings to find someone buying what they are selling.  If they find a match, they can enter a bid and potentially win the contract.  As you can see, “a reverse eBay” aptly describes the FedBid process, as the contracts are essentially auctioned off to the lowest qualified bidder in real time.

Traditional methods for generating Federal leads include trade shows, seminars, direct (junk) mail, email blasts (spam) to purchased lists, internal cold calling, outsourced telemarketing, and print and media advertising.  These outbound methods are where firms push out the message to the four corners of the country hoping that it resonate with that needle in a haystack. Those techniques are very expensive…and are far less effective than they used to be, especially in Federal marketing, for a number of reasons.  First, Federal employees, like all of us, are inundated with marketing interruptions an estimated 2000 times per day.  In order to cope, Federal buyers have constructed creative means to block those messages: